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Obstacles to achieving Goals

Realize Your Personal Goals

Personal Goals

Many people feel as if they're adrift in the world. They work hard, but they don't seem to get anywhere worthwhile.

A key reason that they feel this way is that they haven't spent enough time thinking about what they want from life, and haven't set themselves formal goals. After all, would you set out on a major journey with no real idea of your destination? Probably not!

Goal setting is a powerful process for thinking about your ideal future, and for motivating yourself to turn your vision of this future into reality.

The process of setting goals helps you choose where you want to go in life. By knowing precisely what you want to achieve, you know where you have to concentrate your efforts. You'll also quickly spot the distractions that can, so easily, lead you astray.

Why Set Goals?

Goal setting is used by top-level athletes, successful business-people and achievers in all fields. Setting goals gives you long-term vision and short-term motivation  . It focuses your acquisition of knowledge, and helps you to organize your time and your resources so that you can make the very most of your life.

By setting sharp, clearly defined goals, you can measure and take pride in the achievement of those goals, and you'll see forward progress in what might previously have seemed a long pointless grind. You will also raise your self-confidence  , as you recognize your own ability and competence in achieving the goals that you've set.

Starting to Set Personal Goals

You set your goals on a number of levels:

• First you create your "big picture" of what you want to do with your life (or over, say, the next 10 years), and identify the large-scale goals that you want to achieve.
• Then, you break these down into the smaller and smaller targets that you must hit to reach your lifetime goals.
• Finally, once you have your plan, you start working on it to achieve these goals.

This is why we start the process of goal setting by looking at your lifetime goals. Then, we work down to the things that you can do in, say, the next five years, then next year, next month, next week, and today, to start moving towards them.

Step 1: Setting Lifetime Goals

The first step in setting personal goals is to consider what you want to achieve in your lifetime (or at least, by a significant and distant age in the future). Setting lifetime goals gives you the overall perspective that shapes all other aspects of your decision making.

To give a broad, balanced coverage of all important areas in your life, try to set goals in some of the following categories (or in other categories of your own, where these are important to you):

• Career – What level do you want to reach in your career, or what do you want to achieve?
• Financial – How much do you want to earn, by what stage? How is this related to your career goals?
• Education – Is there any knowledge you want to acquire in particular? What information and skills will you need to have in order to achieve other goals?
• Family – Do you want to be a parent? If so, how are you going to be a good parent? How do you want to be seen by a partner or by members of your extended family?
• Artistic – Do you want to achieve any artistic goals?
• Attitude – Is any part of your mindset holding you back? Is there any part of the way that you behave that upsets you? (If so, set a goal to improve your behavior or find a solution to the problem.)
• Physical – Are there any athletic goals that you want to achieve, or do you want good health deep into old age? What steps are you going to take to achieve this?
• Pleasure – How do you want to enjoy yourself? (You should ensure that some of your life is for you!)
• Public Service – Do you want to make the world a better place? If so, how?

Spend some time brainstorming   these things, and then select one or more goals in each category that best reflect what you want to do. Then consider trimming again so that you have a small number of really significant goals that you can focus on.

As you do this, make sure that the goals that you have set are ones that you genuinely want to achieve, not ones that your parents, family, or employers might want. (If you have a partner, you probably want to consider what he or she wants – however, make sure that you also remain true to yourself!)

Tip:

You may also want to read our article on Personal Mission Statements  . Crafting a personal mission statement can help bring your most important goals into sharp focus.

Step 2: Setting Smaller Goals

Once you have set your lifetime goals, set a five-year plan of smaller goals that you need to complete if you are to reach your lifetime plan.

Then create a one-year plan, six-month plan, and a one-month plan of progressively smaller goals that you should reach to achieve your lifetime goals. Each of these should be based on the previous plan.

Then create a daily To-Do List   of things that you should do today to work towards your lifetime goals.

At an early stage, your smaller goals might be to read books and gather information on the achievement of your higher level goals. This will help you to improve the quality and realism of your goal setting.

Finally review your plans, and make sure that they fit the way in which you want to live your life.

Tip:

If you feel that you're not paying enough attention to certain areas of your life, you'll find our articles on The Wheel of Life   and the Life/Career Rainbow  useful.

