Why We Sleep: The New Science of Sleep and Dreams

I can easily say that Why We Sleep by Matthew Walker, a neuroscientist, is one of the most important books that I've ever read. Modern humans have always taken their sleep for granted. It's always something that we can catch up on. And we have been dead wrong about this. Everything in our life is affected by the quality and quantity of our sleep. Almost everything that we do is enhanced/spoiled by our sleeping decision. Humans are not sleeping the way nature intended them to. The number of sleep periods, the duration of sleep, and when sleep occurs has all been distorted by the modern life. Human beings are the only species that deliberately deprive themselves of sleep to their detriment for petty activities. Even moderate reductions for just one week in our sleep disrupts the blood sugar levels so much that we would be classified as pre-diabetic. A few things that stood out for me: • Sleep is divided into non-REM sleep (early night) and REM sleep (mostly later night) • Sleep enhances our capacity to learn, remember and make logical decisions. • It configures our emotions, guards our immune system, takes care of our metabolism and keeps our weight in check. • Its deficiency is the leading cause of road accidents. • “The shorter you sleep, the shorter your life span.” • Inadequate sleep is associated with higher rates of mental disorders, heart diseases, cancer, dementia, etc. • Sleeping pills are no match for natural sleep. • Alcohol is one of the most powerful suppressors of REM sleep that we know of. • Sleep deprivation vastly increases your likelihood of getting infections. • REM sleep is what stands between rationality and insanity. • Many people walk through their lives sleep-deprived and never realize it. • Regularity is the key to good sleep - going to bed at the same time, waking up at the same time no matter what. There is so much in this book which should not be summarized. It has to be read and felt. This incomparable book should be compulsory reading for everyone.

There is a new pandemic in town, and this time it's not COVID. Seriously. I can't stop talking about stuff I've been reading in this book with people around me. Sleep is as universal as concepts get - and yet, it's crazy how little we know about something we spend 1/3 of our lives doing. Here's a little something about me. I've had a peculiar sleep schedule for the past couple years, staying awake almost all the way through the night. And sleeping an average of 6 hours. Now, if you'd ask someone, they would point to the former as the unnatural pattern. Early to bed and early to rise is the mantra, is it not? And 6 hours doesn't seem TOO bad for a night of sleep, right? Turns out, both of the things couldn't be more wrong. By sleeping any less than 8 hours a day, I was potentially shaving 10 years off my life, of what would have would have been a relatively unhealthier one anyway. That's how much impact sleep has. While I would still highly recommend reading the book, since cliff notes don't do the message justice - I saw how sleep deficiency was linked to Cancer, Alzheimer's, Diabetes, Cardiovascular diseases, high blood pressure, mood swings, depression, anxiety, retention, and just a general sense of well being, to name a few things. Nothing, and I mean NOTHING is going to convince me to sacrifice sleep anymore. Secondly, I learned how sleeping later in the night isn't exactly something which is as terrible as so many people had been trying to convince me of. We keep seeing examples thrown around of CEOs waking up at 5AM in the morning, since the first ones to get up are the first ones to get started on doing great things in the world. But that, too, only has partial truth to it. Some of us are natural early birds and some night owls. And forcing one to comply with another can have a huge impact on how they perform at their workplace, school, or just in general. And I'm just gonna let you guess which of the two suffer here from the general rules widely accepted by society. Another interesting revelation to me, which had been out there in plain sight anyway, was how circadian rhythms are affected depending on age. Someone still in their formative years will have theirs shifted a little ahead, hence folks in their teens and early 20s go to sleep late and tend to wake up late. Unless, of course, they're forced out of bed, and asked to go about their schooling or job at a time the world functions in. And on the other hand, older people have their rhythms shift back, making them wake up as early as 4 AM, leading to drowsiness by late evening. If there's anything all the above shows us, it's that society should be much more forthcoming to people with their own individual sleep schedules, and encourage them to get all the sleep they need. And that brings me to what usually is encouraged. It's no news how getting less sleep is almost a fact people flaunt to show how hard they've been working, and I certainly have been guilty of it more times than one. What I am thankful to learn, now, is that the work you do when sleep deprived is not only less productive, but most likely counterintuitive. And it's only made worse by the cycle of consuming caffeine everyday, which leads to worse sleep, which leads to more caffeine, and the cycle continues. Please ask your doctor how long they've slept if they are to perform a surgery, as they're almost twice as likely to make a fatal mistake if they're not well-rested. Please ask your driver how much sleep they got. Because sleep deprivation has a HIGHER chance of causing a car accident, than even alcohol consumption, depending on the extent of both, of course. Why; you ask? Because alcohol makes you spaced out, or drowsy, or lose control. But lack of sleep will literally turn you off for a couple of seconds every now and then, into little microsleeps where you will lose complete control of what's happening. And those seconds are more than enough to put you into a death-assuring situation. Reading SO much about how lack of sleep can be life-ruining can certainly be very taxing to go through, for over 300 pages too, but this book also taught me a lot more about the brain through these tidbits. About research that revealed much more than simply sleep. About people. And knowing all this equips you, the reader, to protect yourself and the people around you from the sleep deprivation epidemic. This is a must-read book, even if you get 8 hours of sleep, and especially if you don't.

