If not everyone, then most of us definitely loves to sleep. Imagine - nice Saturday morning, soft sheets and sun that is covering your body. Like a dream, right? However, how much do you know about stages of sleep and how sleeping can affect your overall well-being? In this blog, read about four stages of sleep, get an insight how sleep affects your personal health and see how physical activities can improve your sleep.
The FOUR Stages of Sleep
1. STAGE OF SLEEP is called a “light sleep”. In this stage of sleep, you have just closed your eyes and start to fall in sleep. It lasts between 1 and 10 minutes. You are lightly asleep and can be awakened easily.
Did you know?
Usually, we spend most of our night in Stage 2 sleep (approximately 45% of our total sleep duration)
3. STAGE OF SLEEP is called “deep sleep” and it usually starts after 35 - 45 minutes after you fall asleep. In this stage, people may experience talking as well as sleepwalking. Moreover, during this stage of sleep, you will not hear any noises or distractions.
Fun fact: these three stages are called NREM stages (non-rapid eye movement). Why they are so important, you may ask. Well:
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It restores your physical body
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Stimulates your immune system
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Your blood is now “focused” on muscles, not brain
Fun fact: this stage is called REM stage (rapid eye movement). More importantly, at this stage:
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Your body restores the brain
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It clears our brain “junk mail”
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It captures memories
In overall, now you will know how each stage can affect your health and what kind of process you go through while being in sleeping. We truly hope that this will help you to assess the quality of sleep.
Did you know?
Even though you are sleeping, your brain waves look a lot like what can be recorded while you are completely awake. Another factor of this paradox is the fact that even though your mind shows heightened activity, most of your muscular tissues are paralyzed.
Physical Activity Impact on Sleep
Now, let's “walk through” 3 factors of how physical activities can impact your health and your well-being. Shall we? :)
Exercises Alleviate Stress
One of the most common things that maintain us up at night time is stress. People tend to stress about work, financial situation, the relationship between your loved ones and many other problems that make sleep impossible. One thing that most of us do not realize that we are “burning out” due to the stress which is taking over. Workout allows eliminate stress by clearing our minds and removing the symptoms of stress from our bodies. Moreover, a “healthy” sleep can make you feel better and perform better!
Physical Activities Decreases Daytime Sleepiness
Research has shown over and over that regular physical activity reduces daytime sleepiness. And good news for you! You do not need to spend half of the day at the gym. Go for a little walk with your friends before going to bed or do yoga in the morning and you will feel better than ever. That is true throughout nearly every age or fitness level. Specialists believe that this link is so pervasive due to how exercise affects the most frequent reasons for daytime sleepiness which includes depression, weight problems, diabetes, and sleep deprivation. Considering the fact that workouts help to relieve the signs and symptoms of those problems, it also helps mitigate the impact those situations have on our ability to sleep. You can choose any activities which you enjoy and feel like a “fish in the water”. It could be a gym, running, yoga or any other activities, that you would include, as for example, daily routine! :)
Exercises Improve Your Sleep
Together with making it easier to go to sleep and less difficult to stay asleep, researchers have discovered that workout improves the overall quality of your sleep. Even though a lot is still unknown about how sleep works and what it influences, most specialists agree that each stage of sleep is similarly essential and crucial. They also agree that while you are deprived of 1 stage, your body will attempt to balance things out by dedicating extra time to that level the next time you sleep. While people workout continually, the amount of time they spend in every stage of sleep changes, in essence, rebalancing back to normal.
TREINIO MINI "CASE STUDY"
Treinio team also cares about their health and how to improve sleep. Our wonderful colleague Laura did an experiment and shared her information with all of you!
In the picture above our colleague did not do any physical activities. You can see that during the night her deep sleep was only 18 minutes, which is 3%. Needless to say, that a good deep sleep is when you reach 20%.
However, in this day our colleague went for a 5 km run. Her deep sleep increased significantly (19%), thus she improved her daily performance as well.
We believe that you already know how physical activities can improve your health. If not, feel free to read our previous blog (Why You Should Be Physically Active?). Moreover, now you will be aware of how exercises can improve your sleep! So, do not waste your time. Put on your workout clothes on and take a time for yourself and your health. You do not need to go to the gym. You can easily do some easy exercises at home. Such as planking, squats or other simple exercises.
Here Are Some Exercise Suggestions:
