Why We Sleep

I love following folks on Goodreads and one of them is my former boss and friend, Matias. A couple years back, I saw him review a book called, Why We Sleep. And he rarely ever writes reviews and this time around, not only did he write a review but it was a 5-star review. So it came up on my backlog as something I new I had to read.

This year, I finally got around to reading it, and Taylor and I read it at the same time — he breezed through it and I definitely took my time alternating with my fluff books, but it was a great read. And a pretty scary one, too. I’ve always known that sleep is essential, but after reading all the harm that lack of sleep can do, I realise how many years of my life I put myself in harm’s way by not sleeping.

I remember as a kid, I would hate napping — and now as an adult, I crave it so much. There’s a lot to unlearn about habits around sleep and though I’m pretty blessed that I can fall asleep in ANY circumstance with pretty good speed to being horizontal and drifting to sleep, I know this luck can’t last forever, especially as I age.

And so, reading Matt’s pretty scary but straightforward book on how I can keep a better sleep schedule has definitely made it a bigger priority this year. Does this mean I won’t be up for a Tottenham game or an F1 race? Most definitely, but I know I won’t be perfect either. There will still be late nights, but I’ll try my best to not be as terrible about it.

It also helped that I was able to talk to a sleep coach via the Better Up Program and so Coach Daniel has been able to settle some of my fears that Mr. Walker has made me feel. Sometimes, I wish I could tell my younger self to just nap when I was told, but for now, I’ll do my best to get back on track.