Mathhew walker, a neuroscientist shows how a good night's shut eye can make us cleverer, attractive, slimmer, healthier, and ward off many diseases like cancer, diabetes, heart attacks etc. Have you slept well last night?? Well if you haven't then certainly you are feeling dizziness while reading this. This book is divided into 4 parts and 16 chapter. I would like to highlight few facts from the book that will surely help you. 1) Every creature on this planet have their on circadian rhythm, a cycle of melatonin. My rhythm is not as same as yours. 2) Not just this one thing, other is 'adenosine' a chemical that builds up in your brain when you're awake. This is also know as sleep pressure. 3) Avoid caffeine in evening as it blocks your sleep pressure. As the caffeine has the average half-life hours of 5 to 7 hours. 4) There are two types of sleep NREM (non- rapid eye movement) and REM (rapid eye movement). The architecture of sleep contains 5 cycles of these two sleeps which occurs alternately. 5) Deep NREM strengthens individual memories and REM sleeps offers fusing and building of information. 6) Our brain is just a memory storage device, with permanent and temporary storages, 7-9 hours of proper sleep required for the transfer of information. 7) The shorter your sleep, the shorter your life. The leading causes of disease and death in developed nations—diseases that are crippling health-care systems, such as heart disease, obesity, dementia, diabetes, and cancer—all have recognized causal links to a lack of sleep. Well, these are the just few. Book contains more astonishing facts with experiments and demonstrations. The book is required to read in perusing manner with pen and paper. It's becomes hard to stay with book after one part as many facts are repeated in later stage of books, but you can skip few chapters. There are very important points of note for individuals, educational institutions, hospitals, organisations and even governments. Besides, what I don't like is that writer just put 12 tips for healthy sleep at the end of book that he should have described in detail rather than irrelevant information. However the book is overall good. If you are in medical or psychology field then you might find it interesting to read. I recommend it to everyone who struggles to sleep at night and also all those who are still don't believe in the benefits of sleep and cutting their sleep hours unnecessarily to get productive. Trust me you can't be productive by skipping your sleep hours. According to author, many scientists and artists got their discoveries and masterpiece in their dreaming state. So what are you waiting for grab this book and just doze off.

