One of the biggest reasons why we sleep late is because of technology. The use of mobile phones and the availability of social media, vlogs, and blogs can certainly keep us up at night.
That’s why experts are advising us to refrain from using our phones at night. Unfortunately, not all of us have the discipline to do so.
If you’re one of these people, don’t worry. You still have hope of getting the sleep you want, even if you use technology. That’s because the same pool of people who brought us inventions that keep us up at night also made a few nifty solutions to help us fall to sleep.
How Technology Can Help Us Sleep Better
You may not always get that precious 7-8 hours of sleep, but you can at least take advantage of some technological advancements to make sure that the sleep you get is top-notch quality! Here are some things you do for better sleep:
1. Smart speakers provide us with relaxing ambient music.
Remember that familiar feeling of falling asleep to the sound of the washer in the basement? That is white noise at work. It drowns your senses and dampens other sounds that may otherwise startle you at night.
If you have a smart speaker, you can even remotely ask Siri or Alexa to play white noise for you. Washer sound, rain, rustling wind, and ocean waves are a few generic choices that can block traffic noises, footsteps, talking neighbors, and other unwanted noise you want to mute at night.
Bonus tip: If you have smart lights, you can even turn off lights and other smart appliances connected to your smart speaker! If you are unsure if you have turned off the kitchen lights, you don’t have to go out of bed to check and turn it off!
2. Blue light blocking glasses help to minimize the adverse effects of blue lights.
Blue light is a light frequency that tells our body that it’s not yet time to sleep. It’s naturally emitted by the sun, many household light sources, and screens. Blue light helps us maintain our wakefulness during the day. However, exposure to it at night disrupts our body’s sleep cycle.
If you can’t avoid blue light at night, you can wear blue light blocking glasses hours before bedtime to condition the body that it’s nighttime already.
3. Sleep trackers help you to analyze and tweak your sleeping patterns.
Fitness trackers and other wearable devices are often coupled with sleep tracking features. Although this may not be as accurate as sleep tracking done in laboratories, you can find some nifty information about your sleep that can be useful.
One basic function it can do for you is to document the time you slept and woke up. This data alone can give you a clear picture of your sleeping habit and prompt you to adjust your activities to sleep more.
4. Smart mattresses offer a more comfortable sleeping surface.
Air conditioners help us achieve optimal sleeping temperature inside our room. Unfortunately, some of us still tend to sleep hot, especially people on the heavy side. For this purpose, smart mattresses and pads were developed to help maintain the right sleeping surface temperature to sleep cooler and better.
Heavy people can benefit from this technology. However, these are pretty expensive. If you’re on the heavier side and don’t have the budget to spare, the next best option you have is a mattress for big people designed to support your weight and has breathable fabrics so you can sleep cooler too.
5. Heated blankets can help regulate room temperature during the cold months.
Whether it’s too cold or too hot, the temperature inside our room can highly affect our sleep. Luckily, there are now electric blankets that we can take advantage of. These blankets are designed to provide heat so we can sleep warmly during the colder months. This has become a go-to-sleep accessory by many people as this can help them save on heating costs.
Conclusion
Several factors can potentially disturb or improve our sleep at night. Some of it can be easily tweaked to our preference (room temperature and white noise), while others are simply off-limits to us (street noise, neighbors).
To get a restful sleep, the best we can do is take advantage of some technology to sleep better! The technology is already here. We just have to make use of it!
