Bad habits often begin at an early age. An important test at school leads to an all-nighter. Friends want to party so weekends are a time of minimal sleep. A good book keeps us up. The game. A movie. Before long you have a habit eating away at your wealth, causing no end of suffering.
In our modern world we tend to consider sleep as wasted time. Sleeping 8 hours a night is so Stone Age. Anyone worth their salt sleeps as few hours as possible. There is a business to run, a job to get too, bills to pay, things to do, a life to live!
Humans historically slept more than modern people do. The light bulb changed that. Danger lurked in the dark of night so it was natural to sleep more. Artificial light allowed for late nights of socializing, reading, or other desired activities. Then came computers and the blue light part of the screen. Sleep is now interrupted unintentionally.
Reduced sleep has had consequences. We might think we are tough for living on minimal sleep, but you are not as tough as you think you are.
A study by the AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety discovered people getting 6-7 hours of sleep per night had twice as many sleep-related accidents as people getting more than 8 hours per night. Get less than five hours of sleep a night and the risk climbs to a 400%+ increased risk of a sleep-related accident. And many people work hard to get by on 5 hours or less of sleep each day.
If lack of sleep causes so many problems, it stands to reason that adequate sleep is the elixir of many problems. We will use the template from a prior blog post to discover how proper sleep can build wealth. In effect, you build serious wealth, all types of wealth, when you sleep.
We will address each type of wealth in order followed by solutions to disrupted sleep.
Sleep and Financial Wealth
In the prior blog post (What is Wealth?) I mention financial wealth is the least of the five types of wealth. This should not be confused with unimportant. Financial wealth is important and is still on the list of types of wealth.
Money is the most visible of wealths. In a consumer economy money is everywhere. Spending is part of our daily life.
Lack of sleep plays a fundamental role in how much money you have. There is a correlation between unemployment and the amount of sleep you get. And no job means less money. It becomes a vicious cycle.
Sleep also plays a role in spending habits. Adequate sleep—generally 8 hours or slightly more per day—builds willpower. Lack of sleep reduces willpower.
Spending opportunities are everywhere. If you do not build the willpower muscle you will always be financially broke. Retirement and an enjoyable life become a distant dream. And sleep regulates willpower. Less sleep means less willpower and the start of spindown.
Making quality decisions as a business owner is vital. One really bad decision can take years to recover from, if at all. Since we can see lack of sleep puts you at greater risk for a driving error, the same must be true of other decisions made while sleep deprived.
Money problems are often cited as the result of lack of sleep. But that gets it backwards. Lack of sleep leads to money problems which creates a feedback loop. Research reveals even a modest amount of saving can improve sleep quality remarkably.
That is the secret to financial wealth. Sleep. You are not spending while you sleep. And while awake you are making better decisions with your money because you have willpower.
Sleep and Physical Wealth
When do you perform your best physically? Do you lift the most weight, run the best race when you have not slept well the past week?
Exercise is necessary for good bodily health. Strength and aerobic training combined provide the best value.
The reason people don’t go for something as simple as a walk is because they are tired. When you have a splitting headache over sleep deprivation you are putting your physical wealth at risk.
There is hard evidence to back up these claims. Athletes suffering from poor sleep quality “is a good predictor for injuries and more importantly, concussion.”
Ken Farmer, the Western novel author, once said, “It is the silence between the words that makes it a story.”
The same is true for physical training. The runner knows rest days are required to build endurance. The weightlifter knows it is the time between lifts that build muscle.
Burning the candle at both ends is not the recipe for solid physical wealth. Proper amounts of quality sleep is.
Once again we get a positive feedback loop. Ample amounts of quality sleep allow for a good workout which leads to a good night of sleep. Anything disrupting that pattern needs to be excised as quickly as possible so you can return to a nurturing routine.
Sleep and Mental Wealth
Remember back to your college days? Ah, yes. Procrastination required a period of power study. Sleep was sacrificed to get as much study time as possible as the exam date approached.
How did that turn out? Did you get a good grade? How about retention? Did you remember what you studied after the exam?
Of course we know the answer. Power studying does help, but it is more triage than real learning. And then when you need to remember information from an earlier chapter latter in the semester…
Personal experience has taught me that the third day of a tax seminar is worthless. Hours and hours of sitting leads to poor sleep quality, leading to near zero retention of information. Power learning doesn’t work in the business world either. Good thing we have the textbook for research later.
Mental wealth can be the most satisfying of the wealths. Exploring interests builds mental wealth. Reading books, attending seminars, watching videos, and discussing the topic with experts are all part of the fun of learning things of personal interest.
But we all know how it goes when we are reading a book while short on sleep. Often we forget what we read. Sometimes we zone out while reading to such a degree that the words never get into the skull at all.
We are easily tricked into thinking sleep can be curtailed because for a few days we can get away with it. Then it starts to add up. Performance lags and mental fatigue sets in.
In the early days of my career I burned the candle at both ends during tax season. Tax season went from early February to mid-April. The first two weeks of February I felt unstoppable. Week three started to hurts. The remainder of tax season was painful and a few extra hours of sleep did not make up for earlier losses.
As I aged I became wiser. I stopped torturing the candle and only lit one end. Instead of my day starting in the early morning and stretching past midnight, I made a plan where I worked 40 hours per week during tax season.
Yes, I do end up putting a few extra hours during high tide, but in a very limited way. It has been decades since I put in a workweek over 50 hours. Outside tax season my hours are similar to a part-time temp job. This frees my time for quality family time and reading. And the relaxed schedule all starts from a good night of sleep.
Adequate sleep means the quality of my sleep is also higher. More high-quality sleep means I do a better job at the office. I serve clients better! As a business owner that is important to me.
