Rest
November 17, 2019 | Ryan Arnold
Passage: Matthew 11:25-30
The benefits of getting a good night’s rest are fairly well documented. Research has found that getting enough sleep has all sorts of positives. Positive sleep health:
- Improves productivity and concentration
- Increases social and emotional IQ
- Enhances athletic performance
- Strengthens our immune system
- Helps prevent depression, and
- Lowers the risk of weight gain, heart disease, diabetes and inflammation
Getting enough sleep is so important many medical professionals consider it as vital as regular exercise and eating a balanced diet for optimal well-being.
Yet for all these great benefits, when it comes to how long we rest our head on the pillow, many of us don’t get enough of it. A CDC study from 2016 found that over 1 in 3, or 35% of Americans, don’t get the recommended minimum of seven hours of sleep, a night, on a regular basis.
And a separate CDC study finds that 70% of Americans report not getting enough sleep at least once a month. Which makes for an awful lot of us that struggle with this particular issue, at least on occasion.
Sleep stories
To learn more about how sleepless nights affect people, I posted a message on my Facebook feed two days ago, asking for personal stories about sleep deprivation. Responses came pouring in; it seems most everyone had something to share. Here’s a bit of what people posted.
Heads up that many of these are pretty funny