For all the talk about the importance of a good night’s sleep, how many of us actually wake up in the morning feeling rested? In The Sleep Solution,  Chris Winter debunks common myths about sleep by explaining what is actually happening in the body during sleep. Drawing from years of research and firsthand experience dealing with people’s sleeping problems, Winter provides insights and suggestions that can help people understand this vital life process and get the best sleep possible.

Believe it or not, you are not at the mercy of your current sleep patterns: they are subject to alteration and improvement based on actionable steps. Sleep is a skill, and it is an important skill to hone because your body does the most incredible things while you sleep.

For example, your glymphatic system, the brain’s waste removal system, disposes of the harmful amyloid beta proteins with 60% greater efficiency when you’re asleep. Excessive amounts of this protein are linked to conditions like Alzheimer’s, so this process is a critical one.

There is a link between poor sleep and obesity. A study of 1 million Chinese revealed that there are far higher rates of obesity among those who average fewer than seven hours of sleep a night. The connection between sleep deprivation and decreased capacity to manage impulses is also a well-established phenomenon. It is easier to say no to that Krispy Kreme donut after a full night’s sleep than after two hours of fitful sleep.

A prolonged lack of sleep can have devastating effects on the heart and circulatory system. There is ample research that links poor sleep to stroke and cardiac arrest. Sleep is also essential for proper immunity. Without adequate sleep, you are more susceptible to sickness. What is more, sleep helps maintain strong emotional health. Study after study links insomnia and sleep deprivation to depression and anxiety. There is nothing like a night of deep, uninterrupted sleep to lift your mood.

Despite the many op-eds and talk show segments devoted to the subject of sleep, there are numerous misconceptions. Here are a few truths to counteract the myth-making and pseudoscience:

Everyone sleeps

Despite the vehement protests of some insomniacs, everyone sleeps. Many don’t sleep well, but no one does not sleep. Some people have issues of sleep misperception, where they are convinced they lie awake all night even though they were actually asleep. Some patients come to the sleep lab for tests, claiming that they have not slept at all for years. When they are shown camera footage of them fast asleep and charts of their vitals during the night which indicate the same, denial and anger are common reactions. Everyone sleeps. 

90-minute REM cycles and the 8 hours rule are generalizations

The common wisdom has become that it is better to wake up as you exit a 90-minute REM cycle. The idea that 6 hours of sleep is better than 7 hours because 6 hours rounds out a cycle is ridiculous. More sleep is more sleep. 90 minutes is simply an average cycle. One person may have REM cycles that last 80 minutes, another’s might exceed 100 minutes. Everyone is different. If you set your alarm according to 90-minute intervals, you could be missing out on some quality sleep time. Similarly, 8 hours of sleep is a good suggestion, but not a hard and fast rule applicable to all. Between infancy and adulthood, the amount of sleep needed lessens, but it will lessen at differing rates from person to person. Some adults function fine with 6 hours, while others need 9 or more. Don’t listen to the popular talking points; listen to what your body is telling is you.

Deep sleep is distinct from dream sleep

Deep sleep is the phase that makes you feel rested. It accounts for about a quarter of your time asleep. During deep sleep, or N3, the brain wave movement is at its slowest. It is during this period that growth hormone is secreted; this is why children sleep so much and can often sleep through anything. Over the course of a person’s life, growth hormone production tapers off, but even if you’re done growing, this growth hormone helps maintain bone strength, muscle development, and immunity.

Dream sleep, on the other hand, is REM sleep, more or less. This period accounts for another quarter of your sleep time, and it is during this period that your brain remains active, subjecting you to dreams of falling, being chased by animals, flying, etc.

People tend to conflate these two but they are distinct and discrete phases of sleep. The ideal pattern is a vacillation between deep sleep and dream sleep, punctuated by light sleep periods.

Poor sleep hygiene could be inhibiting your blissful, unadulterated sleep. Sleep hygiene refers to the ways you prepare for sleep: the state of your bed, your bedroom, your diet, and how you spend your time before you go to bed.

Ideally, you want to your bedroom to be clean, dark, and quiet. Clean sheets and an organized room can add a sense of order and bring relaxation for some. Because the body produces melatonin when receptors in the eyes pick up darkness, it is best to keep the room as dark as possible. Eliminate extraneous light by buying heavier curtains, covering the light from your alarm clock and from any electronic devices. The bedroom is for sleeping and sex. If you have a TV, move it to the living room. Bright lights and loud sounds before bed inhibit a smooth transition to dream land. The blues and greens in electronic screens stimulate the brain; so, if you must have some kind of screen before bed (again, not recommended), consider downloading an app that filters out certain colors and dims the screen over the course of the day.

If you have a bedmate, you may want to consider sleeping in separate bedrooms. This may rankle some, but remember: the bedroom is for sex and sleep. If you or your loved one is not getting sleep, the bedroom fails to serve a key purpose. It does not need to be a permanent arrangement, but it could help both of you get better sleep.

