Smartphone Tips for Better Sleep

We live in a world where technology is constantly around us, and it's only getting more connected. There are many benefits to this, but one of the challenges is that it can make sleep difficult for some people. The blue light from screens messes with our circadian rhythms, which leads to difficulty sleeping at night. To help you get better sleep while still being able to use your phone during the day here are some simple tips.

How Smartphones Create the Problems with Sleeping

There are many reasons why people don't sleep well. Problems with sleeping can be caused by all sorts of things like stress, alcohol consumption, caffeine intake and more. However, smartphones may also play a role in the lack of quality rest that so many experience every night. This is because smartphones are a significant part of many people's lives, and they often go to bed with them.

A lot of peaople can admit to using their cellphones at night, and many will also say that they have trouble sleeping because of it. This is not surprising since most people know the dangers smart phones pose on sleep: blue light exposure from screens has been linked with insomnia and other sleep disorders. But did you know that these problems date back all the way to 2007 when smartphones were first released?

Using a smartphone before going to sleep may make it harder for you to fall asleep.In fact, according to research presented by Harvard Health Publications , exposure to blue light suppresses the production of this vital hormone up until three hours later! Therefore, keeping your phone out of reach while trying to get some zzzzs might be an important thing do if getting better rest is something you're striving for. It's important to know how much screen brightness affects our brains so we may decrease or increase its impact on us as needed.

How Smartphones can help with Sleeping Problems

The better step to getting better sleep to try keeping your phone outside of your room so you don’t even see it when lying down at night. It might seem trivial but there are so many studies out there that show how detrimental our phones can be on our health if we use them too close to sleeping time. Try taking a break from social media by deleting apps like Facebook or Snapchat, which keep us checking back constantly throughout the day. Apps like Twitter will do less damage as they are more public platforms where users are posting publicly rather than uploading content privately with an audience made up of only their friends (although that’s still a cause for concern).

Turn off all notifications and put your phone on airplane mode at bedtime. This way you won't get any interruptions from alerts, texts or calls that will prevent you from falling asleep quickly. Having a screen light in the room can also be disruptive to sleep since it reduces melatonin production which is critical for initiating restorative sleep.

Dim your smartphone display as low as possible when using it before going to bed by adjusting the brightness settings of your device's main menu options. You'll find this setting under "Display" in most Android devices while iPhones have an option called "Auto Brightness" within their Display Settings menus allowing users to automatically adjust backlight intensity based upon ambient lighting conditions according to Apple Support instructions if needed.

Consider using an app that gradually reduces the amount of blue light your screen emits over time. This helps delay melatonin suppression which can make it harder to fall asleep at night according to Harvard Medical School research. There are a few apps available that do this including f.lux, Twilight and Apple's Night Shift feature if you have iOS devices with up-to-date software updates installed on them as directed by their manufacturers instructions.

Avoid using your smartphone in bed. The light disrupts natural melatonin production and can make it harder to fall asleep when you find yourself awake at night. Sleep experts recommend avoiding any screen time for an hour before going to sleep if possible because of this disruptive property according to the National Sleep Foundation.

Don't look at your phone when you wake up at night! If it is something important, then answer and go back to sleep. Otherwise leave it until morning or simply ignore the notification(s) altogether if they aren’t urgent. It will keep you from worrying about what might be happening on social media (or whatever else). Instead of checking your device every few minutes, try meditating for a couple of minutes or drinking some water instead - that way you can get right back into deep sleep without any interruptions!

Summary

Smartphones have taken over our daily lives without us noticing. People are constantly on their phones, checking for updates and notifications that they may not even care about in the first place. But is it really necessary to check your phone right before bed? Unfortunately, no matter how hard you try to put down your smartphone late at night, there are certain things that can keep you up all night long - or at least prevent full relaxation so you don't fall asleep easily when trying to do so. But if you will use your smartphone wisely, you can actually benefit from it and get a better night's sleep.

The best way to getting better sleep is turning off your phone. If this sounds impossible for you because everyone else in the family uses their devices late at night as well, then try using blue-light blocking screen glasses which will minimize any potential disruptions from artificial lights while also helping suppress melatonin production, which naturally makes us want to fall asleep . And if everything fails and you simply can't resist checking your phone right before bed, then at least set a specific time to do so. You can use an app that will help you achieve this goal - for example, the Offtime app which limits smartphone usage by allowing only certain apps during designated times of day.

