Sleep matters

Especially if you have aspirations in business or sport

Photo by Cris Saur on Unsplash

This article will shed light on two basic misconceptions about sleep:

1) Sleep deprivation doesn’t affect my performance

2) I can catch up on sleep on the weekend

Afterward, the concept of Smart Sleep will be introduced, and recommendations for a better night’s sleep are given. Let’s get into it.

Humans can adapt to less sleep.

The common perception is that sleep is a necessary physiological feature of our body. All mammals sleep, but their duration of sleep differs immensely. Whereas a typical human sleeps around 8 hours per day, a giant sloth sleeps 20 hours. On the other side of the spectrum, goats and horses sleep only 2–3 hours per day. How much sleep do you need to perform at your highest level, both mentally and physically?

Just a quick thought experiment to show you how relevant this debate is: If you would limit your amount of sleeping in a week from 8h/day to 5h/day, you would have an additional 21 hours to spare to work, train, or enjoy yourself. That is for half a week.

At the beginning of sleep science, the Adaption-Theory was widely accepted. The Theory assumes that those differing sleep hours in mammals occur only…