What's the best music to fall asleep to?

Do you think you got enough sleep this past week?

No, well you’re not alone. Two-thirds of adults throughout all developed nations fail to get the recommended eight hours of sleep a night.

Routinely sleeping less than six or seven hours a night demolishes your immune system and more than doubles your risk of cancer.

Lack of sleep is a real problem and for some of us our biggest problem is falling, and then staying asleep.

Scientists have even started lobbying doctors to start ‘prescribing’ sleep. As prescriptions go, it’s perhaps the easiest, simplest, least painless and probably most enjoyable one you’ll ever get

There isn’t a major organ within the body, or process within the brain, that’s not enhanced by sleep.

 

Insufficient sleep has also been shown to be a key lifestyle factor in developing Alzheimer’s disease. Even moderate reductions in sleep for just one week disrupts blood sugar levels so profoundly that you would be classified as pre-diabetic.

Music could be the key

One way to help you drift off to sleep and get those much needed sleep hours is to listen to music. But think carefully about what music you listen to. Those pumping high intensity tunes you listen to in the gym are not conducive to sleep.

What you need is soothing music that has a slower beat, these tracks will help slow down your breathing and heart rate, which will in turn slow down you mind. Not surprisingly, you need to be in a state of relaxation to sleep. But music is also a very personal choice, what one person may find relaxing and beautiful, could drive another to distraction. Instead try Google Play Music, which has over 50 sleep playlists.

Some of the songs are instrumentals and so have no lyrics that you could be tempted to sing along to. Google’s Play Music curator Brady Hayward say’s for the “Fall Asleep” playlist, they make sure none of the songs feature drums unless they’re brushed drums like in Nora Jones’ “Come Away with Me,” he adds.

So we’ve listed below the most popular sleep songs according to Spotify and taken from the Huffington Post’s  “The 10 Best Songs to Help You Fall Asleep Faster”

But remember if you’re using your phone to listen to these tracks you’ll need to turn off all notifications; you don’t want someone’s latest social media update to disturb you just as you’re drifting off. Or your work colleagues desperate attempt to reduce their inbox by sending out late night emails or messages.

 

Finally get yourself a real alarm clock & get ready to wake up feeling fresh and happy!

 

Sonima’s Sleep Playlist

1. Thinking Out Loud - Ed Sheeran
2. All of Me - John Legend
3. Earned It (from Fifty Shades of Grey) -The Weeknd
4. Let Her Go - Passenger
5. Skinny Love - Birdy
6. Say Something - A Great Big World, Christina Aguilera
7. FourFiveSeconds - Rihanna, Paul McCartney, Kanye West
8. Fix You - Coldplay
9. Photograph - Ed Sheeran
10. Latch (Acoustic) - Sam Smith