What you should know about Eye Protection, Visual Aids and Magnifying Lamps

Together with the brain, our eyes help us perceive the world around us in a way that no other organ can. Each of us experiences the world differently: everyone sees differently! What we see depends not only on how well we can see but also on what we want to see with - our personal preferences, experiences, and memories play a key role in what we perceive. We get about 80% of our impressions through our eyes. Today I'm going to tell you in detail about Eye protection and magnifying lamps.

But they do so much more for us: our eyes are often called the mirror of our soul - and it's true. They also reflect our feelings, such as joy, sadness, stress, and fatigue. It can also affect the quality of our vision. If we are stressed during an exam, the result we get may be different from what we might have gotten if we had been relaxed and in a good mood. What we see during the day stays with us at night. When we sleep, we process the images we saw while we were awake. Even embryos in the womb can sense light.

Thus, it is crucial to use any means to protect and care for our eyes. In other words, we should do regular checks on our eyesight.

In Today's World, Our Eyes Face A Variety of Problems

Today, we are constantly using desktops, laptops, smartphones, tablets, and even just watching TV, with our eyes focusing on one distance for much longer than before. This can lead to eye strain and headaches, back or neck pain at the end of the day.

Many argue about how effective eye training is. However, one thing we can say for sure is that if we focus our gaze on an object close to us (such as a computer) for a long time, we should take short breaks during the day to rest. It is very simple: just look away regularly without focusing on anything, for example, for five minutes an hour.

What About Children?

This does not only apply to adults: to maximize children's visual potential, they should train their eyes as often as possible at short and long distances. Everyone knows that children are more likely to develop nearsightedness or myopia if they focus for long periods of time at short distances, such as reading, drawing, or playing games on a tablet or desktop computer.

Physical Exercise

Exercise, daylight, and a balanced diet are equally important for our eyes and overall health. We need to consume enough fluids throughout the day. An unbalanced diet (too many acidic foods or eating foods poor in vitamins and nutrients), smoking, certain medications, and low exercise has a negative effect on our eyes. Circulatory disorders are considered the leading cause of many eye diseases. Excessive exposure to direct sunlight also harms our eyes. Appropriate precautions should be taken - our eyes will thank us.

Methods of Prevention

In addition to regular visits to an ophthalmologist, the following methods are recommended:

Gymnastics for the eyes. Special exercises for the eye are good for increasing the blood supply to the tissues of the eye, increase the tone, elasticity, and strength of the eye muscles, strengthen the muscles of the eyelids, relieve fatigue. There are many techniques to perform gymnastics for the eyes.

Sports. Exercise can help strengthen the vision and restore its sharpness in the initial stages of the disease. Ideally, preference should be given to such kinds of training which require constant eye focusing, for example, badminton, tennis, basketball or soccer.

Water Treatments. Contrasting water treatments help improve blood circulation in the retina. In the morning, rinse your eyes alternately with warm and cold clear water about 20 times. Alternatively, hot and cold compresses can be applied alternately to the eyelids.

Choosing Magnifying Lamps

What criteria should be considered to avoid disappointment from buying a lamp-lamp, because the quality source of light is very important in the work of the master? Each lamp-lamp model has its own features. Lamp-lamp on a tripod with a backlight is characterized by mobility and increased size, but if you are not very limited in space, the lamp on a tripod is the most functional and convenient, especially when using a chair couch. Also, a magnifying lamp on a tripod on wheels so that the master can move it with ease if necessary, to aim and fix the lens in any position. What's more, you can find out all the details about these lamps on this site https://yourdiorama.com/best-magnifying-lamp-reviews/. Here you will see the pros and cons of each type of lamp and its characteristics.

A magnifying glass, by type of magnification, should be selected based on the following important factors:

  • Magnification (multiplicity):
  • 1D magnification type: the focus (between the object and the lens surface) is 100 cm, with a magnification of 1.25 times the viewed area;
  • 3D magnification type: The focus (between the object and the lens surface) is 33 cm, with the viewable area enlarging by 1.75 times;
  • 5D magnification type: focus (between the object and the lens surface) is 20 cm, with enlargement of the viewed area by 2.25 times.
  • The standard magnifying lamp has 3D magnification, such magnifying lamp allows convenient positioning of the instrument and provides normal magnification.
  • Design. You can choose different sizes of the lamp-loupe, as well as different colors (black, white).
  • Power. The chosen lamp-loupe should have a power of at least 12 watts. In this case, the loupe lamp illuminates not only a specific area but the surrounding space.
  • Size. Pay attention to the magnifying glass lens diameter. The material of the lens is glass. The optimal variant is a lens diameter not less than 14 cm. You can see the diameter of the lens in the technical characteristics on the page with the lamp of interest. Lens diameter is given in cm.
  • A loupe lamp on a clamp or a floor loupe lamp with a stand, a loupe lamp on a clamp, a loupe lamp on a bracket. The clamp is a tabletop mount.

