Sleep

"For some of you reading this book, perhaps the single most spiritual thing you could do right now is to put it down and take a nap." - John Ortberg, "The Life You've Always Wanted: Spiritual Growth for Ordinary People"

God has been challenging ... correction ... convicting me regarding my sleep habits.

What's the big deal? There's no commandment like "Thou shalt not be awake more than sixteen hours before sleeping. Sixteen hours thou shalt be awake, and eight hours thou shalt sleep." Is there? Besides, my back hurts if I lay down more than a few hours at a time. I'm a morning person, and a night person. Why can't I be both?

I have been told, and I have told one or more of my children nothing good happens after midnight. Looking back I would say not much good happens after 8PM. Seriously, what worthwhile thing am I usually doing late evenings that I couldn't have done earlier if I hadn't procrastinated?

Typical late evening activities: watch tv (more recently streaming Netflix), read email (follow random rabbit trails), check facebook (follow more random rabbit trails), check the news (tv, web, newspaper), online chat, online games, surf the web (often inspired by and followed by more randomness), read (Bible, devotional books, other books, blogs, newspaper), shop (groceries, clothes, online).

I am being made aware that the later I stay up, the stronger the temptations to read, watch, do, things that Jesus has already told me not to do. The longer I stay awake, the more tired I am, the weaker I am. So why stay up? Because it's tempting, and easy to rationalize, and not necessarily "evil", a few seconds at a time, no big decisions, almost imperceptible drifting.

What are the consequences of staying up too late? Guilt, for one. I know better, but I don't do better, and I am convicted when I finally succumb to sleep, and again when I wake up or am awakened by the alarm. Misery. I don't feel great. In fact I often feel a lot like someone suffering from a hangover. Danger. I'm not as alert as I could be when I'm cutting vegetables or driving. Drowsiness is one of the primary causes of fatal accidents, so others are endangered by me. Sickness. How many cold or flu viruses could my body have warded off if it weren't exhausted? Weight gain. I've lost a lot of weight over the last 18 months, but when I'm up late I'm much more likely to snack so will probably gain weight.

Once in a while I actually do go to bed "early", which for me means before midnight. What good usually follows? I wake up without an alarm clock. I have a more relaxed morning as I prepare to go to work. Nothing is rushed. I'm not [as] cranky. I feel better. I'm more alert.

What happens on the rare occasions when I go to bed before 10PM? If I was exhausted from staying up too late the previous nights, my body gets a chance to recover. If I wasn't in a recovery cycle, I will actually wake up early enough to have time to spend time with my Bible before I go to work.

I'm writing this the Saturday morning after a recovery night. I stayed up too late Thursday night, so fell in bed exhausted between 10 and 11PM Friday night after a pretty miserable day. I woke up this morning about 6AM feeling pretty good. I must have slept almost seven hours. That's unusually long for me to sleep. It's Saturday, so I didn't have to get ready for work. I've had time to make coffee, weigh in, read scripture, eat breakfast, and now work on this blog post I've been putting off for a few weeks.

I want to wake up spontaneously around 5AM. That's not a stretch for me; I often awaken around that time if I'm not recovering. I want the relaxed devotional time to start the day. I want the enjoyable productive days that follow a good night's sleep. The simple math is that in order to get eight hours sleep before 5AM, I must go to bed by 9PM. Yikes! I'll never get everything done if I go to bed that early. But the reality is I don't get much done of any value after 9PM.

The message is simple. I need to discipline myself to go to bed by 9PM on a regular basis. Going to bed at midnight needs to become the rare exception, not the norm. My expectation is that you will see more regular posts about other positive things Jesus is teaching me if I am obedient in the area of sleep. Children of the Father need their sleep.