I love to sleep. Being able to recharge my batteries, forget about this dangerous world and explore places beyond my wildest imaginations is simply divine. I’ve only come to truly appreciate the experience over the last few years, often laying in when I don’t have any early morning commitments. This means I’ve been accused of being lazy; simply wasting the day by deciding to spend more of the morning asleep than awake. Well, I believe sleep is something not to be against, but to cherish and be grateful for.
Others may disagree, but personally, I think I deserve to lay-in this summer. Long term readers will know (and thank you for your continued blog readership) that this year has been exam filled. The months leading up to May were full of mind map drawing and flash card testing. May and June were utterly hectic: 21 exams in less than a month, having to forget about each one as it was completed. Though I managed to remain remarkably stable during exam season, I always felt slightly stressed out and worried. The exams count towards my future, deciding which path I take in the world. I also volunteer on Saturday mornings (which I love), but does mean I have to get up early. This meant, on a normal working week, I was only laying in once every 7 days. Having completed that, lay-ins were a brilliant reflection of no longer having to worry about work and deadlines for 3 months. The freedom to wake up late, look at my phone and casually get breakfast was a great contrast to the rush and frantic atmosphere in the preceding months. The Dalai Lama once said that sleep was the best form of meditation. I couldn’t agree more. Though I’ve never tried yoga, having seen the impossible looking positions that the body is required to form, it appears more stress-inducing than a form of calm meditation – not for me. Sleep is so freeing; a form of escape from troubled times. I can access infinite parallel universes, meeting people I will never see in real life. Explore the skies, countries I have no chance of visiting, places I have no chance of examining. Sleeping, and the dreams that occupy it, offers hope to those, like myself, who are not naturally imaginative, as bizarre, wonderful adventures fill our brains. The verbs I use when talking about sleeping: access, offer, explore etc make sleeping sound like an optional hobby; I’m simply advertising its many benefits. Isn’t wonderful that everyone, whatever race, gender, religion or sexuality has to experience such a wonderful pleasure? It’s been proven. An increased amount of sleep benefits people’s mental and physical health. Studies have shown that people who sleep less struggle more to get on with others, often having mood swings while struggling to pay attention. Futhermore, sleep supports healthy growth and development, as well as repairing your heart and blood vessels. While I dream of flying through the universe, my body has time to be awake, working hard to ensure I’m well. The ability of the body to just do those things is mind-blowing. How does it happen? Why? We are very lucky to be human beings. However, as a nation, we do not value the importance and excellence of sleep enough. A 2011 Sleep Council survey found nearly 50% of people get just 6 hours of sleep a night while a similar 2007 survey discovered 30% of young people were only sleeping for between 4 to 7 hours on a school night. These statistics are a disaster. Compared to the Spanish, who love their 3 hour afternoon siesta, the British appear physically wide awake on the outside, but drained inside. Enjoying my lay-ins during the holidays can cause some issues. Sleeping in until 10:30am can seem like a waste of the day, meaning we’re unable to attend our planned trip, due to a lack of time. While I understand this can be annoying, I don’t sleep in every day of the holidays, especially if there is somewhere I really want to go. And anyway, is sleeping in really a waste of the day? What is a worthwhile day defined by? Surely it is whether you enjoyed it personally, not the number of things you got up to (though a genuinely productive day is very fulfilling). Why do we care more about the number of activities you did i.e. the quantity rather than the enjoyment of activities i.e. the quality throughout the day? These are all open-ended questions, to which I do not have the answer. I’m sure my love of sleep will never die. Always having a warm bed at home to cherish the successful days and forget the dire days is so comforting. Being able to unwind, just for a few hours, thinking of anything, dreaming of endless possibilities is remarkable. I am so grateful to have a warm bed, unlike thousands up and down the country, something one of the world’s richest countries should be ashamed of. After a few weeks of doing nothing, you can feel slobbish and worthless, so thankfully my continuous lay-ins only take place during holidays. Anyway, if I really wanted to wake up early on a Sunday, I could just become a Christian. Now there’s a thought….
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