That’s It!

The eyes are one of the main organs of human perception of the surrounding reality. Human eyes are very complex and need protection from damage, as well as certain conditions for normal development and operation. Prevention of visual impairment is extremely important because every person with age faces the fact that visual acuity begins to decrease. This process happens differently to everyone, but one way or another, vision always suffers, if not from age, then from all sorts of diseases, external influences and disturbances.

15 Reasons Why Good Sleep Is Important

Sleep is a physiological human need, just like hunger or thirst. If a person is deprived of sleep, he will eventually die. In ancient times, people considered sleeping a kind of death, because when a person went to bed and closed his eyes, his breathing became rarer and his reaction to external stimuli decreased. Scientists realized that sleep is not a monotonous state, but an active process with many functions. So today I will tell you about the importance of a good night's sleep.

What are the dangers of insomnia? Every neurologist knows that insomnia is an insidious time bomb in our bodies. It starts with difficulties falling asleep, as well as short-term sleep disorders, and eventually leads to physical and nervous exhaustion. Insomnia can cause fairly serious CNS disorders, psychosis, depression, lack of sufficient normal sleep increases the risk of dangerous diseases such as stroke and heart attack.

What Happens to Our Brain Because Of Lack of Sleep

Insomnia and lack of sleep significantly reduce the quality of human life, cause apathy, irritability, and increased fatigue. A "sleep-deprived" person may have problems with memory, reduced mental and physical activity, and this will have a negative impact on your professional activities.

1. The Latest Findings on Sleep and Memory

How well we sleep depends on our brain and memory function. Our brain, not getting the hours of rest it needs, begins to perceive familiar tasks as new, and therefore spends considerably more effort to solve them.

2. Sleep as A Means of Memory Training

Those people who regularly do not get enough sleep very often show poor results in memory tests. Belgian scientists conducted an entertaining experiment. Volunteers were shown images and then given time to rest. Those of them, who suffered from insomnia, when repeatedly shown the images were able to remember less than those who had a good sleep.

3. Remembering Things

Recent scientific research has revealed that while sleeping, the brain is engaged in remembering and learning things seen while awake. Evidence has been found that sleep is indeed necessary for humans at all stages of learning about the world, from schoolwork to learning how to cook. In addition, they look better.

4. Sleep Time

Babies spend the most time sleeping. While an adult's need for sleep is satisfied on average by seven to eight hours, for infants it is at least ten. In addition, a child has to absorb a lot of new information. Just to remember and process it requires a long sleep.

5. After Pregnancy, You Won't Have A Good Night's Sleep for A Long Time

Unless you plan to give your baby to a nanny immediately after birth, you will definitely not have a good night's sleep for the next few months. However, it turns out in your case, tries to get as much sleep as possible during your pregnancy. Sure, it's hard to get enough sleep, but you won't be as crushingly tired.

6. A Good Night's Sleep Is Important for The Fetus

Getting plenty of rest is critical not only for you but also for your unborn child. During pregnancy, the body has special stress, only properly sleeping, he will be able to cope with them fully.

7. Nervous System

Lack of sleep affects the immune system. Simply speaking, the antiviral system simply doesn't have time to recover, thereby depressing it. This makes us vulnerable to any infections. Sleep and immunity are interrelated. The immune system can affect sleep patterns, and sleep affects the body's defense system. More sleep is unlikely to make you completely immune to disease, but lack of sleep very quickly leads to an imbalanced immune system in which some elements are overstimulated and others are weakened.

8. Sleep and The Brain

The nervous system is directly affected by your sleep patterns. If we don't give our head enough rest, our nerve cells become agitated, work beyond normal, our mood becomes anxious, aggressive, depressed, etc. The brain becomes incapable of working, the ability to work falls.

9. Weight Gain

If a person is sleep-deprived, they expose themselves to weight gain, obesity, and even type 2 diabetes. If the brain and nerve cells begin to work at full blast, then most of the energy from food goes there.

