Top-7 Rules of How to Enjoy Sound Healthy Sleep

Everyone knows that sleep is a source of well-being and mood. No wonder many famous people think sleep is the best medicine and some women are sure that sleep is a source of beauty.
Sleep is a vital state of brain activity, so a healthy, strong sleep is very important. To make your sleep refreshing and deep, let’s dwell on the basic rules of healthy sleep.

Rule number 1: Don’t eat 2 hours before going to bed
Rule number 2: Go to bed not later than 10-11 p.m.
Rule number 3: Choose the right position of your body
Rule number 4: Sleep on a firm level surface.
Rule number 5: Have a nap in the afternoon
Rule number 6: Relax your mind before going to bed
Rule number 7: Listen to the relaxing music If suffer from insomnia
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Rule number 1: Don’t eat 2 hours before going to bed

It is recommended to exclude food immediately before bedtime. Two hours before bedtime, you can take only light food:

vegetables,
fruits,
sour-milk products.

Many times you heard tha you should not eat food less than 2 hours before bedtime as this leads to a deterioration in metabolism and easy replenishment. How actually everything happens can be understood by going into the details.
During sleep, the body goes into a “recovery and rest regime”, in the normal state, the process of recovery begins, which occurs by the production of certain hormones, the main one being growth hormone (somatotropin).

Somatotropin strengthens the synthesis of protein and slows its decay, helps to reduce the deposition of subcutaneous fat and increase fat burning, which makes you more slender and healthy person.

When a person takes food less than 2 hours before going to bed, the stomach does not have time to completely process the food that came into it and after he falls asleep, his stomach remains full and forced to digest his food. In this case, the stomach sends a signal to the pituitary (one part of the brain) that it is full, and it needs energy to digest food. After this, the production of growth hormone ceases until the person wakes up, as more energy is sent to the splitting of food. This process can lead to: increased fatigue, poor sleep, weight gain, exhaustion of the vital forces of the body.

Important: If a person does not eat food before going to bed, the growth hormone will be produced in full, and the hormonal background of a person becomes better, therefore, the condition of the whole organism also improves.
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Rule number 2: Go to bed not later than 10-11 p.m.

It is recommended to have a rest not later than 10-11 p.m. because of the following reasons:

At this time the body is relaxed,
the nervous system rests,
you can fall asleep easily.

Doctors believe that an adult needs 7-8 hours to sleep to rest and not sleep at work during the day. For a normal night’s sleep, 5-6 hours is enough. The most useful time for sleep is from eleven o’clock in the evening to five o’clock in the morning.

In any case, sleep must necessarily capture time from two o’clock in the morning to four in the morning. At this time, the sleep is the strongest, you need to try to sleep at this time for at least one hour.
Daytime sleep is not recommended. It is especially undesirable to sleep before sunset. The duration of sleep depends on what was eaten per day: the less you ate, the less sleep is required.

Important: It is undesirable to work in the three-shift operation mode, especially the schedule, when the shift changes every week.
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Rule number 3: Choose the right position of your body

The requirement of the correct orientation of the body in space is associated with the need to harmonize the electromagnetic fields.

There is an opinion that the position of our body during sleep in relation to the sides of the world is important for inner harmony and health.

Yogis believe that each person has his own electromagnetic field, just like the Earth. The north of our “magnet” is on the top of the head, and the south – in the feet.

The electromagnetic north of the Earth is located at the southern geographic pole, and the magnetic south is on the north. Yogis advise you to sleep your head in the north or north-east direction. This position of the body in a dream is most useful for our health and well-being. If the layout of the bedroom does not allow you to put the bed in the north, turn its headboard to the east.

According to Feng Shui, the correct organization of the bedroom, the position of the bed in it and the direction of the body while sleeping is of great importance. Feng Shui divides all people into two categories: western and eastern. For each category, the direction of the head during sleep is its own. And within the category, these directions have individual meanings for each person.

For example, if for one to sleep head to the north means health, then for another one – success in love, for the third one – development.

To determine which category you belong to, you need to determine your number of Gua:
Write the year of your birth to get four numbers in a row. Add the last two digits. If you get a two-digit number, then add up the two numbers again. For example, you were born in 1985, add 8 + 5, get 13. Then add 1 + 3, it turns out 4. If the number came out double-digit, then fold it again until you get one number.Men should subtract 10 from the obtained number. Adolescents born in 2000 and later need to subtract 9. Women should add 5 to the received number. Girls born in 2000 and later should add 6.

Calculating your individual Gua number, you can determine which category you belong to:

Eastern – 1, 3, 4, 9.
Western – 2, 6, 7, 8.

Favorable direction for the head according to Gua’s numbers:

1 – northern, eastern, southern, south-eastern.
2 – choose the north-east, west, north-west and south-west.
3 – southern, northern, eastern, south-eastern.
4 – northern, southern, south-eastern, eastern.
6 – north-east, north-west, west, south-west.
7 – north-east, north-west, south-west and west.
8 – south-western, western, north-western, northeast.
9 – south-east, north, east, south.

Important: To wake up vigorously and in a good mood, you need to reconcile your electromagnetic field with the Earth’s field.
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Rule number 4: Sleep on a firm level surface.

On soft feather beds the body inevitably bends, and this causes a violation of the blood supply to the spinal cord and various organs that are trapped. In addition, this leads to jamming of nerve endings, which can adversely affect any part of the body.

It’s well-known that those who suffered a spinal cord injury and patients with radiculitis are recommended by doctors to sleep on a completely rigid bed. Ideally, the bed (at least under the mattress) should be made of unpainted and varnished boards. But it’s nice and easy to install a sheet of plywood on a mesh or other base. From the top you can put in 1-2 layers of a quilt and blanket or even an ordinary cotton mattress.

