The stress of work and life leaves many people feeling physically and mentally exhausted.
In order to cope with this situation, many people choose to use weekends or holidays to "catch up on sleep", hoping to relieve fatigue and restore energy in this way.
However, this seemingly reasonable approach often backfires – many people feel even more exhausted after a period of compensation.
So, what exactly is causing this phenomenon?
First of all, let's be clear: sleep is not simply an input-to-output.
It is a complex physiological process that involves the regulation of the nervous system, endocrine changes, and the functional adjustment of various organs of the body.
Therefore, in daily life, we should not only rely on prolonging sleep time to compensate for fatigue, but should pay attention to the quality, regularity and stability of sleep.
1. The influence of the biological clock
There is a system inside the human body called the "biological clock" that regulates our routine.
When we follow a certain routine of life, the biological clock helps us to fall into deep sleep at the right time and wakes us up early in the morning.
However, when we significantly advance or delay our sleep schedules (e.g., staying up late until the wee hours of the morning on Friday night and sleeping again during the day on Saturday), it can disrupt the normal rhythm of the biological clock and prevent it from accurately providing us with quality sleep.
2. The ratio of light sleep to deep sleep is out of balance
A complete sleep cycle consists of three phases: light sleep, deep sleep, and REM.
The first two phases are mainly concerned with physical rest and recovery, while the last stage is concerned with the integration of dreams and the psychological level.
The problem is that when we stay awake for long periods of time, the brain tends to prioritize the shorter, quicker stages of light sleep, which allow for a quick recovery, while the deep sleep phases, which really allow the body to get enough rest, are compressed.
In this way, even if we spend a lot of time sleeping, it is difficult to achieve the desired effect.
3. The impact of anxiety
The competition in modern society is unprecedentedly fierce, and people are generally under greater mental pressure.
Too often, it's these underlying stressors that keep us in a state of tension when we should be relaxing, so much so that we can't fully release our fatigue even with enough rest.
At this moment, "heart disease still needs heart medicine", the key lies in how to resolve inner contradictions and reduce the burden through effective means.
Fourth, the accumulation of bad habits
In fact, fatigue is not only due to the day's work exertion, but can also be linked to other health problems.
For example, nutritional deficiencies caused by an unbalanced diet, physical decline caused by lack of exercise, etc. If these problems are not solved for a long time, it is impossible to eliminate fatigue fundamentally by increasing rest time alone.
To sum up, although compensatory time off can sometimes meet our short-term needs, in many cases it does not really relieve fatigue.
If you want to be full of energy, you also need to start with a good lifestyle, plan your time reasonably, pay attention to physical and mental health, and truly achieve relaxation, so that you can find your own source of happiness in the busy world!