Sleep is a mystery. And this book is a lifesaver. For normal folks like you and me, and for doctors or scientists as well, sleep's been always a mysterious phenomena. We humans sleep (preferably) one third of our whole life. This is an enormous amount of time which demands some attention. Though historically the attention has not been allotted to sleep it deserves, academically or culturally. If you read this book (and you should; whether you love or hate or enjoy or avoid or have problem with or have some queries on sleeping) you'd understand why the evolutionary process didn't eliminate sleep from our biological dictionary. Why, though seemingly unnecessary/time-wasting/futile/unproductive, we still need to get a good night's sleep to get a long list of physiological, biological, psychological benefits. And if you by any chance fail to get the necessary amount of sleep (voluntarily or otherwise), you're a big gambler who doesn't have the idea about the grave repercussions. (No kidding.) This book will be beneficial to everybody except those smart dudes who have unwavering faith in some generic and prejudiced sayings like: "Six hours of sleep is enough for a functional adult" or "You'll have chance to sleep all you need when you're dead" or "Our great leader sleeps only four hours/day, hence I should do the same to be like him." etc. Don't trust them for Kumbhkarna's sake. Don't mess with sleep. Some curious takeaways from the book: ● Not only the starting phase of sleep is important, when you're going to wake up in the morning is equally significant too. If you get up earlier without fulfilling your sleep-quota, there will be consequences. Serious consequences. ● Melatonin doesn't make you feel drowsy; it just reminds your brain, "Time to go to bed, fella." Part of a whole set of timekeeping mechanism actually. The chemical substance which in fact pressurize your system to make you feel sleepy is named Adenosine. ● Dreaming makes you more visionary/creative/shrewd, really. And dreaming is not just some "commercial breaks" between slumber, it has serious impact on your mindset/thinking/worldview/self assessment and many things more. ● Homo sapiens is "biphasic" in case of sleep requirement. That is, we humans are biologically inclined to get sleep two times a day. Taking a siesta is not just a cultural phenomena in origin, but deeply biological. Dozing after lunchtime is absolutely human-like, nothing shameful if you think so. ● It's not mere practice that makes a person perfect. Practice, followed by a good night of sleep is what required for perfection. And the writer is serious about that. ● You can sleep as many hours trying to recover/make up the sleep that you've lost or skipped; but make no mistake, humans can never "sleep back"/rebound the sleep once lost. ● "Night owls" are real, not myth. As real as the "Morning larks" are. Don't bully them; or feel guilty of being one. ● Caffeine is the most widely used (rather abused) addictive psychoactive stimulant drug in the world. It is also the only addictive substance that we readily give to our children and teens. ● And a lot more.

Humanity spends a third of its time on this planet sleeping - a state in which it loses consciousness, hallucinates, significantly loses awareness of its environment, and is prone to being attacked (from an evolutionary POV). Just thinking about it makes one wonder what a bizarre process it is to go through day-after-day. But as Matthew Walker rightly points out, it's the benefits accrued from a timely nightly shut eye that is keeping us alive and healthy. Spread across 340 pages, this book reads more as an affirmation to treat sleep as the holy grail of existence and not a biological falling that hustle culture would have you believe. That wanting an uninterrupted quality sleep is not a privilege but a fundamental right, failing which you are setting yourself up for a lifetime of misery. That sleep, as Matthew writes, "is not like a credit system or the bank. We can never recover... what's been deprived". Filled with case studies, tidbits about neuroscience, and socio-cultural practices that go against nature's instinct to nourish humans, it was quite a learning experience reading this. It's chock full of quality content, written in an accessible manner albeit slightly draggy at times. My highlight from this book was its 15th chapter, one that dealt with questions that society should ask its systems - work, education, and health care, and why all of us are forced to condition ourselves to acclimatize to its absurdities - "a contrived, yet fortified arrogance...focused on the uselessness of sleep", as Matthew puts it.

Unfortunately even though I had got copy of this book right after its release, it has been bit too late that I started this highly informative and life changing book. Dr Walker takes us through long and amazing journey of what sleep really is, how it spans across different species, and most importantly what happens if we don't get right amount of quality sleep. During these times of COVID, sleep is possibly one of the few ways we can keep ourselves mentally strong and support our immune system to remain healthy. One chapter, which I found particularly intriguing is about his recommendations towards building societies which give right value to sleep over current notions of productivity measured in terms of time spent on activities. It was quite insightful to learn how critical is it for children to sleep more to be able to grow properly in their lives (and in worst case avoid early morning accidents if they are driving to attend schools) and how much harm those schools, which start early in morning cause by disrupting their vital sleep! I feel fortunate that I never attended such schools but also recall self induced exam pressures owing to which many precious nights went without proper sleep! Personally, reading this book together with sleep tracking has helped me to detect problems in my sleep (e.g., poor quality of deep sleep), identify factors which might be leading to these problems (e.g., not following most of the recommendations given in the last part of the book), and have started seeing value in my life after I started to work on correcting these factors.

