Surprising Mental Health Benefits Of Mid-Day Napping

An urge to close your eyes and have a power nap after lunch at the workplace is something we are all familiar with. Continuing work at that time becomes an uphill task. All you want is to catch a few quick winks somehow. However, a guilty feeling might have prevented you from doing that.

Others jump into analyzing why that individual is into that situation and how it could be solved to become a more productive individual. Does anyone emphasize providing some education on why one should not avoid mid-day napping and its benefits? Not many. Below are some points which would highlight the advantages of mid-day napping and the positive points regarding this.

Reduces Fatigue And Makes You Feel Relaxed

A nap is not a solution for sleep deprivation. For that, you must get some sound sleep at night. The noisy and chaotic environment around you and the electromagnetic frequencies emitted from various electric devices can lead to extra fatigue in you, which is where a nap can have a major role to play.

A power nap has the potential to reduce fatigue and alleviate stress. It also promotes alertness and boosts your productivity and learning. According to a study by NASA, a nap of 40 minutes helps you enhance your performance by 34%. And it increases your alertness by almost 100%.

Prevents Burnout

Sometimes, people tend to miss out on proper sleep and forget a nap due to a tight schedule. Many think that taking a nap would make them lose out on a lot of vital time. They do not realize that their productivity would go downhill if they continuously avoid this nap for four days.

It has proved through a study that if an individual takes a nap session of half-an-hour, they can prevent a deterioration in their performance. If you take a one-hour nap after your second session, your performance will reach an altogether new level in the third and the fourth session.

Boosts Your Mood

When you are under a great amount of stress, your body tends to use serotonin responsible for a feeling of well-being. The production is less, and the usage is more. As a consequence, there is a shortage. Thereby, you become irritable, run out of patience, depressed, and anxious.

To make up for the lack of serotonin, you must have a power nap. A nap helps in the production of serotonin, reverses the effects of stress, and helps you have a more positive outlook. All these are important for increased productivity at work.

Improves Health And Helps in Weight Loss

You might have often heard about the word, cortisone. Cortisone happens to be a stress hormone that gets released when your body is under anxiety and stress. Therefore, this is harmful to your mental and physical well-being—a power nap aids in the release of a growth hormone which acts as an antidote to cortisone.

This hormone improves your body’s immunity system, aids in the reduction of stress, helps in muscle repair, and boosts weight loss. Aside from this, it also reduces the risks associated with heart diseases. As per a study conducted over six years, those who opted to have a power nap had a 37% less risk of dying due to any heart disease.

Increases Creativity

Lack of sleep can decrease productivity. When you feel sleepy during the second session, you refrain from falling asleep since you feel guilty. For some, it is against work ethics. As a result, productivity comes down during the third and the fourth session. A quick nap of 30 to 40 minutes helps a lot in that situation.

If you take a nap for an hour, your performance gets enhanced later on. People often believe that good food and beautiful sceneries heighten their senses. A power nap does the same. Through a nap, the link between different insights gets stronger. You experience an increase in your creativity too.

A nap gives extra stamina to work for long hours and helps you to de-stress. If you get sleepy post-lunch, it doesn’t imply that you are lazy. It’s quite natural.  Post nap, you would automatically realize that your cognitive performance has heightened. And you would thank yourself for napping!