"Are you tired and forget things more often"

... than you used to?...

Why?

People in previous generations did not have calculators available for them to solve even the complex calculation. They did not have Facebook to remind them of upcoming parties, events, or so. They did not even rely on 'sticky notes' or 'To-do-List' as a tool to remember things they were supposed to do at some designated point of time.

Yet these people could remember their friends' birthdays', addresses' at ease.
Today we don't even remember our friends birthday, and could hardly remember our roommate's phone number. We are completely on 'Mobile Reliance'.

One of the very basic reasons for forgetting things is lack of deep sleep. Irregular sleeping patterns, drinking alcohol and over-dependency on technology are some of the causes.

The loss of memory is connected to the ageing brain cells that gradually die. Slow - wave sleep is critically important for cementing new memories that one has recently learned.

Recently I have had been teaching this good habit to my sister(Song Shan). She was able to do it for a day, because she loves me, after I asked her to do so. She complained that it's very difficult for her and also the whole day she feels headache. What she doesn't understand is that once the sleep gets better, memory becomes healthy. And talking about difficulty, yes, it is. It needs '21' continuous days for an action to become a habit.

Let me bring up the different stages of sleep:

Stage 1: is a drowsy, relaxed state between being awake and sleeping.

Stage 2: is a period of light sleep where heart rate slows and body temperature decreases, getting ready for deep sleep.

Stage 3 & Stage 4: or deep sleep, are hard to wake up from because there is the lowest amount of activity in the brain and body.

After deep sleep, we go back to Stage 2 and then enter dream sleep, also called Rapid Eye Movement or REM Sleep.

Sleep plays a significant role in brain development. The amount of deep sleep helps predict how much one can remember. One should avoid noisy and uncomfortable setting. there should be a specific time for going to bed, the earlier the better.

* The perception that alcohol helps in one's sleep is wrong. Research has shown that alcohol disrupts sleep cycle. One may fall asleep but the sleep cycle gets fragmented.

"I follow the pattern of 10 PM to 6 AM i.e. I sleep 8 hours a day. I drink 4 liters of water everyday. I read a book and play slow music (retro-years) before sleeping. I avoid coffee (am a teetotaler). It is also very important to get rid of stressful thoughts. I practice Yoga and enjoy swimming an hour a day. The above mentioned points are my 'healthy secrets to happiness and success.'"