Sleep is vital to how we perceive our surroundings, as it is directly responsible for the state our brains are in throughout the day by its rejuvenation of brain chemicals throughout the night. This means that sleep is a good place to start if you want to alter your perception of the world, be it for a bad day, a bad outlook on life, or just a lingering negative feeling.
If you get home and slump onto your cushiony Koala mattress at the end of the day, usually able to drift off in seconds, but lie there awake for hours instead, your perception of the following day could be drastically altered by your sleep-deprived state. To help out in this sleep-related quandary, we have put together this list of a few ways changing your sleep space could help to alter your perception.
Better sleep, better dreams
To get a good night’s sleep can sometimes seem impossible, what with all the distractions and stresses of the day-to-day bearing down on you. Luckily, there are ways to organize your room to lessen their intrusions on your sleepy safe haven. If you are having trouble sleeping because of external stress factors, it could be invaluable to try reorganizing your room, to avoid relating your sleep space to anything outside of it. Bring in different kinds of furniture and block the door from physical view, place colors where you usually would leave bare, making your room unique and different, even to the rest of your house. This way, it feels like you’ve gone somewhere else entirely when you enter and close the door.
The quiet of the night sets in, and in the safe capsule of your room, you can leave your worries at the door. Don’t do any work in your room, and don’t take any work calls or social media requests, unless it’s specifically away from your bed. This way, your bed is the exclusion zone within your room, where no work is allowed, and no stress is brought.
Light pollution causes sleep evasion
Maybe your problem isn’t outside sleep factors; maybe it’s something a little more physical. If there is a high level of light entering your dark room at night, this can be something that causes you to wake time and time again. Luckily, if street lights, hallway lights, or other room lights within the house are intruding on your sleeping, there are a number of things you can do to darken your room further and ensure longer deeper sleep.
Firstly, the windows. If your windows are the source of your light troubles, then it’s an outside problem, and can be dealt with in one of a few ways. If a neighbor has a security light that shines directly in your room, often a friendly conversation explaining the problem will convince them to change the direction of the safety light. A streetlight, however, cannot be moved, at which point you should look to invest in blackout curtains.
These are available online or in any number of stores, and are designed to shut out 100% of light from the outside world. If the light is coming from inside the house, something to block up the bottom side of your door might be the key, but make sure it doesn’t actually jam your door shut, as that could be a safety hazard.
New room with a better view
Sometimes the problem is neither mentally complex, nor light-related, and can just be a product of stagnation. Try rearranging your room entirely, move every bit of furniture you have to a different place, and change your well-worn sheets and pillows covers. Making the room look entirely new, can help you look at things from a different angle.
No longer staring at the same patch of ceiling can work wonders for your sleep cycle, and this works especially well if you’re remained with the same configuration for a long period of time. For even better effects, clean the room as you rearrange, making sure to get all of the dust out, and then get a breeze blowing through. Fresh air and clean surfaces can help to diminish background anxiety caused by dirt and clutter.
Perception can be altered by sleep very effectively, and a good night’s sleep can leave you feeling refreshed and awake in the morning, allowing for more productivity during the day and a better self image over time.