Staying on Course

Once you've decided on your first set of goals, keep the process going by reviewing and updating your To-Do List on a daily basis.

Periodically review the longer term plans, and modify them to reflect your changing priorities and experience. (A good way of doing this is to schedule regular, repeating reviews using a computer-based diary.)

SMART Goals

A useful way of making goals more powerful is to use the SMART mnemonic. While there are plenty of variants (some of which we've included in parenthesis), SMART usually stands for:

• S – Specific (or Significant).
• M – Measurable (or Meaningful).
• A – Attainable (or Action-Oriented).
• R – Relevant (or Rewarding).
• T – Time-bound (or Trackable).

For example, instead of having "to sail around the world" as a goal, it's more powerful to say "To have completed my trip around the world by December 31, 2015." Obviously, this will only be attainable if a lot of preparation has been completed beforehand!

Further Goal Setting Tips

The following broad guidelines will help you to set effective, achievable goals:

• State each goal as a positive statement – Express your goals positively – "Execute this technique well" is a much better goal than "Don't make this stupid mistake."
• Be precise: Set precise goals, putting in dates, times and amounts so that you can measure achievement. If you do this, you'll know exactly when you have achieved the goal, and can take complete satisfaction from having achieved it.
• Set priorities – When you have several goals, give each a priority. This helps you to avoid feeling overwhelmed by having too many goals, and helps to direct your attention to the most important ones.
• Write goals down – This crystallizes them and gives them more force.
• Keep operational goals small – Keep the low-level goals that you're working towards small and achievable. If a goal is too large, then it can seem that you are not making progress towards it. Keeping goals small and incremental gives more opportunities for reward.
• Set performance goals, not outcome goals – You should take care to set goals over which you have as much control as possible. It can be quite dispiriting to fail to achieve a personal goal for reasons beyond your control!
  In business, these reasons could be bad business environments or unexpected effects of government policy. In sport, they could include poor judging, bad weather, injury, or just plain bad luck.
  If you base your goals on personal performance, then you can keep control over the achievement of your goals, and draw satisfaction from them.
• Set realistic goals – It's important to set goals that you can achieve. All sorts of people (for example, employers, parents, media, or society) can set unrealistic goals for you. They will often do this in ignorance of your own desires and ambitions.
  It's also possible to set goals that are too difficult because you might not appreciate either the obstacles in the way, or understand quite how much skill you need to develop to achieve a particular level of performance.

Achieving Goals

When you've achieved a goal, take the time to enjoy the satisfaction of having done so. Absorb the implications of the goal achievement, and observe the progress that you've made towards other goals.

If the goal was a significant one, reward yourself appropriately. All of this helps you build the self-confidence you deserve.

With the experience of having achieved this goal, review the rest of your goal plans:

• If you achieved the goal too easily, make your next goal harder.
• If the goal took a dispiriting length of time to achieve, make the next goal a little easier.
• If you learned something that would lead you to change other goals, do so.
• If you noticed a deficit in your skills despite achieving the goal, decide whether to set goals to fix this.

Tip 1:

Our article, Golden Rules of Goal Setting  , will show you how to set yourself up for success when it comes to your goals. If you're still having trouble, you might also want to try Backward Goal Setting  .

Tip 2:

It's important to remember that failing to meet goals does not matter much, just as long as you learn from the experience.

Feed lessons learned back into your goal setting. Remember too that your goals will change as time goes on. Adjust them regularly to reflect growth in your knowledge and experience, and if goals do not hold any attraction any longer, consider letting them go.

Goal Setting Example

For her New Year's Resolution, Susan has decided to think about what she really wants to do with her life.

Her lifetime goals are as follows:

• Career – "To be managing editor of the magazine that I work for."
• Artistic – "To keep working on my illustration skills. Ultimately I want to have my own show in our downtown gallery."
• Physical – "To run a marathon."

Now that Susan has listed her lifetime goals, she then breaks down each one into smaller, more manageable goals.

Let's take a closer look at how she might break down her lifetime career goal – becoming managing editor of her magazine:

• Five-year goal: "Become deputy editor."
• One-year goal: "Volunteer for projects that the current Managing Editor is heading up."
• Six-month goal: "Go back to school and finish my journalism degree."
• One-month goal: "Talk to the current managing editor to determine what skills are needed to do the job."
• One-week goal: "Book the meeting with the Managing Editor."