10. Hormone Production

  • First, melatonin, which normalizes hormones in general and blood pressure, as well as supports the immune system.
  • Second, male and female sex hormones.
  • Third, the hormones leptin - satiety, and ghrelin - hunger.

11. Training

The connection between normal sleep and training is simple: if you got enough sleep - full of strength and energy - ready and willing to work out if you did not get enough sleep - no mood, strength, energy, desire to do something - you skip the workout. At this point, melatonin and somatotropin are important. They help repair the muscles and the body as a whole. If sleep is lacking, cortisol (elevated) will come into play and prevent proper recovery or even expose the muscles to decay.

12. Cleansing

While awake, the human body is busy organizing movement, digesting food, and actively exercising. In sleep, when you are resting, completely different processes take place - the binding and removal of toxins, the elimination of harmful microorganisms.

13. Fixation of Information in The Brain

New knowledge stays in the memory exactly because of the night process of remembering. Long-term memory is formed, new skills are fixed.

14. Immunity Strengthening

New immune system cells are formed during sleep, protecting the person from infections.

15. Replenishment of Energy Resources

Performance in the morning is due to the fact that for 6-8 hours there was no load on the muscles.

That’s It!

To get a good night's sleep and a good night's sleep, you need to take your bedroom arrangements seriously. It is not enough to choose a beautiful and comfortable bed, you need a mattress on which you will feel comfortable all night long.

Music to listen to before the bedtime

The best music to enjoy before the bedtime

A sleepless night is, to put it mildly, not a pleasant thing. It would seem that sleeping should be an extremely natural and uncomplicated activity for a person, but insomnia torments many of us. This is all the more unpleasant, since, according to new data, hours spent in bed are no less important for physical and mental health than eating, socializing, and walking.

A healthy night's sleep helps to improve mood, improve concentration, and memory. And scientists often associate sleep deprivation with a number of diseases, from heart disease to diabetes. If a person tries to fall asleep with all his might, then the effect is often the opposite - sleep does not come. Therefore, many ways have been invented that supposedly help us achieve our cherished goal. And listening to different sounds and music is one of them. Let's have a more detailed look at it.

Impact of music

In fact, the quality of sleep itself is not affected by music at all. We just don't hear it when our brains are disconnected from reality. But at the intermediate stage, that is, falling asleep, sounds can have a certain effect. In 2007, Hungarian scientists conducted one curious study, as a result of which it was found that the music that the experimental students listened to during sleep lowered blood pressure, reduced the heartbeat, in general, calmed the respondents, and they safely flew to the land of dreams. Experts from other countries, including China, also agreed with the Hungarians.

If music really has such a beneficial effect on the body, then another reasonable question arises: which melodies should be downloaded to your player? Everything is very simple here: focus on your own preferences and your own experience. However, experts still advise listening to some of their recommendations.

Recommendations on choosing music

  • First, listen only to music that brings pleasant associations or memories to you. Moreover, these memories should not awaken wild delight in you or other bright emotions. Otherwise, you will definitely not be able to fall asleep due to nervous overexcitement.
  • Secondly, it is not necessary to exclusively use melodies that are supposedly specially designed for sleeping and with which the Internet is full nowadays. They really help some people, but not because they have some miraculous effect. Often it is music without words, slow and calm. Thanks to these qualities, it promotes relaxation and subsequent falling asleep. However, you can compose your own collection of melodies for sleep, based on your own feelings. Someone falls asleep with the help of classical music, and someone chooses pop or even rock.

Sounds of nature

A survey conducted among residents of the UK showed that many people use various sounds of nature as a sleeping pill. Frequently, the chirping of birds and the noises of tropical forests are preferred. Scientists only support this point of view. Experts from the Brighton and Sussex Medical Schools have proven that sounds of nature actually contribute to relaxation. Therefore, the natural sound background perfectly distracts from obsessive and disturbing thoughts, which most often prevent us from falling asleep.

However, professionals warn: the sounds of nature, too, must be selected based on only your experiences and emotions. The fact is that some people relax perfectly when listening to the rain, and for some, it may be associated with some unpleasant memories that are unlikely to contribute to a quick fall asleep.

Audiobooks

As for audiobooks, while listening to them, many of us fall asleep due to the conditioned reflex developed in childhood, when mothers read books to us before going to bed. A low voice, as well as the monotony of the narrative, also promotes relaxation and focuses attention on the content of what is being read, and not on your own, sometimes restless, thoughts.

