Human Longevity Secrets: Sleep

Video Transcript

"Another thing that can really help you live a long healthy life is getting adequate sleep. There's been a lot of news in the media lately about the benefits of sleep. And certainly studies have supported that adequate, sleeping adequate amount is really going to make a big difference in your health. And conversely not getting enough sleep can have very disastrous health effects. On the other hand it is possible to sleep too much. A recent study came out that demonstrated that sleeping more then nine or ten hours a day can also damage your health as much as sleeping under five to four hours a day. So you really want to kind of staying in that range between seven to eight hours. But everyone is a little bit different and even the experts will say that you need to listen to your body if you need a little bit more sleep than recommended then that's alright, and if you need a little bit less then that's fine. But the idea though is not chronically deprive yourself of sleep that your body does require and your body does want. So some of the studies that have come out recently have shown that getting adequate sleep can help with metabolism, which you know is a big factor in weight gain and weight loss so you'll, getting sleep can actually help you maintain a healthy weight. Sleep is also heavily involved with your learning and memory process, it's good for your heart, for your immunity, and several others things. But the bottom line is you want to make sure that you are getting adequate rest, that's a big factor in living a long and healthy life."