As you can see from this example, breaking big goals down into smaller, more manageable goals makes it far easier to see how the goal will get accomplished.

Tip:

A good way of getting going with this is to use the Mind Tools Life Plan Workbook. Supported by worksheets and advice, this guides you through a simple 5-step process for setting your life goals, and for organizing yourself for success.

Key Points

Goal setting is an important method of:

• Deciding what you want to achieve in your life.
• Separating what's important from what's irrelevant, or a distraction.
• Motivating yourself.
• Building your self-confidence, based on successful achievement of goals.

Set your lifetime goals first. Then, set a five-year plan of smaller goals that you need to complete if you are to reach your lifetime plan. Keep the process going by regularly reviewing and updating your goals. And remember to take time to enjoy the satisfaction of achieving your goals when you do so.

If you don't already set goals, do so, starting now. As you make this technique part of your life, you'll find your career accelerating, and you'll wonder how you did without it!

Why we set goals

Visualize your goals

The Equation for Change

Prospecting New Clients

SELL THE APPOINTMENT NOT THE PRODUCT

STEP 1) FINDING THE DM:    

If you don't know who the DM is:

Hi, this is (Your name and company), I need to speak with the person responsible for (insert the name of the service you are selling), Who might that be at your practice? Great, Is he/she available? 

...... If the DM is not available.

       Shoot, well I realize that I reached out unannounced. I have an important message for him/her, what does he/she check most often; email, voice mail, or text? Great, May I please have his/her (voice mail,cell number, email)

If you know who the DM is:

Hi, this is (Your name and company), I need to speak with (insert the name DM), 

...... If the DM is not available.

       Shoot, well I realize that I reached out unannounced. I have an important message for him/her, what does he/she check most often; email, voice mail, or text? Great, May I please have his/her (voice mail,cell number, email)

STEP 2) INTRODUCTION:  

Hi, ( the name of the DM), My name is (Your name and company)? First, did I catch you at a bad time?

  YES.... Ok, no problem, when would be a good time to call you back? Ill just need one minute.

 .......if they still say no:  what do you check most often; email, voice mail, or text? What is the best (number or email) to get back in touch with you.

  NO..... Great! I only need one minute of your time to asses if your practice would partner well with our company. Is that ok?

 .......if they still say no: Then hang up (politely) because they aren't worth your time

STEP 3) WIIFM (What's In It For Me) STATEMENT:  

The practices that we partner with are able to streamline operations thus saving themselves a significant amount of time and money. Now, its easy for me to determine how valuable our working relationship will be by asking by asking you 3 simple questions: 

 1) Does your practice  (insert the #1 universal pain point your product solves)?

 2) How do you currently address  (insert the #1 universal pain point your product solves)?

 3) Would you be interested in a solution that helps manage (insert the #1 universal pain point your product solves) with less time, effort, and resources?

 If they say YES..... Great well that is why I'm calling!

  If they say NO..... Is saving your practice time and resource something that interests you?

 .......if they still say no: Then hang up (politely) because they aren't worth your time

STEP 4) Third Party Testimonial:

In fact your practice reminds me a lot of  (Insert a name of a current client), They were previously dealing with  (insert the #1 universal pain point your product solves) similarly to your practice. After meeting with us for 20 mins we were able to identify that our companies would become strategic partners.They are now projected to save ______________ annually as a result of our working relationship. 

STEP 4) Sell the Appointment:

Based on what you have told me so far about your practice, I'm confident that we will both gain significant value by becoming strategic partners. I want to come out and meet with you for about 20mins to get to know your practice and discuss how you can save a significant amount of time and resources dealing with  (insert the #1 universal pain point your product solves).  

I have time on _________________ and ______________________, What works best for you?

Situational Leadership

What matters most: Personal Development

Self-Evaluation for Personal & Professional Development: CLICK HERE

How to use LinkedIN

GREAT ARTICLE CLICK HERE

Emotional Intelligence

What is emotional intelligence?

Emotional intelligence (EQ) is the ability to identify, use, understand, and manage emotions in positive ways to relieve stress, communicate effectively, empathize with others, overcome challenges, and defuse conflict. Emotional intelligence impacts many different aspects of your daily life, such as the way you behave and the way you interact with others.

