I avenge a busy day with my sleep

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2 years ago

In community: Life Lessons(9e2c)

Topics: Personal Growth, Self-improvement, Life, Blog, Creative Writing, ...

Have you ever woken up early in the morning and rushed to work; worked almost non-stop all day, finished the day without even a proper coffee break and come home exhausted; done housework, personal care, and so on until midnight; been so tired that you couldn't even move and said, 'At least let me watch an episode of TV series...'? Of course!" we can hear you saying...

Because we are facing a situation that is probably a common problem for all of us.

Before we take a closer look at the reasons for its emergence in our lives, let's understand its definition. Revenge bedtime procrastination, or 'revenge bedtime procrastination' as it is called in the literature, is actually defined as many of us resisting not sleeping despite being tired at the end of the day.

In other words, no matter how tired we feel, no matter how sleepy-eyed we are, we don't go to bed easily; instead, we spend our bedtime watching movies, browsing social media accounts, browsing YouTube posts, listening to podcasts, reading books, painting, in short, we spend our bedtime with actions that appeal to our personal tastes, which explains the habit of revenge bedtime procrastination. So when we go to bed later and stay up past our bedtime and don't get enough sleep, we wake up the next day feeling much more tired, and this effect continues to accumulate; eventually it can lead to more serious health problems.

So why do we do this to ourselves? Why do we torture ourselves by staying awake after a tiring day instead of resting, going to bed early and recovering our bodies and minds? And what does this have to do with China?

The reason why this sleep postponement behavior is included in the literature is actually the working system in China. The 996 system, that is, working from 9am to 9pm 6 days a week, causes Chinese workers to seek to do something for themselves, despite the fact that they return home exhausted; so instead of going to bed and rest, no matter how tired they are, they take actions that feed their sense of freedom.

In other words, they refuse to go to sleep, even if it is late at night. Research on Chinese workers also reveals sleep procrastination, as mentioned above. However, it later became clear that this is not a Chinese phenomenon, but a universal behavior experienced by many people around the world.

Especially if we think about the working conditions of the modern world, the constant busyness, the culture of urgency at work, many of us work long hours in power, so when we come home, we feel the need to create space and time just for ourselves. This means we have to sacrifice our sleep at night. Even though we know we'll wake up more tired the next day, many of us can't resist the temptation to watch a few episodes of our favorite shows or spend hours scrolling through posts on Instagram. So why do we keep putting off sleep when we're already sleepy-eyed?

I mean, we all need to create time to do things for ourselves rather than choosing to sleep, no matter how tired we are, because we want to feel in control of our lives, to reinforce our autonomy. But unfortunately, we don't realize that while reinforcing these feelings, we are also paving the way for very serious health problems. In fact, this is exactly why it is translated as 'revenge sleep procrastination'. Because, in trying to get back the time lost at work and spend it only on ourselves, we are taking revenge on our health.

Watching a few episodes of a TV show in the evening or hanging out on social media are not problematic behaviors, but when we sacrifice sleep for them, they become a problem for our mental and physical health. While revengeful sleep procrastination is not actually defined as a psychiatric problem or sleep disorder, but as a type of behavioral disorder or procrastination habit, unfortunately, it can cause both sleep disorders and mental distress in the long run.