Why We Sleep

Unlocking the Power of Sleep and Dreams

De: Matthew Walker

Narrado por: Steve West

The first sleep book by a leading scientific expert - Professor Matthew Walker, director of UC Berkeley's Sleep and Neuroimaging Lab - reveals his groundbreaking exploration of sleep, explaining how we can harness its transformative power to change our lives for the better.

Sleep is one of the most important but least understood aspects of our life, wellness, and longevity. Until very recently, science had no answer to the question of why we sleep, or what good it served, or why we suffer such devastating health consequences when we don't sleep. Compared to the other basic drives in life - eating, drinking, and reproducing - the purpose of sleep remained elusive.

But an explosion of scientific discoveries in the last 20 years has shed new light on this fundamental aspect of our lives. Now, preeminent neuroscientist and sleep expert Matthew Walker gives us a new understanding of the vital importance of sleep and dreaming. Among so many other things, within the brain, sleep enriches our ability to learn, memorize, and make logical decisions. It recalibrates our emotions, restocks our immune system, fine-tunes our metabolism, and regulates our appetite. Dreaming mollifies painful memories and creates a virtual reality space in which the brain melds past and present knowledge to inspire creativity.

Walker answers important questions about sleep: How do caffeine and alcohol affect sleep? What really happens during REM sleep? Why do our sleep patterns change across a lifetime? How do common sleep aids affect us, and can they do long-term damage? Charting cutting-edge scientific breakthroughs and synthesizing decades of research and clinical practice, Walker explains how we can harness sleep to improve learning, mood, and energy levels; regulate hormones; prevent cancer, Alzheimer's, and diabetes; slow the effects of aging; increase longevity; enhance the education and lifespan of our children, and boost the efficiency, success, and productivity of our businesses. Clear-eyed, fascinating, and immensely accessible, Why We Sleep is the crucial account on sleep that will forever change listeners' minds on the subject.

Download the accompanying reference guide.©2017 Matthew Walker (P)2017 Simon & Schuster, Inc.

Good basic information

This was a good book, but had some very basic information in it. If you are looking for ways to help you sleep better, find something else. If you are wanting to understand the benefits of sleeping or detriments of not sleeping, this is very good. I enjoyed the narration.

Highly Recommended

There is a nice PDF for this book with charts and graphs that are quite useful to review before (or during) listening to this book.

Clearly the author has strong views about the importance of sleep, and perhaps goes a little overboard with his passion. Nevertheless there is a lot of interesting, important, and actionable information about sleep in this book.

I learned quite a bit, relearned quite a bit, and was convinced about the importance of good quality sleep. I would highly recommend this to anyone, particularly anyone with any trouble sleeping. Even if you sleep really well, this book is interesting to learn about the powerful effects of poor quality sleep on keds, doctors, drivers, and others.

The narration is completely excellent with good clarity, good pacing, and very good energy.

Fascinating book on sleep, highly recommended!

I️ was searching for a book on the science behind sleep, and I️ definitely found it! The author did a phenomenal job explaining all things sleep. From benefits, to diseases, to harmful impacts and more. I️ love learning the science behind things, and this book definitely delivered in that aspect.

In terms of practically, if you’ve ever read anything on how to sleep better I️ doubt you’ll find something new here. But this book doesn’t promise “how to sleep better” so I’m not docking it for that. I️ do recommend “Sleep Smarter” by Shawn Stevenson if you want more practical tips on how to sleep better. That being said, I️ have never been so motivated to get a consistent sleeping schedule than after/ while reading this book. For me, the book is worth it for that alone.

The narration was ehhh, I️ would give it a 3.5. I️ liked the authors voice but I️ did not finding him engaging, at all. To me it seems like he assumed people would be listening to this right before bed and read with a relaxed tone. However, it is definitely not bad enough to where I️ wouldn’t listen to it again.

The only part I️ thought was silly was when the author was trying to emphasize the evolutionary importance of sleep and he tries to flip the question of “why we sleep” to “why ever need to wake up?” Well let’s see there is food, water and sex, just to name a few reasons. Other than that I️ loved the book and think it’s well worth your credit!

Importante book to read but too long

Everyone must read about sleep. But this book has some sections not so relevant like sleep of animals. Skim over the overly scientific bits and replay the bits about the damage of lack of sleep to humans.

A MUST FOR LITERALLY ANYONE

This is a mind blowing book, there’s so many things we’re neglecting about sleep, we should as individuals and society know a lot more about what should indeed take a third of our lives.

great information on sleep, so good I overslept.

The information is critical for the public to know. I think most people are completely unaware how poor sleep adversely affects health.

Some great sleep recommendations to take to heart

This is the second book on sleep I've read, and I admit I like it better than the first. It probably spends a little less time on the WHY of sleep than it does on how sleep is extremely important. It has some good recommendations on how to improve your sleep and a ton of very interesting statistics. Recommended!

Rude awakening into better sleep

Informative, easy and soothing to follow. Everyone should read this book , especially educational for parents .

Sleep

Who knew that sleep plays such a pivotal role in health, and disease prevention. Bravo to the author! This info must be available to all; a public health campaign is called for.

I LOVE Sleep!

I've always loved sleep, and believed it was precious, but this book has made me OBSESSED with it. I'm one of those people who need 9 hours to feel rested, plus a nap and often felt a little guilty that I needed so much sleep. Then I had a baby and sleep became SACRED. We sleep trained as early as possible, not just because we needed sleep, we thought we were going to DIE of sleep deprivation. This book has given me so much validation for my deep love and reverence for sleep. The stories and metaphors used throughout the book paint perfect pictures of how important and essential sleep is in order to survive, thrive and heal from our waking life. I can't recommend this book enough!