The Importance of Getting a Good Night’s Sleep

Everyone knows that getting a good night’s sleep makes you feel better. It also improves your memory, strengthens your immune system, and helps maintain a healthy weight. It can even reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease, diabetes, depression and anxiety. But most people don’t realize how important sleep is to the functioning of every system in the body. In fact, scientists believe that sleep is a vital part of the body’s biological clock and that it has a direct impact on how we age and our overall health.

While it might seem that sleep is a passive state during which the body rests, it is actually a highly active process that is essential to the survival of every living organism. Within a minute of falling asleep, significant changes occur in the brain and body: the temperature drops, the heart rate and breath slow down, and the electrical signaling of the brain begins to slow down and shift from a more rapid alpha wave pattern to slower theta waves.

Then the brain enters REM sleep, where the eyes move rapidly behind closed lids and brain activity is similar to that of wakefulness. During this phase, the amygdala, an almond-shaped structure involved in the processing of emotions, becomes particularly active. During REM sleep, we dream. These dreams can be vivid and arousing, but they usually don’t last very long. During this time, the body repairs the damage done to cells throughout the day and the hormones released during stress are eliminated.

Sleep also provides an opportunity for the brain to clear out and organize all the information accumulated during the day. It converts short-term memories into longer-term ones and helps us learn. It also allows the brain to regulate blood pressure and glucose levels, manage stress hormones and control appetite, and protect the nervous and endocrine systems.

It’s no wonder that regular poor sleep is linked to high blood pressure, heart disease and obesity, as well as a host of mental health problems including anxiety and depression. But it’s even more important to remember that when you get a good night’s sleep, the restorative effects extend far beyond your mood.

Scientists have only begun to scratch the surface of understanding what sleep is all about. It is a massively complicated process that affects all the major tissues and systems in your body. It’s like a huge jigsaw puzzle: we can see some of the pieces, and we know that they fit together, but we haven’t yet figured out how everything fits. This page focuses on what we do know about the different stages of sleep, and how each one is related to your body’s needs and habits. It also discusses some of the things that may be contributing to your sleeping difficulties and ways to try and overcome them.