18 Things a Cat Nap Can Fix

Reader s Digest Magazine

Yeah, we know. You didn't sleep well last night. So why not take a nap?

Studies show that not only will you feel better almost immediately, says Sara Mednick, Ph.D., a sleep medicine researcher at the University of California at San Diego and author of Take a Nap! Change Your Life, but a daily nap of between 20 and 90 minutes before 4:00 P.M. will also increase your mental performance, reduce your chances of gaining weight, and make you feel a whole lot more like having sex after dinner than you probably do now. What's more, it won't affect your nighttime sleep.

All told, a nap, according to Dr. Mednick, will:

  • Increase your on-the-job alertness by 100 percent

  • Sharpen your thinking so you make more accurate judgments and better decisions

  • Ramp up your productivity

  • Regenerate skin cells so you look younger

  • Increase your sex drive

  • Help you lose weight by altering metabolism and shifting chemicals that affect appetite

  • Reduce your risk of heart attack, stroke, irregular heartbeat, high blood pressure, and other cardiovascular problems

  • Lift your mood by bathing your brain in the neurotransmitter serotonin

  • Speed up your ability to perform motor tasks, like typing, operating machinery, even swimming

  • Improve your accuracy - in everything

  • Improve the way your body processes carbs, which reduces your risk of diabetes

  • Sharpen your senses so you take in what's important in your environment - and screen out the 24-hour culture chatter that surrounds us

  • Put your brain into its creative gear so you can come up with fresh ideas

  • Trigger a naturally occurring hormone that blocks the destructive chemicals produced by stress

  • Boost your ability to learn something new - and, better yet, remember it

  • Zap the need for drugs like caffeine and alcohol to manipulate your mood and energy level

  • Relieve migrainesImprove your nighttime sleep by eliminating that wired feeling and thus shutting off the brain chatter

  • Make you feel good all over

from Sleep to Be Sexy Smart and Slim

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