Not sleeping is a badge of honor in American Culture! Why!?

Why do we wear "not sleeping and functioning" as a badge of honor in America? Why is it considered cool and impressive to walk into a breakout session while away on a company retreat and say "We went from the dinner to the club and then to breakfast this morning? I just showered and came down to the meeting." How many times have you heard this while away at a conference? Why have truck drivers been embracing the macho idea of being able to drive from New York and California and back without stopping? It starts at an early age. We finish our term papers and go to class in high school without sleeping. We see our parents go without sleep and go to work day in and day out. We go to college and stay out all night and then crash on our bed for a few hours and run to class while scarfing down a donut and a cup of coffee to stay awake for the morning lecture.

Living and working on little sleep is seen as a superhero power. It is embraced and bragged about in conference rooms and break rooms across this country every single day.

What cracks me up is the party animal that makes it to the gym in the morning and eats organic food and talks about the importance of meditation and an organic diet.

My favorite line of hypocrisy is the weed smoker that talks about how bad it is to eat McDonald’s. I have so many friends that smoke weed that they don’t grow themselves but they love to talk about how horrible it is for the body to consume McDonald’s. The last time I checked the dude selling weed was not selling certified organic weed.

Here is my point: get some sleep on a comfortable mattress and stop thinking that whatever you are doing is healthy and what other people are doing is not healthy. Sleep is important, even if it’s not on an amazing adjustable bed. Eating healthy is important and so is exercise. It is not cool to stay out all night and come into work on little or no sleep. For those of you that have used cordless drills on the job, it’s kind of like running your rechargeable battery until it has no power left and plugging it in for a few minutes and expecting to last another 8 hours and perform at full capacity.

We are not superheroes. We are not robots. We need to sleep to recover and heal.

 

Brian