This is a fascinating article on why a person needs REM sleep.  Of the 4 stages of sleep, REM seems to be where the brain is most active.  REM sleep is where you dream your most unusual dreams.  In the REM (Rapid Eye Movement) stage, your body is actually in a near state of paralysis and usually people do not move at all.

While you sleep, your brain reorganizes your memories from the day.  Exactly how dreaming influences this is not known, but scientists are exploring this.  When you take a nap, it is best to only sleep for 20 minutes so you do not go into a stage 4 sleep.  If you do go in to a stage 4 sleep, you will feel more tired when you wake up.  So limit those power naps to 20 minutes.

If you want to be as smart as possible, be sure to get your 6-8 hours of sleep per night, and especially that 2 hours in the dream state where your eyeballs are watching that imaginary tennis match called REM.

This article discusses the stages you go through as you sleep and why each is important. There are 4 stages of sleep, and if you are awakened during stage 3 or 4, you will probably feel very groggy.

Sleep is needed to refresh the body and enable the brain to process and retain information. Lack of sleep can contribute to daytime mood problems, decreased productivity and an increased risk for accidents. Studies show an accumulated sleep “debt” may lead to the development of high blood pressure, obesity, cardiovascular disease and an increased risk for infections.

On average, adults need 7 to 9 hours of sleep each night. But surveys by the National Sleep Foundation find many Americans aren’t getting enough sleep. On average, respondents say they get 6 hours, 40 minutes of sleep on weeknights and 7 hours, 7 minutes on weekends. Twenty percent of Americans are getting less than six hours of sleep a night.

Naps are also very good for you.  A short 20 minute nap (before you get beyond stage 1) will help you to become refreshed and ready for the rest of the day.

While a person sleeps, their brain is actually working very hard to consolidate everything they have learned that day so they can recall things from long term memory.  If a person’s sleep is interrupted, their ability to remember what they learned that day is seriously degraded.  So, pulling those all-nighters in college may have helped get through the exam for that day.  But it probably severely  hurt the chances of remembering that information for the long term.

If you fail to get enough sleep, your ability to remember what you learned has been shown to suffer dramatically.  People who got less sleep than their body demanded were 80% less effective than people who got the sleep their body required.   People who stay awake for many days, have been shown to display severe psychological problems such as hallucinations.

Naps are good for you. As soon as you wake up, your body begins to tell you to go to sleep.  Around 3 PM, your body’s natural sleep rhythm wants a 25 minute nap.  People who nap actually perform better the rest of the day than people who stay awake all day.  Your brain revitalizes itself and is better able to focus for the second half of your day.

Sleep deprived people have issues being creative.  Tests have shown that the brain of people who have not gotten the proper amount of sleep actually act differently.  The frontal lobe is associated with a person’s speech as well as novel and creative thinking.  In sleep deprived people, there is a significant decrease in activity in this area of the brain.  While activity is seen within the parietal lobes of rested people as they think through math problems no corresponding activity is visible within the brains of sleep-deprived subjects.

It is important to have a consistent sleep schedule.  Our bodies and the chemicals it produces work best when it can depend on a schedule.  One study showed that by merely anticipating a wake-up time, our bodies will spike ACTH and cortisol higher than normal.  By anticipating our wake-up time we can give ourselves that hormonal jolt of energy to hop out of bed with ease.  Depressed people do not have that anticipation and never get that hormonal boost.

Our brain needs sleep to form long term memories and repair itself.  Depriving our brains of the sleep it requires (the amount which is different for each person) and you can ensure that your brain will NOT operate at it peak efficiency no matter how many Myfitbrain games you play.