What kind of sound book to take to bed? You are free to decide for yourself. Some fall asleep when reading (or listening to) detective stories, others prefer classics, while the others like poetry the most.

For children

Bedtime meditation poems are a special kind of cure for improper sleeping for children. They help to relax, relieve stress after a long busy day, improve mood, help a child fall asleep faster and enjoy a sound and healthy sleep.

Meditation poems, like lullabies, are useful for getting your child to sleep quickly. It's possible to listen to them online or download several.

Listening to online meditation poems will be a great addition to lullabies for quickly falling asleep. Sometimes, just listening to the poem is enough for the child to fall asleep without any problems.

How to make a collection of songs to help you sleep

A collection of songs and other helpful things

American psychologist and sleep specialist James Findlay named eight ways to fall asleep quickly when you are troubled by anxious thoughts.

“Very often people complain that they are physically tired, but cannot sleep because of worries and annoying thoughts,” says James Findlay. According to the expert, there are some techniques that can help you cope with anxiety and fall asleep easily.

If you often suffer from insomnia, check out these recommendations.

To-do list

Make a to-do list. If you have anxious, negative thoughts before going to bed, turn them into positive ones. Make a list of good things to do for the next day, such as pleasant trips or good deeds. When falling asleep, you will be thinking about your plans. Research shows that writing down tasks can help clear your mind and tune in to a productive new day, which means you fall asleep faster.

Get out of bed

If you have been wasting time in bed for a long time and cannot sleep, it is better to get up and concentrate on something else. Psychologists say that frequent, prolonged attempts to sleep train the brain in such a way that it begins to associate the bed in your bedroom with insomnia. If within 20-30 minutes you cannot sleep, get up and do something: read, do crosswords. Soon you will really want to sleep.

Books will do

Read a book, but not a very exciting one. You can't just stop annoying thoughts in your head, but you can take your mind off of them by focusing on the book. But it should be a paper book, as gadget screens can further disrupt sleep. When you're distracted from what's bothering you, you fall asleep faster. The main thing is not to choose a book that is too interesting, because of which it will also be difficult to fall asleep.

Audiobooks

Listen to a podcast or audiobook. An audiobook or podcast works just like a book, distracting from sad thoughts and calming down. After listening, you can safely fall asleep.

Various sounds

You can also turn on soothing sounds. You can create a sleep-friendly sound environment for yourself. Some people are soothed by the sound of the ocean, others - by the singing of birds or the sounds of the evening forest. Just download these sounds and put on your headphones.

Breathe

Focus on your breathing. Deep and slow breathing can slow your heart rate and relieve stress. Accordingly, it will be easier for you to fall asleep.

Meditate

Meditation allows you to find mental balance and calmness. You can meditate not only just before bed, but also throughout the day. If you are unsure of the best way to meditate, you can use dedicated apps or YouTube videos that detail meditation techniques.

Download the sleep app

In the modern world, there are useful applications for smartphones that help you fall asleep faster. These apps contain specially selected sounds and noises to help the brain relax and fall asleep.

A collection of songs

Create a list of songs to fall asleep quickly. Music can really help you fall asleep. Many people use it for this, but, of course, it all depends on the type of music and the specific person. Some types of music can help you sleep better than others. Quiet, calm compositions at a slow pace with a small number of dynamic changes are most suitable for this. Such music helps to calm down, slow down the physiological processes in the body and get distracting thoughts out of the head.

Music has two effects on us. The first one is biological: you synchronize your breathing and pulse with the help of the slow tempo of the music and thus turn off your body and get ready for sleep. The second effect is that it chases away thoughts that keep you awake. Focused listening can distract you from anxiety and fill you with positive thoughts that are helpful for falling asleep.

Calm music usually helps you fall asleep. It's better not to listen to punk or heavy metal at night: aggressive, fast compositions with a lot of dynamic changes will certainly not help you fall asleep. Many people - for example, singers or songwriters - say that classical music or songs with a calm voice help them a lot.

But how to create a helpful playlist for yourself? There are several options for you to choose from: you can download a special app that already contains playlists of songs for falling asleep or create such a collection by yourself. If you have decided to use the second option, it may be a little bit more challenging. For example, if you want to download some songs From YouTube, you will understand it's impossible to do it. Nevertheless, you can easily download any YouTube video and convert it to MP3 format with the help of special convertors. It's quick and easy, so you will create a collection really quickly.