If you have high emotional intelligence you are able to recognize your own emotional state and the emotional states of others, and engage with people in a way that draws them to you. You can use this understanding of emotions to relate better to other people, form healthier relationships, achieve greater success at work, and lead a more fulfilling life.

Emotional intelligence consists of four attributes:

• Self-awareness – You recognize your own emotions and how they affect your thoughts and behavior, know your strengths and weaknesses, and have self-confidence.
• Self-management – You’re able to control impulsive feelings and behaviors, manage your emotions in healthy ways, take initiative, follow through on commitments, and adapt to changing circumstances.
• Social awareness – You can understand the emotions, needs, and concerns of other people, pick up on emotional cues, feel comfortable socially, and recognize the power dynamics in a group or organization.
• Relationship management – You know how to develop and maintain good relationships, communicate clearly, inspire and influence others, work well in a team, and manage conflict.

Why is emotional intelligence (EQ) so important?

As we know, it’s not the smartest people that are the most successful or the most fulfilled in life. You probably know people who are academically brilliant and yet are socially inept and unsuccessful at work or in their personal relationships. Intellectual intelligence (IQ) isn’t enough on its own to be successful in life. Yes, your IQ can help you get into college, but it’s your EQ that will help you manage the stress and emotions when facing your final exams.

Emotional intelligence affects:

• Your performance at work. Emotional intelligence can help you navigate the social complexities of the workplace, lead and motivate others, and excel in your career. In fact, when it comes to gauging job candidates, many companies now view emotional intelligence as being as important as technical ability and require EQ testing before hiring.
• Your physical health. If you’re unable to manage your stress levels, it can lead to serious health problems. Uncontrolled stress can raise blood pressure, suppress the immune system, increase the risk of heart attack and stroke, contribute to infertility, and speed up the aging process. The first step to improving emotional intelligence is to learn how to relieve stress.
• Your mental health. Uncontrolled stress can also impact your mental health, making you vulnerable to anxiety and depression. If you are unable to understand and manage your emotions, you’ll also be open to mood swings, while an inability to form strong relationships can leave you feeling lonely and isolated.
• Your relationships. By understanding your emotions and how to control them, you’re better able to express how you feel and understand how others are feeling. This allows you to communicate more effectively and forge stronger relationships, both at work and in your personal life.

How to raise your emotional intelligence

All information to the brain comes through our senses, and when this information is overwhelmingly stressful or emotional, instinct will take over and our ability to act will be limited to the flight, fight, or freeze response. Therefore, to have access to the wide range of choices and the ability to make good decisions, we need to be able to bring our emotions into balance at will.

Memory is also strongly linked to emotion. By learning to stay connected to the emotional part of your brain as well as the rational, you’ll not only expand your range of choices when it comes to responding to a new event, but you’ll also factor emotional memory into your decision-making process. This will help prevent you from continually repeating earlier mistakes.

To improve your emotional intelligence—and your decision-making abilities—you need to understand and manage your emotions. This is accomplished by developing key skills for controlling and managing overwhelming stress and becoming an effective communicator.

Developing emotional intelligence through a few key skills:

Emotional intelligence (EQ) is built by reducing stress, remaining focused, and staying connected to yourself and others. You can do this by learning key skills. The first two skills are essential for controlling and managing overwhelming stress and the last three skills greatly improve communication. Each skill builds on the lessons learned in practicing the earlier skills and include:

• The ability to quickly reduce stress in the moment in a variety of settings
• The ability to recognize your emotions and keep them from overwhelming you
• The ability to connect emotionally with others by using nonverbal communication
• The ability to use humor and play to stay connected in challenging situations
• The ability to resolve conflicts positively and with confidence

How to learn the key skills that build emotional intelligence

The key skills of emotional intelligence can be learned by anyone, at any time. There is a difference, however, between learning about emotional intelligence and applying that knowledge to your life. Just because you know you should do something doesn’t mean you will—especially when you become overwhelmed by stress, which can hijack your best intentions.