This is a very well-researched exposition on almost all aspects of sleep - its physiological, medical, psychological and societal aspects. The author goes at great length to emphasize the need for 7-8 hours of uninterrupted sleep for our well-being, and why our modern lifestyles deny us from one of this most basic evolutionarily important biological functions in the living world. I loved the way the book starts and gets into the scientific details of what is sleep; a lot of the findings, the history of research and the anecdotes were new to me. It is well-written and interesting. As the book proceeds through Parts 2 and 3 on why we sleep and about dreams, the message around the importance of sleep becomes too repetitive and almost preachy. Part 4, on society and sleep has interesting nuggets on how modern lifestyle is at the heart of the insomnia epidemic. Yet here too, the proposed societal changes seems to ignore the larger aspects of economics and our current social structures, which makes the proposals sound like - at best - wishful thinking. Overall, I enjoyed the book and learnt quite a few new things, though I won't say that it is an engaging or unputdownable non-fiction. I also felt that the book was overly US centric, leaving out important cultural and social aspects of sleep beyond the states. I found the writing style a little dry and anecdotes emotionally distanced.

Good books are rare. I rate good books on a scale of 1 to 3. At Level 1, a good book must force you to think and reflect or teach you stuff that you did not know. At Level 2, you should want the book to not end. At Level 3, it should be great enough to recommend to people you care about. "Why We Sleep" is at Level 3. I get my full complement of sleep, as per Walker's recommendation (7 to 9 hours). It's the whys and wherefores that make the book phenomenal. Imagine a book whose storyline is already known to you and yet you cannot avoid turning the pages, afraid to miss out a single word. Walker's homely style, his explanations of complex terms within the text itself (without those pesky footnotes) are a refreshing aspect. Plus he does not assume that once you have read the explanation of a complex term, you will recollect it in full, he will gently summarise it again, if the term reappears. This book is a testament to the power of knowledge. All in all highly recommended.

I can't say anything about the book yet, I'm sure it's good... But I was upset by the condition it arrived in. It's sticky and scratched. It looks as if it's already been read, and it's unpleasant to hold. The price was ok, otherwise I would return it straight away

Lettura estremamente interessante ed educativa: esaustiva, dettagliata, con decine di studi scientifici a supporto degli argomenti trattati. Descritto così sembra quasi si tratti di un libro universitario, ma non lo è affatto! L'autore, professore di Neuroscienza e Psicologia e direttore di un laboratorio di ricerca su sonno e neuroimaging, è riuscito a mettere a terra l'argomento in maniera da rendere la lettura interessante, piacevole, e soprattutto di facile comprensione. Sicuramente consigliato a chi, come me, è sempre stato incuriosito dal sonno e voglia saperne di più. Tra gli argomenti più interessanti in mia opinione: cos'è il sonno e dove ha origine, a che cosa serve, come cambia nel corso della vita, quali possono essere gli innumerevoli effetti del dormire poco (ad esempio su apprendimento ed emotività), a cosa servono i sogni, e come sia possibile migliorare il proprio sonno senza ricorrere a farmaci.

Que gran libro, si tienes problemas de insomnio o quieres informarte con lo mejor en los estudios del sueño es un libro ideal

This book compiles a lot of scientific findings about sleep. Sleep is essential for our mental and physical health. A lack of sleep can cause many serious problems. I have changed my recognition of sleep entirely. I want to recommend everyone who engages in health care.

O livro explica de maneira muito clara e didática sobre inúmeras nuances do sono e como elas afetam o comportamento de maneira geral. É uma viagem não apenas sobre saúde física e emocional como também sobre o impacto social, em múltiplas áreas, da privação crônica de sono atual.