Schlafen

Sleep.  Its a crazy thing.  It is simultaneously necessary and wasteful, relaxing and frustrating, delightful and dumb.

From what I read, it is necessary to rest of our bodies and allow our minds to process the events and learning of the day.  To connect and develop cognitive thoughts and synapses to let us make sense of new-found knowledge.

It also wastes a lot of damn time.  “They,” whoever they are, suggest 8 hours of sleep.  Haven’t you always heard that; “get 8 hours of sleep.”  That is a full 33.3% of our day.  Place that over a lifetime and you are sleeping over 26 years (assuming you make it to 80).  What a waste!  Who decided that 8 hours is necessary?  I for one feel terrible if I sleep 8 hours.  Beyond the guilt of wasting 1/3 of my day, I feel drowsy the rest of my waking hours.  My max is 7 hours.  I feel very rested with that amount.  I also am still pissed about wasting just slightly less than 1/3 of my day.  So, I am now shooting for 6.  Its tough, yet rewarding.  I go to sleep at 11pm and rise around 5am to workout, read, or study.  The world is a wonderful place at that hour.  It is quiet on the streets.  Rewarding to know that you are awake and enriching your mind or body while the majority of the world sleeps.  Sure, I get sleepy in the afternoon and don’t feel as sharp as I would normally. I am hoping this subsides.

But, how damn fun is it to sleep?  I love having dreams.  I love waking up without an alarm, just laying in bed.  But I can’t anymore.  Ever since I realized how much precious time my sleep consumes, I am guilt-ridden regarding my sleep.  I rise no later than 8 on the weekends, regardless of what ridiculous hour I stumbled home the night before.  Too much to do and see….

And let’s not even get into naps.  That is a whole ‘nother post whereby I will lay out my theory on naps and their role in a productive workday.  Sadly, my current job does not allow nap time. One day.

Anyway, sleep is a terrible mystery to me that merits exploring.  Suppose you have to be awake for that however.