In order to permanently change behavior in ways that stand up under pressure, you need to learn how to overcome stress in the moment and stress in your relationships by remaining emotionally aware. This means that you can’t simply read about emotional intelligence in order to master it. You have to experience and practice the skills in your everyday life.

Emotional intelligence (EQ) skill 1: Rapidly reduce stress in the moment

High levels of stress can overwhelm the mind and body, getting in the way of your ability to accurately “read” a situation, hear what someone else is saying, be aware of your own feelings and needs, and communicate clearly.

Being able to quickly calm yourself down and relieve stress helps you stay balanced, focused, and in control—no matter what challenges you face or how stressful a situation becomes.

Stress busting: functioning well in the heat of the moment

Develop your stress-busting skills by working through the following three steps:

• Realize when you’re stressed – The first step to reducing stress is recognizing what stress feels like. How does your body feel when you’re stressed? Are your muscles or stomach tight or sore? Are your hands clenched? Is your breath shallow? Being aware of your physical response to stress will help regulate tension when it occurs.
• Identify your stress response – Everyone reacts differently to stress. If you tend to become angry or agitated under stress, you will respond best to stress-relieving activities that quiet you down. If you tend to become depressed or withdrawn, you will respond best to stress-relieving activities that are stimulating. If you tend to freeze—speeding up in some ways while slowing down in others—you need stress-relieving activities that provide both comfort and stimulation.
• Discover the stress-busting techniques that work for you – The best way to reduce stress quickly is by engaging one or more of your senses: sight, sound, smell, taste, and touch. Each person responds differently to sensory input, so you need to find things that are soothing and/or energizing to you. For example, if you’re a visual person you can relieve stress by surrounding yourself with uplifting images. If you respond more to sound, you may find a wind chime, a favorite piece of music, or the sound of a water fountain helps to quickly reduce your stress levels.

Emotional intelligence (EQ) skill 2: Beat relationship stress with emotional awareness

Being able to connect to your emotions—having a moment-to-moment awareness of your emotions and how they influence your thoughts and actions—is the key to understanding yourself and remaining calm and focused in tense situations with others.

Many people are disconnected from their emotions—especially strong core emotions such as anger, sadness, fear, and joy. This may be the result of negative childhood experiences that taught you to try to shut off your feelings. But although we can distort, deny, or numb our feelings, we can’t eliminate them. They’re still there, whether we’re aware of them or not. Unfortunately, without emotional awareness, we are unable to fully understand our own motivations and needs, or to communicate effectively with others. We are also at far greater risk for becoming overwhelmed in situations that appear threatening.

What kind of a relationship do you have with your emotions?

• Do you experience feelings that flow, encountering one emotion after another as your experiences change from moment to moment?
• Are your emotions accompanied by physical sensations that you experience in places like your stomach or chest?
• Do you experience discrete feelings and emotions, such as anger, sadness, fear, joy, each of which is evident in subtle facial expressions?
• Can you experience intense feelings that are strong enough to capture both your attention and that of others?
• Do you pay attention to your emotions? Do they factor into your decision making?

If any of these experiences are unfamiliar, your emotions may be turned down or turned off. In order to be emotionally healthy and emotionally intelligent, you must reconnect to your core emotions, accept them, and become comfortable with them.

Developing emotional awareness

Emotional awareness can be learned at any time of life. If you haven’t learned how to manage stress, it’s important to do so first. When you can manage stress, you’ll feel more comfortable reconnecting to strong or unpleasant emotions and changing the way you experience and respond to your feelings.

You can develop your emotional awareness by learning the mindfulness meditation in Helpguide’s freeEmotional Intelligence Toolkit that helps you to get in touch with difficult emotions and manage uncomfortable feelings.

Emotional intelligence (EQ) skill 3: Nonverbal communication

Being a good communicator requires more than just verbal skills and the ability to manage stress. Often, whatyou say is less important than how you say it, or the other nonverbal signals you send out—the gestures you make, the way you sit, how fast or how loud you talk, how close you stand, or how much eye contact you make. In order to hold the attention of others and build connection and trust, you need to be aware of, and in control of, this body language. You also need to be able to accurately read and respond to the nonverbal cues that other people send you.