It is better for healthy people to dispense with a pillow or to confine themselves to a thin and sufficiently dense pillow due to the following reasons:

Maintain the cervical spine in normal condition,
improve cerebral circulation,
normalize intracranial pressure,
prevent the formation of wrinkles on the face and neck.

Important: However, patients with cardiovascular insufficiency and bronchial asthma should not abandon the pillow until the underlying disease is cured, and during periods of exacerbation one can use two or three hard pillows.
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Rule number 5: Have a nap in the afternoon

The main rule for those who like to wake up late: do not stay in bed for too long in the morning. As soon as a person wakes up (and it may be early in the morning), one should smile, stretch, throw off the blanket and get up. And usually people look at the clock: “Oh, only 5 o’clock!” and again lie down. But the benefit of such sleep is very doubtful.

If you start getting up at 4 or 5 in the morning, then there will be a lot of time for gymnastics, water procedures and useful things for your health. The first 5-7 days in the morning or in the afternoon you will want to sleep, but this is not a true need but only a habit of the body. Then it will pass.

But during the day it is desirable to relax several times. Physicians think that the most suitable time for a nap is from one to three o’clock. But if you get overwhelmed by drowsiness, lie down and sleep, even if it’s 4 or 7 o’clock. 30 minutes of sleep will bring much more benefit than resistance to your nature with strong tea, coffee, energetic drinks and so on.

How long is it recommended to sleep in the afternoon?

In order afternoon nap brings cheerfulness and a feeling of refreshment, try not to dive into the deep stage of a slow dream, which occurs about 30 minutes after falling asleep. In order not to sleep, you can resort to the achievements of civilization: alarm clocks, reminders in the phone and so on. Or try to sleep like Salvador Dali. If you decide to rest thoroughly during the day, then sleep no more than 2 hours. This duration of daytime dormancy is explained by sleep phases.

If you fall into a deep sleep, which occurs 30 minutes after falling asleep, then awakening before it ends (its duration is 30-45 minutes) does not bode well for you as such side effects are possible:

weakness,
reduced efficiency,
headaches.

Plunging into a sleepy state, we first go through the stage of drowsiness or a shallow sleep that lasts 5-10 minutes, then the sleep spindles “come” with even greater relaxation and last about 20 minutes. Then a deep sleep comes, which is called the slow one.

Important: Physicians recommend a short nap as prevention of cardiac and mental diseases.
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Rule number 6: Relax your mind before going to bed

Before going to bed, it is recommended to get rid of all thoughts of the outgoing day that can excite your nervous system. The main idea is to settle on a full-fledged sleep, giving rest and restoring the strength of the whole organism.

There is a wise aphorism: “Calm conscience is the best sleeping pill”. To accelerate self-improvement, a person must, analyze all his thoughts, words and actions that took place during the day before going to sleep.
Begin to calm your mind even before going to sleep, for example, during hygiene procedures. Try to get rid of extraneous thoughts:

When you take a shower, feel the water flowing down your body, observe the sensations inside.
When you brush your teeth, be aware of how the brush slides on the teeth, feel the taste of the paste.
Let your mind stop for at least a few seconds its restless wanderings and concentrate on what is happening here and now.

Use meditation to control your thoughts. You can try to immediately replace negative thoughts with positive ones. It’s also worth using positive visualization every time one of your unpleasant thoughts pops up in your head. In the end, you will be able to learn to control your thoughts because your outlook on life will improve, you will be less stressed and sleep peacefully.

Important: As soon as attention is distracted – return it to the present moment. Try not to litter your head with new information right before going to bed. Let your brain relax.
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Rule number 7: Listen to the relaxing music If suffer from insomnia

Noise may have a negative affect on human health. And especially a person is vulnerable in a dream. Sounds of 30-40 dB (whispering and chirping of birds outside the window) affect the sleep of the most sensitive people, and 40-55 dB (working refrigerator or air conditioner in a radius of 30 meters) make most people’s sleep more restless and make them toss. Sounds above 55 dB (washing machine or switched on music) lead to insomnia and irritability.

About 30% of the adult population is well aware of what chronic insomnia is. Even higher is this percentage among the elderly and those who are prone to regular stress. Insomnia can have the devastating effect on the body.

In addition, it is able to cause cognitive impairments:

memory failures,
various psychological problems,
depressed mood and anxiety disorders.

The most severe cases of chronic insomnia guarantee long-term health problems: obesity and dementia, and an increased risk of death.

Even in ancient times people noticed the healing power of music. Healers used this knowledge for medicinal purposes. Music is able to save from insomnia, the so-called music for a dream coming. It goes without saying that the tunes that we listen to before going to bed should carry positive emotions, be quiet, calm and melodic, with a clear tempo and slow rhythm to set up the body for rest and a sound sleep. Slow and relaxing melodies clear the space of negative energy and add positive energy to the human biofield. Positive affect can be reached with the help of nature’s sounds:

birds singing,
the sound of rain,
the sound of the surf or waterfall,
the voice of dolphins.

And certain sounds can, on the contrary, improve sleep. For example, white noise helps not only to fall asleep more quickly, but also provides a healthy sleep throughout the night. In addition to white noise, a similar effect relaxing music or the sounds of nature have. Sounds are present in our lives all the time, and we can seldom enjoy the silence. But if you know about the useful sounds and their impact on us, you can improve the quality of your life, provide yourself with a sound sleep, comfortable work and just enjoy life, not paying attention to annoying noise.

Important: Studies conducted at the Institute of Behavioral Sciences (Budapest, Hungary) in 2006 showed that listening to self-selected music can actually shorten the stages of two sleep cycles. This means that people reach the REM phase much more quickly (the restoring part of our sleep) while listening to favorite music.
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