Understanding Sleep Cycles and How to Improve Your Rest

Sleep plays a pivotal role in your physical health, mental health, and your overall well-being. Unfortunately, we live in a society that teaches us that we need to be as busy as possible at all times, often forfeiting rest in the name of being more productive.

Unfortunately, when you give up sleep, even a couple of hours of sleep, you run the risk of not being able to perform at your best in any area of your life.

Many people don’t understand the science behind sleep, which leads to them assuming that staying up two or three extra hours to get a few more things checked off the to-do list is a good way to cut down on the stress that they’ll face the following day.

That’s just not the case at all. Today, learn more about sleep cycles, which are at the heart of sleep science, and find out how you can improve your rest, allowing you to be the best version of yourself professionally and personally.

What Are Sleep Cycles?

You’ve probably heard people talk about “shutting off their brains” so they can get some sleep. That’s just not possible. In addition to the automatic, involuntary responses that your brain controls while you are sleeping, such as breathing, swallowing, and more, the brain also goes through sleep cycles. The term “sleep cycles” refers to the natural patterns that your brain goes through while you sleep.

In general, sleep cycles last for around 90 minutes, and the average adult experiences four to six sleep cycles every night. That means that most people sleep somewhere between six and nine hours each night.

While each part of the 90-minute cycle has a name and a purpose, experts typically break sleep cycles down into two categories.

Non-REM sleep refers to the part of sleep that takes place when your brain is not in REM sleep and the other is REM, which stands for rapid eye movement sleep. Non-REM sleep makes up ¾ of your sleep cycle, while REM sleep is its own unique concept.

The early part of the night is when you get some of your deepest sleep, which is a vital part of your body healing itself from the day.

Even if you don’t perform a physically demanding job, your body needs rest and recovery from the day that you went through. This deep sleep, which is REM sleep, not only allows your body to heal, but it also allows your mind to reconcile deep, emotional conflicts that you’ve encountered.

Why Each Stage of Sleep Matters

If REM sleep is the most important of the cycles, wouldn’t it make the most sense for your body to stay in that stage for as long as possible? Why haven’t humans evolved to the point where all sleep is REM sleep, allowing their bodies and minds to perform at their best all day every day?

It’s because every stage of sleep matters, and there are no unimportant parts of the sleep cycle.

Stage 1

Stage 1 of the sleep cycle is when your body starts to drift from being awake to being asleep. You’ve probably found yourself nodding off on the couch, finding yourself unable to take part in conversations going on around you, even if you can hear them.

Many people take this first stage as a sign that it’s time to go to bed. When you start dozing off while watching the evening news or your favorite late-night TV show, you feel like your body is telling you it’s time for bed. Actually, your brain is telling you that it’s entering the first stage of sleep.

Stage 2

In the second stage of sleep, your body temperature drops and your heart rate decreases. This is one of the most important parts of the sleep cycle, thanks in large part to the benefits that it provides to your body.

While your resting heart rate during daytime hours may be anywhere between 60 and 90, it often drops into the high 40s during stage 2 sleep. This is an important opportunity for the most important muscle in your body to rest.

The decreased temperature stems from the fact that your heart isn’t pumping as much blood through your body, and your cooler internal temperature also helps other organs get a break from their functions during the day.

Stage 3

Once your body is cooled, stage 3 can begin. Even though your heart rate is slower and blood isn’t reaching all of your muscles, tissues, and organs at such a high rate, this is a stage of deep sleep where physical healing takes place.

Long before the wonders of modern medicine made medications possible, allowing us to treat injuries and illnesses, doctors would tell patients to sleep as much as possible and get plenty of rest. This was because even though they didn’t know it in detail at the time, sleep plays a pivotal role in the healing of your body.

Tissue growth and repair take place during this stage, and it’s also a chance for your immune system to rebuild itself from waging war against the microbes and bad bacteria that you’ve encountered throughout the day. This is why doctors thousands of years ago told patients to rest.

Stage 4

Finally, the fourth stage of sleep is REM sleep. While your eyes are closed, your eyeballs are actually moving rapidly, receiving signals from your brain.

It’s during this stage that you dream, and while not every dream has some sort of deep-seated meaning, dreams do allow you to work through some of the emotional turmoil and mental weight that you’ve been faced with.

This fourth stage focusing so much on your cognitive function and mental health means that every part of the sleep cycle plays a role in your overall health and wellness.

How to Get Better Rest

Now that you know how important each part of the sleep cycle is, how do you make sure that you get enough rest every night?

The first step is to create a consistent bedtime routine for yourself. This means putting your phone down, ideally 30 to 60 minutes before you’re ready for sleep. The blue light that comes from your cellphone can trick your brain into thinking it’s still daytime, which will throw off your sleep patterns.

The second part of improving sleep hygiene is to create a space that’s conducive to sleep. For most people, this means keeping their bedroom lights dim or completely off. It also includes the patterns in your bedroom and even the color of your walls.

While bright colors and flashy patterns are fine for some parts of your home, your bedroom should be an area that calms the mind. It also includes investing in high-quality bedding items that allow you to get comfortable and stay asleep.

If you’re constantly tossing and turning, trying to get comfortable, and fighting for rest, you’ll struggle to adequately go through all of your nightly sleep cycles.

Ultimately, improving your sleep quality is all about consistency. Go to bed around the same time each night, and try to get up around the same time each morning.

While sleep provides a host of benefits to the body, it all begins in your mind. When you get your brain into a habit of sleeping during the same hours in the same environment, your mind and body can reap the many benefits of quality sleep.