Your bedding also matters a great deal. Buy the most comfortable mattress you can afford. Try out different pillows until you find the one you like best. Buy sheets with a high thread count and a down comforter if that would make you more comfortable. Do everything you can to love your bed and the space in which you sleep.

Nicotine, alcohol and caffeine should also be limited, especially before bed. Nicotine and caffeine are both stimulants. Smoking is a health-eroding habit and does not actually “calm you down” before bed. Some tests suggest that drinking caffeinated substances even six hours before going to bed can reduce sleep by as much as an hour. Alcohol is among the more popular soporifics, but sedation is different than sleep. Many of the amazing things that the body does during sleep do not happen when one is merely sedated. What is more, despite dubious reports about alcohol’s usefulness in enhancing sleep (sedation) during the first half of the night, there is no doubt that alcohol consumption tends to hamper sleep during the second part of the night. It is not uncommon to sleep soundly for four to six hours and then be wide awake and unable to get back to sleep after consuming alcohol. And then there’s the dehydration, the headaches, the nausea: your sleep is too important.

Diet is also an important factor to consider. Exact timeframes are somewhat arbitrary, but the National Sleep Foundation’s recommendation that you eat two to three hours before going to sleep is a sound one. If you must have a late night snack, light foods that contain melatonin (walnuts and tart cherries) are ideal. Teas with valerian root and chamomile can be helpful before bed. Avoid foods loaded with proteins, as this can have a stimulating effect, making you more alert at a time when you are ready to hit the hay.

Though many don’t sleep well, everyone sleeps—including those who deal with insomnia. If you have difficulty getting sleep consistently and you are frustrated about the consistent lack of sleep, then you could have insomnia. It is important to emphasize the role of personal feelings toward the lack of sleep.

There are numerous insomnia typologies out there, attempting to document insomnia in its various manifestations: sleep-onset insomnia, paradoxical insomnia, familial fatal insomnia, and sleep maintenance are but a few. The more multifaceted they are, the less helpful they tend to be. Perhaps the most useful division is between temporary and chronic insomnia, or “simple” and “hard” insomnia. Simple insomnia is a helpful nomenclature because it describes the problem as having a solution that’s not complicated. As the other label suggests, hard insomnia is a more difficult matter, but it is not an impossible one to sort out.

Some believe genetics shed light on insomnia. Dutch researcher Eus van Someren and others have made waves with talk of an insomnia gene, but psychology is more helpful than biology in understanding the phenomenon. For one, insomnia is better understood as a symptom rather than a condition, a fruit rather than a root. More often than not, it is stress and anxiety that lead to insomnia. The consistent inability to get to sleep makes people concerned that they are insomniacs, which can snowball into a full-fledged state of fear that they will always struggle with sleep issues. Linking insomnia to genetics is not only inaccurate, but has likely resigned some to its presence because there’s no solution to defects in your DNA.

Part of the cure to insomnia is in attitudes and beliefs, how you choose to view its presence in your life. If you make it an all-consuming thought, you risk giving it an added weight that it doesn’t deserve. When people start to call themselves insomniacs, it can become part of an identity. If you make insomnia an inextricable part of who you are, you will have a harder time moving past it. This “insomnia identity,” as some scholars call it, can exacerbate the symptoms of anxiety and stress that gave rise to insomnia in the first place, strengthening its hold.

Sleep is incredibly important. If you don’t manage to get a good night’s sleep, that’s okay. Fretting over it makes it worse than it already is.

This argument might upset some. It might strike some as overly simplistic. The intent is not to minimize the problem of insomnia but to reframe it. Accepting the difficulty of getting good sleep might help reduce the stress and anxiety that comes from difficulty getting good sleep. It is a way of short-circuiting a vicious feedback loop.

To nap, or not to nap, that is a frequently asked question. The answer is that it depends—naps are intended to complement an efficient night’s sleep, not compensate for inefficient sleep. When sleep doctors talk about sleep efficiency, they refer to the amount of time spent asleep divided by the amount of time in bed, multiplied by 100.

Time asleep ÷ Time in bed x 100 = Sleep efficiency rating

You might get seven and a half hours of sleep, but if you’re in bed for ten hours in order to accrue that amount of sleep, that is an incredibly inefficient ratio, and you’ll likely feel like garbage during the day. Let’s plug those figures into the above equation:

7.5 hours spent asleep ÷ 10 hours in bed x 100 = 75%

A sleep efficiency rating between 85 and 90% is ideal. A rating of 75% is far less than optimal because it means you’re spending a long time in bed without the payoff of good sleep. A nap may sound like the natural decision to someone whose sleep is routinely inefficient, but it could be ruining that person’s sleep for the following night. It’s like snacking before a meal. If you eat too much, or too soon before the meal, it could ruin your appetite. It's best to nap when: 1) your sleep is efficient, and 2) your naps don’t interfere with your sleep at night.