Business life has become tougher and more stressful. CEOs and the management are experiencing this the most. According to a survey (Max Grundig Klinik für Internistische und Psychologische Medizin, Schwarzwald, Germany), 81 % (!) are complaining about disturbed sleep or symptoms that are connected with sleep disturbances. With that, since years a fatal downward spiral has begun to move -– a spiral of health disturbances of body and soul as well as of huge costs for the health- and economy-system.
Especially entrepreneurs, CEOs and executive managers are affected by this serious development. One of the main causes for numerous health disturbances are sleeping difficulties, especially too less sleep. The economic and financial crisis has even worsened the already existing bad sleeping behavior of this group.
For years, this development has been proved by international surveys and studies. Thereby, the mostly psychological stress due to objectives and expectations too high is playing a central role. Especially the non-achievement of high performance goals is leading to inner stress and in consequence to a disturbed sleep and a drop in performance. The visible consequence: more and more often CEOs and managers are no longer able to withstand this pressure with its involving negative health-related implications and have to retire from business life. The combination of high responsibility, daily stress, psychological pressure and persistent sleep disturbances form the preconditions for the dreaded burnout-syndrome. When drifting into a burnout you only have a 50 % chance to actively return into business life again. Here, prevention is the only reasonable solution.
Meanwhile, work, private life, family, leisure time and hobbies merge seamlessly. Above all, work life is omnipresent –- at least in the head. A main reason seems to be that the personnel under-staffing since beginning of the crisis has dramatically increased in many companies. Out of this reason, especially the CEOs are having a huge workload. This further raises the stress level. Along with that come too less recreation breaks, nutritional deficiencies, too less work out, too less day- and sunlight, too much nicotine, caffeine and alcohol and above all too less sleep. And more and more often this is accompanied by the misuse of stimulating drugs and substances. These negative, synergistically working factors are leading many CEOs into a sanitary disaster – accompanied by the commercial disaster.
This negative spiral beginning with the persistent stress in professional life is leading to a compulsory submission of private and family life as well as of leisure activities. This leads to a continuously decrease of the frustration tolerance and the danger of anxiety states up to depression is increasing dramatically. For years, the WHO (World Health Organization) has been pointing out that chronical stress with its impact on body and soul will be the biggest health hazard in the 21st century. The interaction of the pillars job, family, friends, leisure time and hobbies are the basis for lasting well-being and health – and of course for a healthy, recreational sleep, too. As soon as an imbalance arises, sleep is the very first thing that becomes noticeable by disturbances to fall asleep and to sleep through.
Long since, surveys have proved that executive managers are suffering under chronical sleeping debt. On an average, per year 500 (!) hours of sleep are missing. Hence, it is impossible to balance the biologically necessary amount of sleep during weekends or holidays. And – should the time spent in bed with seven to eight hours for once seem to be enough – the sleep efficiency most likely will be bad. Meaning, the proportion of bed time and recreational sleep is no longer right. You are lying in bed for eight hours but only spend six hours sleeping. The rest of the time you are lying awake and instead of sleeping you are busy with distressing thoughts and rumination – mainly about the daily problems of business life. This for example leads to a meager sleep efficiency of 75 %. A really good sleeper has a sleep efficiency of more than 95%!
Aggravating is, that most of the time the “sleep-healthy-trio” – bed/sleeping system – sleeping place – bed room – is not meeting the sleep biological expectations. And exactly these sleep biological basic prerequisites for a recreational, biologically high-quality sleep are having the highest leverage on sleeping quality and sleep efficiency. From this point of view, one of the most important and at the same time easiest decision is to create the basic requirements for healthy sleep. Namely, a comprehensive optimization of bed/sleeping system – sleeping place – bed room. By the way, the ROI (return of investment), so important for managers can never be reached so easily and quickly as with the targeted optimization of the own sleep. Remember: the healthy, recreational sleep is the most important factor for well-being and health, is enhancing the creativity and power, is bringing alertness and clear thinking – and therewith is forming the base for personal and professional success! When subsequently dealing with the variable basic prerequisites for healthy sleep – like a reasonable management of breaks, recreation, movement and nutrition, for example – business is fun again in stress times, too, and you really are able to sleep vital energy every single night again.
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