Early to bed and early to rise - Importance of sleeping properly

"Early to Bed and Early to Rise, Makes Man healthy wealthy and Wise."

How thoroughly we were taught this quotation as children, we almost knew it by heart. But time moves on, and we are no more kids, and we no more give importance to what our teachers/parents tried to teach us. How ironical it is - Off course it is a children's rhyme. But it is taught for adulthood, kids generally don't suffer from health problems adults are prone to, they generally won't care about the wealth yet, and yeah wisdom... they are safe in their ignorance. All that preaching was only applicable for our life in adulthood.

What we set aside calling "kiddish", is so important, and actually setting it aside is bringing serious problems. Off late, an apparently healthy CEO of a multi-national company died suddenly of heart attack. He exercised daily and was in his early forties, so how come he suffered from such a fate? He didn't sleep properly. He twisted the saying, used to get up very early for exercise but didn't sleep on time. That left his sleeping duration of a mere 4-5 hours.

Research has shown that not taking enough sleep tends to increase toxic substances in the body which can be very harmful in the long run and also young people are twice as likely to get high BP if they sleep less. (Read more here in the article about SAP CEO who died evidently because of lack of sleep.)

But sleeping late and getting up late won't help. According to Indian Yoga theory, the time which you spend sleeping, is rather more important than you thought. Each hour you spend sleeping between 8 to 12 in the night will be 4 times more relaxing for your body than an hour between 12 to 4, and similarly each hour between 12 to 4 would be two times more relaxing than an hour between 4 to 8. It seems the saying, "Early to bed...", had more meaning than we ever realized.

Moreover, random sleep times are not as relaxing for the body as a regular sleeping routine. So ideally one should enjoy a sound sleep of at least 6-7 hours between 10/11 to 6/7. Off course, it won't always be possible for you to manage that, but then ignoring the dark circles beneath your eyes for long isn't a good idea. Trying to regularize your sleeping pattern can be very helpful if you're suffering from insomnia. Also make sure that your bed, pillow etc. are comfortable. Spending a little on your comfort while sleeping is really worth it - you will see amazing improvements in your efficiency if your body gets enough rest.

So it's high time you decide, choose from the following - would you like to wake up in the morning with drooping eyelids, burning eyes, a little headache and work with half your efficiency? Or would you like to have a pleasant morning, feeling fresh, enjoying the music around you. Off course, if you worked late in the night (or maybe you were partying, which you might excuse, there is nothing wrong in enjoying sometimes) you might have covered up for a lot of back log, but aren't you about to start creating back log again? Working with half of your actual efficiency? And off course, very few people would be able to work late at night with their full efficiency. You see yawning every few minutes is not very helpful when you're trying to focus.

Changing habits and routines of years overnight is not possible, but if you try enough you'll also be able to see a rising sun with its full glory. After all, your eyes deserve the treat.