Ask any new mum what were the two most important factors of motherhood in the early days and she will say; food and sleep. Sleep is an essential element of the foundation that leads to happiness in this life. Without sleep the human body will eventually shut down. As you look at the actions of a newborn baby, its body understands what it needs to survive: food and sleep. These two factors allow the baby to grow physically, mentally and emotionally. Sadly, once the baby grows and claims their independence the need to sleep, although still essential to growth, looses its priority.

Sleep is a debatable factor for so many people. Teenagers are notorious for sleep deprivation and their bodies crave sleep. A teenager's body is embarking on a journey full of the twists and turns of puberty and sleep is vital for them to stay healthy and most importantly happy. Adults are no better. Instead of learning from years of being sleep deprived adults manage to over book their schedules with no room to get sufficient sleep.

If you are loosing one hour a sleep from Monday to Friday by the weekend you have deprived your body of five hours of sleep. Even though you are staying up later your brain's ability lessens the more tired you are. With this said the last couple hours before you go to be and the first couple of hours in the morning are less efficiently utilized because your brain is not receiving the rest it needs to function at its best. Instead of catching up on lost sleep by sleeping in and wasting Saturday you could get sufficient sleep every night. It just makes sense to sleep!

Regardless of whom you are, you know the benefits of a good nights sleep. So STOP depriving your body and brain of the essential hours of sleep that they crave each day. By adopting good sleeping habits you will have more energy during the day which will enable you to accomplish more.

Most people need about 8-9 hours of sleep each night. Some people will protest and say that they only need 5-6 hours of sleep but analyze their behavior. People who sleep less often are grumpy, easily aggravated, unstable emotionally, clumsy, forgetful, unsociable, always getting sick and have little energy. Eventually sleep deprivation will lead to some sort of break down either physically or emotionally.

The Challenge

Go to bed earlier and wake up earlier. It's that simple! Now, it doesn't have to be the same time every day because it's understandable that schedules with work and other responsibilities often require a little flexibility. The most important element of sleep is that you control all the factors that are in your power. For example, you cannot control your children but if you have gone to bed at 10:30 instead of 12:30 and you child wakes up at 1am you have already had 2 and a half hours of sleep instead of 30 minuets; can you see how that could make a big difference.

Some people say "I'm just not a morning person." This challenge doesn't require you to wake up really early everyday but maybe just twice a week. Remember you determine the factors.

It's amazing what a great 20 minute power nap can do to invigorate and energize the body. It's really amazing how much you can accomplish in those early morning hours. The early morning is a great time to exercise, write papers without any interruption or just getting a head start on your To-do list.

To ensure a good full nights sleep make sure that you eat well, exercise daily and turn off any distractions when getting ready for bed. It's really helpful to meditate or engage in some deep breathing before falling asleep.

Sleep and enjoy the benefits.