on Bags: Prioritize Sleep this Year

I’ve recently come across the idea of “clean sleeping.” Like clean eating, clean sleeping purports that we can all greatly improve our health and wellness by being hyper-vigilant about one day-to-day metric. In this case, “at least seven or eight hours of good, quality sleep—and ideally even ten” a night on the road to optimal living. It goes against every entrepreneur I respect, but is still an interesting idea. Especially because I’ve developed a seriously bad case of baggy, droopy eyes lately.

I’ve read up on this from different sources: nutritional scientists, detox experts, osteopaths. Everyone seems to be in agreement that sleep is good for your body, and that you’ll most likely notice improvements like glowing skin, decreased appetite, and improved hormone regulation—but somehow no one addresses why people aren’t getting enough sleep in the first place. It’s as if all of us are on YouTube until 2 AM, getting wrinkles just because we’re ignorant and not, say, concerned about keeping our jobs.

Of course, in a perfect world, sleep wouldn’t be caught in an either/or dynamic with our other basic needs, but I don’t know that I’ve held a single job that wouldn’t be pissed as hell with me if I replied to an e-mail ten hours after it was sent because “sleep is my first priority right now.” If I joined a morning meeting late because “I’m really emphasizing sleep as part of my lifestyle,” I don’t think I’d get invited to many more morning meetings, and I doubt I’m alone here. The culture of having a full-time paying job is, “This is a priority for you,” and since it finances the lifestyle that allows me to do whatever the fuck we want, we don’t really have the luxury of saying, “Hm, but I think it’ll be second to sleep.”

Well, just stop looking at screens earlier in the evening. Give your body a chance to realize that it’s almost time for sleep. I hope I’m not alone in recognizing the tone-deafness of this idea. My addiction to my phone and laptop is the main cause of my sleep deprivation. Not because I’m on YouTube or playing GTA: San Andreas on my iPhone. But because this is the time where I get to crank out writing, look at art, catch up on news, watch stand-up comedy, inspire creativity. And before I know it, it’s 1am and I’m not even remotely tired. But I fucking love writing. And if this is the only time I can write and inspire myself to write, then it’s worth getting less sleep.

And I’m the lucky one here! I don’t prioritize sleep because I don’t want to. There are so many people I know who simply can’t sleep because they have to deal with kids or work or stress. Because they don’t have the luxury of opting into ten hours of nightly sleep as a lifestyle choice, this must not be for those poor bastards.

I guess this article is less about sleep and more about never having kids. Whatever, I’m going to go play some Grand Theft Auto.