Sleep after lunch: understand this ancestral technique that brings countless health benefits, learn a little more about this practice.
Taking a short sleep after the midday meal is an ancestral tradition of many civilizations (wise naps).
Know the advantages of sleeping 20 minutes after your midday meal.
Scientific research has proven that taking a short nap of between 10 and 20 minutes, after the main meal in the middle of the day, increases work capacity, improves creativity, business lucidity and conflict management in the second part of the day and even makes sleeping during the night more regular and effective.
Perhaps for all these reasons, in Asian culture, this sleep is called the nap of the wise.
It is a fact that most people feel drowsy and lack energy after lunch and try to ward off sleep through coffee or other stimulating drinks.
What is interesting is that realizing that a short period of light sleep would be much more effective in providing a second half of the day with more physical and cognitive vitality and good mood.
When you immerse yourself in a state of deep sleep, even if only for a few minutes, the brain is allowed to enter a functioning state that is recorded on the electroencephalogram with waves called alpha.
In this state known as “alpha state” the brain recovers from the wear and tear of the previous hours and is ready to return to work at its best with more vivacity, better memory capacity and greater resilience.
For those trained in meditation, this “alpha state” corresponds to the state of deep meditation.
Around the world, many people organize their daily lives with a nap routine.
In Mediterranean culture – “la siesta” – it is a very old habit to sleep for about half an hour after lunch, which, fortunately for Spaniards, is still alive in Spain.
But in the other countries of the Mediterranean basin it is only practiced by a few farmers.
In Japan, businessmen are well aware of the advantages of the “nap of the wise” for their good deals in the afternoon and it is frequent to see them on the benches of the gardens after lunch, sleeping peacefully for 20 minutes.
The natives of South America know from their ancestors that it is good to be asleep when “the sun changes its radius”, that is, when the sun changes from ascending to descending, which corresponds to the siesta of the wise men of Asia and to the siesta of the Mediterranean.
The habit of taking a short nap in the middle of the day, up to about 20 minutes, helps to regulate the person’s sleep rhythm and allows them to fall asleep better and have a more restful sleep during the night.
Whenever possible, recover this old healthy habit and take a short nap of up to 20 minutes on the couch at home, leaning back in your office chair or on the seat of your car, or on a garden bench.
After that, have your coffee.
We are certain that the rest of your day will go much better and your sleep at night will be more rewarding!