These messages don’t stop when someone stops speaking. Even when you’re silent, you’re still communicating nonverbally. Think about what you are transmitting as well, and if what you say matches what you feel. If you insist, “I’m fine," while clenching your teeth and looking away, your body is clearly signaling the opposite. Your nonverbal messages can produce a sense of interest, trust, excitement, and desire for connection—or they can generate fear, confusion, distrust, and disinterest.

Tips for improving nonverbal communication

Successful nonverbal communication depends on your ability to manage stress, recognize your own emotions, and understand the signals you’re sending and receiving. When communicating:

• Focus on the other person. If you are planning what you’re going to say next, daydreaming, or thinking about something else, you are almost certain to miss nonverbal cues and other subtleties in the conversation.
• Make eye contact. Eye contact can communicate interest, maintain the flow of a conversation, and help gauge the other person’s response.
• Pay attention to nonverbal cues you’re sending and receiving, such as facial expression, tone of voice, posture and gestures, touch, and the timing and pace of the conversation.

Emotional intelligence (EQ) skill 4: Use humor and play to deal with challenges

Humor, laughter, and play are natural antidotes to life’s difficulties; they lighten your burdens and help you keep things in perspective. A good hearty laugh reduces stress, elevates mood, and brings your nervous system back into balance.

Playful communication broadens your emotional intelligence and helps you:

• Take hardships in stride. By allowing you to view your frustrations and disappointments from new perspectives, laughter and play enable you to survive annoyances, hard times, and setbacks.
• Smooth over differences. Using gentle humor often helps you say things that might be otherwise difficult to express without creating a flap.
• Simultaneously relax and energize yourself. Playful communication relieves fatigue and relaxes your body, which allows you to recharge and accomplish more.
• Become more creative. When you loosen up, you free yourself of rigid ways of thinking and being, allowing you to get creative and see things in new ways.

How to develop playful communication:

It’s never too late to develop and embrace your playful, humorous side.

• Try setting aside regular, quality playtime. The more you joke, play, and laugh—the easier it becomes.
• Find enjoyable activities that loosen you up and help you embrace your playful nature.
• Practice by playing with animals, babies, young children, and outgoing people who appreciate playful banter.

Emotional intelligence (EQ) skill 5: Resolve conflict positively

Conflict and disagreements are inevitable in relationships. Two people can’t possibly have the same needs, opinions, and expectations at all times. However, that needn’t be a bad thing. Resolving conflict in healthy, constructive ways can strengthen trust between people. When conflict isn’t perceived as threatening or punishing, it fosters freedom, creativity, and safety in relationships.

The ability to manage conflicts in a positive, trust-building way is supported by the previous four skills. Once you know how to manage stress, stay emotionally present and aware, communicate nonverbally, and use humor and play, you’ll be better equipped to handle emotionally charged situations and catch and defuse many issues before they escalate.

Tips for resolving conflict in a trust-building way:

• Stay focused in the present. When you are not holding on to old hurts and resentments, you can recognize the reality of a current situation and view it as a new opportunity for resolving old feelings about conflicts.
• Choose your arguments. Arguments take time and energy, especially if you want to resolve them in a positive way. Consider what is worth arguing about and what is not.
• Forgive. Other people’s hurtful behavior is in the past. To resolve conflict, you need to give up the urge to punish or seek revenge.
• End conflicts that can't be resolved. It takes two people to keep an argument going. You can choose to disengage from a conflict, even if you still disagree.

Stop Stressing NOW- Video

Stress Managment

CLICK HERE

The biology of emotion- Happiness and Health

CLICK HERE

Dealing with Stress Video

Better Sleep Video

Tips for better SLEEP

Like good nutrition and exercise, adequate sleep is crucial for wellness and success. Sleep is particularly important for students because there seem to be so many time pressures—to attend class, study, maintain a social life, and perhaps work—that most college students have difficulty getting enough. Yet sleep is critical for concentrating well. First, use the Sleep Self-Assessment to consider your current habits and attitudes.

Sleep Self-Assessment

Check the appropriate boxes.

	Usually	Sometimes	Seldom
1. I usually get enough sleep.
2. I feel drowsy or unfocused during the day.
3. I take a nap when I need more sleep.
4. I have fallen asleep at work or had trouble staying awake.
5.
6.

Write your answers.

