Day: 30 July 2009

Categories
Thoughts

Our little world on the 26th floor

As I sit here in Kuala Lumpur, on the 26th floor of Villas Angsana, I am amazed by how loud the traffic is way down there below me on the new expressway they have just built. I think it is more noisy up here than it is sitting perhaps next to the traffic.

Looking out through the open French windows to the banking area of KL, the massive high office blocks where I was only a couple of days ago in a meeting, seeing all the bankers working away, I wonder if they know or care what suffering is happening to others not far from them.

I look into the sky and see an aircraft at high altitude, carrying people back to their homes or away on business or on their holidays, and wonder if they knew of how life was proceeding towards the end 35,000 feet below. Often as I fly around the world, looking down as the earth slowly passes below me, I wonder if the people know there is someone looking down at them, and I wonder what these people are doing at that time.

As I am writing this blog, do the people who are keeping the internet and the computer structures functioning, know how I and others are trying to make suffering as easy as possible.

I wonder if those in the shopping centres, buying their new dresses, gadgets, toys and food know I can see the bright lights of the shops, yet have no desire to visit them, there are more important things happening here now.

Above the noise of the traffic I hear the calls to prayers, and I wonder if those who are worshipping their god, in their belief system, are considering how they could pray for those less fortunate, and perhaps how they can offer hope, help and support as well as prayer.

At the moment it is as if here on the 26th floor we are on our own.

How many more people throughout our small world are going through what we are experiencing?

……….

We try and find some medicine to make the brother-in-law more comfortable, but suddenly, my brother-in-law has taken a turn for the worse, and we call his two sons and another brother-in-law to come to help as an ambulance is called.

………..

It is a time to give care, kindness and compassion, as he is taken to hospital.

For me I will stay behind on the 26th floor with my sister-in-law, who herself is too ill to go with him.

We will sit up into the night to await news.

Categories
NLP Sleep

Sleep, Power-Naps the downside

I have just awoken from my “power-nap”, and I notice a downside.

I feel very groggy as soon as my eyes open, my arms feel heavier, my legs are like lead, my head does not want to work. I feel my age of 95, or is it 96?

Groggy after sleep
Groggy after sleep

But I know if I relax a little, within a short period, I will be like the superhero I am.

Super Hero Phillip
Super Hero Phillip

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Categories
Sleep

Sleep, Power-Naps the benefits

A power-nap can be from a couple of minutes to no more than 90 minutes research has indicated, and having a power-nap can have many beneficial results.

As in the previous article Sleep Power-Nap, it has been found that when REM sleep is attained, the brain passes short-term memory to long-term memory, the brain learns, the plasticity of the brain occurs. In Berkeley continuing research indicates that a 15 minute to 35 minute “power-nap” is the most efficient to obtain best results for increased cognitive learning and increases in IQ.

There is a saying in English, “If you have a problem, sleep on it.” How often have you woken in the middle of the night with an answer to a question you have been searching for the previous day? For me, many times. A “power-nap” may be the answer to problem solving.

“Power-naps” may help us to be more creative, as stepping away from a problem will help us gain insights to new ideas, find loose associations which we may have missed having been too close to the subject, or just dreaming to hallucinate new ideas.

Often our brain becomes overloaded with information, for some this is alright, they can cope, but for the majority, this overload is too much, by having a “power-nap” the brain has time to dump unnecessary information, clear working storage, sort-out and link associated ideas, in computer terms undertake a defragmentation, leaving room for more learning and information. Even just standing up from our desk, our study book will perhaps be enough.

Taking the afternoon nap, even at the desk research has found, reduces the stress hormones, thus leading to a more focused and risk free afternoon and evening. We can become more alert, energetic and having more stamina. Our mood can change and we will be more efficient.

“Power-naps” can be beneficial to health and well being as it triggers cell repair, maintains hormone levels and their maintenance. It has also been seen to reduce the risk of heart disease, as research on young men from Greece, where the culture is taking an afternoon snooze, nap or siesta, when compared to other young men who did not “power-nap” had a 35+% lower risk of heart related deaths.

People who say cannot sleep at night, like a certain person I know, can help themselves by having a “power-nap”, as it seems that the cumulative sleep over 24 hours will be equivalent to a straight 8 hours.

Can a session of hypnosis produce the same results? I believe so, as work I have done with colleagues produce good results, especially as hypnosis produce sleep like states, i.e., REM, paralysis or rigidity of the outer limbs, and brain waves similar to REM sleep or Delta sleep.

Other experiments I did and introduced into an intensive language course in Istanbul, Turkey, seemed to prove that the participants who were in-class from 9am till 9pm, with breaks, and whom I placed in a trance for 30 minutes in the afternoon and early evening, learned better than those who did not attend the hypnotic sleep time.

So now I have earned a “power-nap”, sitting here on a comfortable sofa with a cooling breeze lulling me towards downtime.

Dreams
Power Nap

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