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I woke in the middle of the night.
The clock said 3 a.m.
Nothing in particular had happened.
I just couldn’t sleep.
I picked up my phone, and put it down again.
I opened social media, and closed it again.
Staring at the ceiling, I was thinking about something without quite thinking.
Sleep would come back eventually, I thought.
But before I knew it, the gap in the curtains had turned white.
The next morning
I stand at the bathroom sink.
I wash my face the way I always do, and put on the same toner.
But something is off.
My skin looks dull.
Under my eyes feels heavy.
Even with foundation on, my face looks somehow flat.
“My face looks different from yesterday” — that feeling is right.
On nights of shallow sleep, the body overproduces the stress hormone cortisol.
It breaks down collagen and upsets the balance of sebum. The skin’s barrier function weakens, and moisture slips away.
It has been scientifically confirmed that even a single night is enough to significantly lower the next morning’s skin hydration, firmness and clarity.
There are nights that skincare alone can’t make up for.
👉 To stay young at heart, and in body. — A new anti-aging habit.
What happens while you sleep
Then there are the mornings after a deep sleep.
You wake a little before the alarm, and touch your face without thinking.
Your skin feels softer than yesterday.
After washing, the mirror looks a little brighter.
I don’t think it’s your imagination.
In the first deep sleep after you drift off, growth hormone is released in a concentrated burst.
The damage from the day’s UV rays and dryness is repaired, and the production of collagen and hyaluronic acid is encouraged.
Through the night, your skin is quietly being rebuilt.
What’s more, melatonin, released at night, has been found to have an antioxidant effect stronger than vitamins C and E.
It clears away the reactive oxygen species behind spots and wrinkles, and helps prevent aging.
Sleep may be the most valuable skincare there is.
The morning mirror reflects how you spent the night.
👉 Korean Beauty × Mindfulness × Billiards.
One reason for sleepless nights
Twenty minutes since I got into bed.
My eyes are closed, but my head keeps moving.
The things I couldn’t say in today’s meeting.
Tomorrow’s deadline.
The messages I haven’t answered —
It’s not that I’m trying to think.
But it won’t stop.
Sit at a desk all day, and while your body isn’t tired at all, your mind stays wound up.
Body and mind tired out of step with each other — that is one of the real reasons behind sleepless nights.
Move your body, and your sleep changes
On days you exercise, you sleep well at night — have you ever felt that?
As the body temperature raised by exercise comes back down, a natural drowsiness sets in.
With a moderate tiredness built up in the body, deep non-REM sleep grows longer.
A state where only the mind was tired finds its balance once the whole body is tired too.
Hard exercise right before bed, though, has the opposite effect.
Body temperature and heart rate climb too high, and sleep gets harder, not easier.
The ideal is to finish some light exercise at least two hours before bed.
It doesn’t have to be intense.
You don’t need to be drenched in sweat.
A sense that your body has moved just enough is plenty.
One night, after work
Some days, after work, I don’t go straight home.
Inside the pool hall, it was quiet.
Everyone was at their own table, and no one paid me any mind.
I walk slowly around the table, get down, and shoot.
Thinking only of the one ball, the small things of the day slip out of my head, little by little.
I miss, smile wryly, and get down again.
Before I noticed, my shoulders had loosened.
On the way home, the air was a little cool.
Somehow, I’d grown sleepy.
That night, for the first time in a long while, I slept through till morning.
The next morning, in front of the mirror, I thought:
Today feels kind of good.
Probably not my imagination.
Why not make billiards your next beauty habit?
👉 Your face today was decided last night.
👉 See the Yokohama Billiard Hall Guide
References
- Leproult, R. et al. (1997). Sleep loss results in an elevation of cortisol levels the next evening. Sleep, 20(10), 865-870. PubMed
- Chen, Y. & Lyga, J. (2014). Brain-skin connection: stress, inflammation and skin aging. Inflammation & Allergy Drug Targets, 13(3), 177-190. doi:10.2174/1871528113666140522104422
- Oyetakin-White, P. et al. (2015). Does poor sleep quality affect skin ageing? Clinical and Experimental Dermatology, 40(1), 17-22. doi:10.1111/ced.12455
- Van Cauter, E., Leproult, R. & Plat, L. (2000). Age-related changes in slow wave sleep and REM sleep and relationship with growth hormone and cortisol levels in healthy men. JAMA, 284(7), 861-868. doi:10.1001/jama.284.7.861
- Fischer, T. W. et al. (2008). Melatonin as a major skin protectant: from free radical scavenging to DNA damage repair. Experimental Dermatology, 17(9), 713-730. doi:10.1111/j.1600-0625.2008.00767.x
- Reiter, R. J. et al. (2016). Melatonin as an antioxidant: under promises but over delivers. Journal of Pineal Research, 61(3), 253-278. doi:10.1111/jpi.12360
- Kredlow, M. A. et al. (2015). The effects of physical activity on sleep: a meta-analytic review. Journal of Behavioral Medicine, 38(3), 427-449. doi:10.1007/s10865-015-9617-6
