No Two Snowflakes

I remember those times quite vividly.  I hated the night-time, if only because I knew that it would take a miracle for me to fall asleep.  I just couldn’t do it, no matter what.  I would go to bed around 11:30 PM, dead-tired, in desperate need of a long-night sleep; instead, I would wake up about an hour later, around 12:30 AM and just lie around, exhausted yet unable to fall asleep.  I’d get up, visit the computer, watch some TV and then return to bed for some additional torture of just lying there, caught up somewhere in-between.  Being completely drained of energy the entire next day, only to look forward to the continuation of this literal nightmare the following night.

Fast-forward to 2005… In order to break the pattern, I actually decided to change my own clock.  I was determined to wake up so early, that by the end of the day I’d literally be falling down unconscious!  The experiment worked, and I was so tired by 9:30 PM that I literally fell down somewhere and slept like a baby.  This, in turn, meant that from that point on I would be waking up fresh and ready by about 4:30 – 5 AM every morning.   I was no longer the same person everyone knew… Slowly but surely, day after day, I began to realize that I was becoming something entirely different – I was now a 5 AM Runner…

The rest is history.  The new lifestyle ended up changing me completely and entirely for the better, chopping countless pounds off my massive frame and making me feel 1,000,000% better!  Perhaps this new schedule was exactly what my body required in order to function better, maybe that was my personal rhythm, and just maybe the same could be said about many other people.  Who knows!?  We are all perfectly imperfect, as they say; no two snowflakes are alike, not to mention any given two people!

Which is exactly why I was so mad to read the latest research out of Canada, specifically by the Laval University in Quebec.  These geniuses actually decided to track the sleeping patterns of 740 people over the course of 10 years.  Primarily, they wanted to monitor the relationship between the amount of sleep and weight loss in those individuals.  Their published results suggested that lack of sleep or irregular sleep times cause most people to gain weight or even become obese.  Their recommendation – sleep as long as you can, get your 8-9 hours a day and be happy.  The rest will work itself out.

Well, that is all good and nice and dandy, but aren’t we all so different and what works for one of us may not necessarily work for another?  And besides that, sleeping long hours will never do anyone any good, no matter what!  You have to jump up to start the day, get an early move on it, wake your body up by letting it know YOU are in control, not vice versa!  Of course, the body wants to sleep and eat and relax, don’t they all!?  That is the reason most of us look the way we look – because we allow our bodies to dictate the pace and because we read too much of that unsubstantiated Canadian research, most likely compiled by a sluggish, slow, sleepy bunch of so-called scientists, who couldn’t run a mile if their lives depended on it!

I am sorry for getting a little emotional about this topic – it is very near and dear to me.  Plus I could probably use some sleep right about now… I just want to leave you with one final thought – remember your own individuality, your uniqueness in this world, and occasionally, only once in a great while, try something unconventional, something different.  You never know what may work for YOU personally.  Until next time,

Keep it running!