Monthly Archives: March 2015

If you’re like me and have always thought of yourself as a night owl and of the alarm going off in the morning as the enemy, then I have news for you. If you’re not getting up early then you’re missing out on a tremendous opportunity to get a lot of stuff done in a much more efficient, more tranquil manner. Not only that, you have no idea how good it will feel. You just have to make yourself do it, and that’s not necessarily an easy thing to do, at least not at first. Continue reading →

Though it would seem at first glance that your skin color or ethnic heritage would have nothing to do with your nightly sleep habits and quality, a study conducted by the National Sleep Foundation has provided food for thought and a strong display of differences between different groups. Continue reading →

It’s two weeks before spring and time to spring forward once again, setting our clocks forward by one hour. Most of us do this dutifully when the newscasters tell us to without giving the whole thing much thought or having any understanding of why we do it. The history behind our annual change is rather interesting. It was first introduced in the United States while we were in the midst of World War I, when it was thought that by moving the clock forward an hour we would need to use less electricity at night and save energy. Once the war was over the time shift was immediately repealed by Congress because people hated it so much, and though Woodrow Wilson vetoed the repeal, Congress prevailed — twice. Continue reading →

It is well known that those who are required to work the late shift, as well as those who have to cross time zones, often face difficulties with sleep. The shift in light exposure wreaks havoc with their internal body clock and circadian rhythm, making sleep a fleeting memory. But now a Florida inventor has created a special LED bio-bulb that uses what science knows about the way that the eye receives wavelengths of light. It eliminates a small segment of blue wavelength of light, offering enough illumination to allow people to see without throwing off their body’s production of melatonin. Continue reading →

There has been a lot of information in the news recently that links the amount of sleep that we get with our overall health, and it comes as no surprise in our diet-obsessed culture that the articles that are getting the most attention are the ones that explain the relationship between sleep quality and quantity to gaining weight. Aside from the association between sleep deprivation and obesity there have also been reports that speak to the difficulty in losing just a little bit of weight. These articles provide answers to those who are trying to lose five or ten pounds and who can’t seem to succeed — maybe if you just get an hour more sleep per night, your body will stop working against you is what they all seem to be saying. Continue reading →

If you are having a hard time getting a good night’s sleep, chances are that you’re scratching your head and trying to figure out why. Though there are doubtless plenty of people whose insomnia is out of their control, caused by physiological problems that have skewed their body’s internal clock, in a large number of cases the problem is a matter of our own making. Continue reading →