For better or worse a common trait of college students and professionals alike is skimping on sleep in favor of “getting ahead”. We stay up all hours of the night working on a project or studying for a test to get a step closer to achieving perfection. However, the one method too many are avoiding could be the key to our academic and professional breakthroughs- getting a solid night’s sleep as often as possible. Sleep helps balance us, from our weight to how quickly our reflexes respond, you cannot be your best without it.
Not only is sleep good for your physical well being but also, it’s necessary for maintaining mental health. While you may feel that sleep is a waste of time, sleep is shown to improve memory, comprehension and mood. Further more, sleep helps to reduce stress that can pile up quickly with the onset of work duties, family life, and other relationships. For many millenials, just getting a job is not satisfying; we want to be successful in all aspects of our life. We want to be socially engaging and are operating at an almost constant rate through social media, involvement with relationships and creating our own paths professionally. Since we're already the generation that creates our own rules, we should stop following the antiquated view that overworked and overwhelmed equals success. If we continue to skimp on sleep to get more done, our definition of success continues to be counterproductive. The glorification of "busy" plagues everyone from the strung out high schooler in every activity and AP class to the CEO skyping with their family while jetting to another international meeting. While I believe we can all have it all, no one can be or do everything at all times.
However, make no mistake about what I am suggesting. I do not mean that we should cut down to the bare bones version of our lives, only living to sleep, having a full life is undoubtedly a blessing. Rather, when the multitude of responsibilities begins to affect our personal well being is when we should be worried for ourselves. Too many people are harried from striving to have lives that look like the ones on Instagram, stressing themselves out over a lack of aesthetic perfection although they have a beautiful life.
At the root of this stress is our technological age. I love my technology as much as anyone, I am always on one of my devices. But, when even in our downtime we are scrolling through our newsfeeds and never letting ourselves decompress from the constant onslaught of information, our technological advancements become hinderances. We are not developing when we allow ourselves and our sleep schedules to be stunted by technology, as entertaining as it may be.
Not only is sleep good for your physical well being but also, it’s necessary for maintaining mental health. While you may feel that sleep is a waste of time, sleep is shown to improve memory, comprehension and mood. Further more, sleep helps to reduce stress that can pile up quickly with the onset of work duties, family life, and other relationships. For many millenials, just getting a job is not satisfying; we want to be successful in all aspects of our life. We want to be socially engaging and are operating at an almost constant rate through social media, involvement with relationships and creating our own paths professionally. Since we're already the generation that creates our own rules, we should stop following the antiquated view that overworked and overwhelmed equals success. If we continue to skimp on sleep to get more done, our definition of success continues to be counterproductive. The glorification of "busy" plagues everyone from the strung out high schooler in every activity and AP class to the CEO skyping with their family while jetting to another international meeting. While I believe we can all have it all, no one can be or do everything at all times.
However, make no mistake about what I am suggesting. I do not mean that we should cut down to the bare bones version of our lives, only living to sleep, having a full life is undoubtedly a blessing. Rather, when the multitude of responsibilities begins to affect our personal well being is when we should be worried for ourselves. Too many people are harried from striving to have lives that look like the ones on Instagram, stressing themselves out over a lack of aesthetic perfection although they have a beautiful life.
At the root of this stress is our technological age. I love my technology as much as anyone, I am always on one of my devices. But, when even in our downtime we are scrolling through our newsfeeds and never letting ourselves decompress from the constant onslaught of information, our technological advancements become hinderances. We are not developing when we allow ourselves and our sleep schedules to be stunted by technology, as entertaining as it may be.