7. How many hours of sleep do you usually get on weeknights?
   __________________________________________________________________
   __________________________________________________________________
8. How many hours of sleep do you usually get on weekends?
   __________________________________________________________________
   __________________________________________________________________
9. How would you rank the importance of sleep in relation to studying, working, spending time with friends, and other activities?
   __________________________________________________________________
   __________________________________________________________________
10. How many hours of sleep do you think you ideally need?
    __________________________________________________________________
    __________________________________________________________________
11. Generally, do you believe you are getting as much sleep as you think you need?
    __________________________________________________________________
    __________________________________________________________________

The Importance of a Good Night’s Sleep

You may not realize the benefits of sleep, or the problems associated with being sleep deprived, because most likely you’ve had the same sleep habits for a long time. Or maybe you know you’re getting less sleep now, but with all the changes in your life, how can you tell if some of your stress or problems studying are related to not enough sleep?

On the positive side, a healthy amount of sleep has the following benefits:

• Improves your mood during the day
• Improves your memory and learning abilities
• Gives you more energy
• Strengthens your immune system
• Promotes wellness of body, mind, and spirit

In contrast, not getting enough sleep over time can lead to a wide range of health issues and student problems. Sleep deprivationcan have the following consequences:

• Affects mental health and contributes to stress and feelings of anxiety, depression, and general unhappiness
• Causes sleepiness, difficulty paying attention in class, and ineffective studying
• Weakens the immune system, making it more likely to catch colds and other infections
• Increases the risk of accidents (such as while driving)
• Contributes to weight gain

How Much Sleep Is Enough?

College students are the most sleep-deprived population group in the country. With so much to do, who has time for sleep?

Most people need seven to nine hours of sleep a night, and the average is around eight. Some say they need much less than that, but often their behavior during the day shows they are actually sleep deprived. Some genuinely need only about six hours a night. New research indicates there may be a “sleep gene” that determines how much sleep a person needs. So how much sleep do you actually need?

There is no simple answer, in part because the quality of sleep is just as important as the number of hours a person sleeps. Sleeping fitfully for nine hours and waking during the night is usually worse than seven or eight hours of good sleep, so you can’t simply count the hours. Do you usually feel rested and alert all day long? Do you rise from bed easily in the morning without struggling with the alarm clock? Do you have no trouble paying attention to your instructors and never feel sleepy in a lecture class? Are you not continually driven to drink more coffee or caffeine-heavy “power drinks” to stay attentive? Are you able to get through work without feeling exhausted? If you answered yes to all of these, you likely are in that 10 percent to 15 percent of college students who consistently get enough sleep.

How to Get More and Better Sleep

You have to allow yourself enough time for a good night’s sleep.  If you still don’t feel alert and energetic during the day, try increasing this to nine hours. Keep a sleep journal, and within a couple weeks you’ll know how much sleep you need and will be on the road to making new habits to ensure you get it.

Myths about Sleep

• Having a drink or two helps me get to sleep better. False: Although you may seem to fall asleep more quickly, alcohol makes sleep less restful, and you’re more likely to awake in the night.
• Exercise before bedtime is good for sleeping. False: Exercise wakes up your body, and it may be some time before you unwind and relax. Exercise earlier in the day, however, is beneficial for sleep.
• It helps to fall asleep after watching television or surfing the Web in bed. False: Rather than helping you unwind, these activities can engage your mind and make it more difficult to get to sleep.

Tips for Success: Sleep

• Avoid nicotine, which can keep you awake—yet another reason to stop smoking.
• Avoid caffeine for six to eight hours before bed. Caffeine remains in the body for three to five hours on the average, much longer for some people. Remember that many soft drinks contain caffeine.
• Don’t eat in the two to three hours before bed. Avoid alcohol before bedtime.
• Don’t nap during the day. Napping is the least productive form of rest and often makes you less alert. It may also prevent you from getting a good night’s sleep.
• Exercise earlier in the day (at least several hours before bedtime).
• Try to get to bed and wake about the same time every day—your body likes a routine.
• Make sure the environment is conducive to sleep: dark, quiet, comfortable, and cool.
• Use your bed only for sleeping, not for studying, watching television, or other activities. Going to bed will become associated with going to sleep.
• Establish a presleep winding-down routine, such as taking a hot bath, listening to soothing music, or reading