Ample sleep caused something else. A clear mind meant I made fewer mistakes on tax returns reducing stress for all involved. I also gave more and better advice to clients. Again, more value for those I serve.
Most of all the type of clients I served changed. No longer were my clients a list of people interested in the cheapest service they could get. No. Now clients were showing up with more complex issues and I had the grey matter to handle the complex issues. That led to better fees for your favorite accountant. And clients were happy to pay those fees because they received value in exchange for the fee paid.
It is easy to see how proper levels of sleep improved profits in my tax practice while allowing me a personal life at the same time. I worked smarter, not more. Sacrificing sleep to get more done actually meant I got less done! And it hurt clients and me alike.
The evidence is clear. Sleep is the secret to mental wealth. That often leads to more financial wealth. A pretty good sweetheart deal if you ask me.
There is evidence ample sleep is good for mental health.
Sleep and Spiritual Wealth
Many people struggle with understanding spiritual wealth. They mistakenly think going to church and praying are what spiritual wealth is all about. Or, if they are not of faith, they think meditation is what spiritual wealth is.
The real answer is that meditation is the way to attain spiritual wealth. Prayer, too.
But meditation and prayer are not the actual wealth. Just as eating is not physical wealth, eating proper foods are the way to nourish the body and build physical wealth.
Spiritual wealth is a set of feelings. Someone with spiritual wealth has low stress. They feel content. Are satisfied with what they have.
Low stress and satisfaction removed binge spending and shopping as a form of therapy. Then we see the feedback loop again. Less stress means better sleep. Better sleep means less stress. Better sleep and less stress increases willpower. With willpower you don’t destroy your financial wealth which is the leading cause of sleep loss. Got it?
Prayer and meditation are the gateway to spiritual wealth. Prayer and meditation quiet the mind, allowing you to find that quiet place.
Often we are told that we should clear our mind when meditating. That is incorrect. Meditating allows you to process your thoughts so you can pack them away. There is a difference.
Meditation prepares you for sleep. Prayer plays the same role. Prayer is a way of getting things off your mind by talking with God. Meditation should be similar. It might be self talk. Or it could be the combination of prayer and meditation. They do go together.
As with all types of wealth, it takes time and effort to build the level of wealth you have. One prayer, one meditation session, is not enough. It is consistency that counts. Religious people understand prayer is a daily exercise. God was on to something when he asked for prayers. Those without faith can learn a lot from the faithful because pure meditation is the same activity.
The more you pray or meditate the better you will get at it. Start with five minutes in a quiet place. If a quiet place is unavailable you can close your eyes and focus on your thoughts and your breathing. Let the world go. Let the world be “out there.” You are in the moment.
Spiritual wealth is like nothing else. The contentment is incredible! Don’t skimp on spiritual wealth. And you need good sleep to meditate properly.
Meditation before bed is also the best way to gain a good night of sleep. Drop the baggage off before your head hits the pillow.
Sleep and Health Wealth
Health is wealth. Lacking all other forms of wealth, if you are healthy you still can be a very happy human being if you choose to do so.
Lack of health subtracts from all other forms of wealth. Money means a lot less when you are dying in a hospital bed. Hard to have physical wealth without at least a limited amount of health. Mental wealth requires a certain level of health. Focusing on spiritual wealth becomes increasingly more difficult as our health fails. We may pray, but our requests becomes narrowly focused, asking for less pain or perhaps more life.
Health wealth is the one wealth you are guaranteed to lose.
No matter how good you take care of yourself, the Grim Reaper always collects his prize in the end.
The question is how soon can the Grim Reaper collect?
The Mayo Clinic reports that men who get proper levels of sleep over their lifetime live an average of five years longer. Women getting ample sleep live about two years longer. (Proper levels of sleep between men and women may equalize longevity between the genders.)
Saying sleep is important understates the importance of sleep. You can live longer without food than sleep. Even water. Sleep is a basic building block of a satisfying life. In fact, there is no life for human beings without sleep.
Lack of sleep kills. It kills on our highways and in work accidents. Overall health is impossible without proper amounts of sleep. You can cheat for a short period of time and you can run a sleep deficit for a lifetime. But the cost is tremendous.
Walking through life as a sleep-deprived zombie is the antithesis of health wealth.
Health wealth is the most important of all the wealths. It always runs out in the end. And must be a priority your entire life.
Solutions to Sleep Issues
We examined the feedback loop between every type of wealth and sleep. No lasting wealth is possible without proper sleep.
But sleep is an issue for many people. You might spend plenty of time in bed to get those proper amounts of sleep. You might have the quiet necessary. You may have eliminated stress and financial issues, yet sleep evades you.
There are a few steps you can take to get a better night of sleep.
Reduce or eliminate caffeine. I love my coffee so I understand this problem all to well. A good solution that doesn’t require giving up the bitter liquid is to cut back and to refrain from consuming caffeinated beverages or foods after noon.
Another sleep issue in the Accountant household is apnea.
Mrs. Accountant snores. So do I.
By the way, so does Shaquille O’Neal. Shaq popularized a product called the Zyppah. An FDA approved clinical study found the Zyppah to be 91% effective in reducing snoring. Less snoring means better quality sleep for you and any sleep at all for those within earshot. It is worth the hundred bucks the product costs.
If simple DIY solutions don’t work you will need to discuss the matter with your doctor. There are multiple remedies for sleep issues.
Age does not have to include reduced quality sleep. As we saw above, a few dollars in savings, some light exercise (simple walking can do the trick), a good book, and a bit of meditation or prayer before bed can do wonders for your sleep hygiene.
Make sleep a priority. There is nothing I can say or do to increase your wealth, any type of wealth, if you are sleep deprived.