ZZZZZLEEPY?

Television and internet consumption have become necessary for human existence and have a powerful influence on the lives of people. How come? A myriad of people use pre-bedtime hours in front of a computer or TV screen on a daily basis. And so what? Well, these are the people who daily report not having slept enough that night. Then, their friends surely give them the same piece of advice daily, “just go and try to sleep a bit more tonight.” And that is precisely what they do. But still, it is not enough.

Using the computer or watching TV during long periods of time before going to bed has proved to have a negative effect on perceived sleep duration. That is, we feel as having slept much less than we really have. We might have our eyes closed but our body and mind are not at rest. Lead researcher Dr. Nakamori Suganuma, of Osaka University, Japan, carried out a research in which he explained, "while many people use electronic media, such as the internet, it should be noted that the longer media use before sleep can trigger self-perceived insufficient sleep”. His findings suggest television viewing and computer exposure at night is fooling our body clock and our sleep wake system is then completely disrupted. Then, we always feel exhausted, even after a ‘good-night sleep.’

The reality is that we do need to relax. Sometimes? Definitely, NOT SOMETIMES. I’d rather say ‘ALWAYS!’ We do need to sleep in order to learn, and we do need to learn something every day. We do need to sleep in order to remember whatever we learn. Neural networks, which help us remember, are only built at night while we sleep. Finally, we do need to sleep in order to make the right decisions. It is a fact that sleeping enhances the functioning of your brain and helps you in taking better decisions. Isn’t it interesting?

I take for granted that if you are visiting this blog and reading my contributions, you must be in front of you desktop computer, or your laptop computer, or your palmtop computer instead. It may be late at night or it may be not. In any case, maybe it’s time you should take the right decision. So, why not turning it off at this very moment? Just ‘read’ to me and do follow my advice: get away from ‘the boxes’ tonight!