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10 Reasons Cuddling Every Day Is So Important

March 13, 2022 by Sarah Barkley

Finding time to relax in your busy schedule might be challenging. But making it a priority can improve your life. Taking time to relax and cuddle with someone has many benefits you’ll be happy to take advantage of.

Physical touch is a basic human need, along with food, water, and adequate shelter. People require interaction with others, and the power of touch is incredible. Your skin is the first organ that develops within the womb, making touch the first experience sensation.

Because it is the first organ to develop, babies thrive on touching others. The urge never diminishes because even adults need to experience touch. Needing to be touched is more than just a craving; cuddling with someone is essential for your well-being.

If you ever need an excuse to cuddle, you can use some of these reasons snuggling every day is so important. It’s beneficial to your mental and physical health, and it can make every aspect of your life a little better.

Ten Reasons Cuddling Every Day Is So Important

1. Cuddling Boosts the Immune System

When you cuddle with someone, your body releases hormones that help fight infection. Making snuggling a typical part of your routine can save you from getting sick as often. It strengthens your immune system cells, keeping them in good shape.

You can avoid catching a cold or other illness while snuggling each day. When you feel good, your body works wonders in eliminating foreign bodies and viruses.

2. It Benefits Your Brain

Cuddling will trigger the release of cortisol and dopamine, hormones associated with brain health. Dopamine promotes positive brain function, including attention, behavior, cognition, mood, pleasure, and desire. It also makes you feel more motivated and ready to move, and it helps you reinforce positive behavior.

Additionally, since it helps you sleep better, it improves your memory. When you get good sleep, your brain functions better, and you can recall things you learned before.

3. Cuddling Decreases the Risk of Heart Disease

Physical touch and intimacy increase oxytocin levels, offering many benefits. It helps reduce blood pressure, reducing your risk of developing heart disease. Your heart is healthier when your body isn’t working so hard to prevent stress and illness.

Hugging or touching someone you care about reduces blood pressure. When it decreases, you’re less susceptible to the risks associated with high blood pressure.

4. It Helps You Sleep Better

Snuggling for even ten minutes before going to bed can help you sleep much better. Since it triggers the release of oxytocin, you’ll experience less stress as you drift off to sleep. You’ll fall asleep easier and sleep better during the night, waking up feeling well-rested.

Plus, if that’s an issue, you might sleep longer and have fewer nightmares. Experts say that even ten minutes of snuggling can improve your sleep health.

5. Cuddling Makes You Feel Good

When your body releases oxytocin while you cuddle, the hormone helps you feel good overall. It promotes positivity and happiness, and it can reduce aches and pains. The mood-boosting side effects kick in quickly and last for quite some time.

Snuggling also makes you feel calmer as it releases oxytocin. Finding a calming technique can make all the difference in your life when you have a hectic and busy schedule.

6. It Reduces Stress and Anxiety

The hormones released while snuggling inspire positive thinking, helping you feel less stressed and anxious. You’ll have a more optimistic outlook on life and won’t get caught in the cycle of rumination or worry as often.

Snuggling also makes you feel more confident in yourself, making you more resilient. When you can handle unexpected situations easier, you won’t stress over them as much. The oxytocin released when you cuddle leads to the following:

Increased positive response to many stimuli
Suppressed physiological stress
Lowered norepinephrine
Decreased blood pressure and heart rate
Lowed cortisol hormone levels

7. Cuddling Relieves Pain

If you have tense muscles or an injury, snuggling can help relieve the pain. Physical touch and oxytocin make you feel better, so find someone to cuddle up with. It prevents pain signals from reaching your brain in the first place, making pain management much more manageable.

If you suffer from chronic pain, snuggling can help with that, too. It reduces lower back pain and decreases the discomfort associated with irritable bowel syndrome. Cuddling can also reduce pain for those with cancer.

Researchers found that oxytocin can help with pain from less severe situations like menstrual cramps. If you have a headache or stubbed your toe, look for someone to cuddle with. Snuggling has similar effects as therapeutic touch, an alternative medicine practice that balances energy to ease the pain.

8. Cuddling Strengthens Relationships

You probably guessed this one, but snuggling strengthens your relationships. You don’t have to communicate verbally if you’re touching, and it promotes feelings of comfort, safety, and trust. Plus, it reassures both people that they are wanted.

These feelings don’t only happen during the snuggling session, either. They last long afterward, benefitting your relationships even when you’re apart for a little while.

Instead of coming home and stressing out about your job or other issues, sit down to cuddle. When you cuddle instead of stressing, it improves your relationship overall. Plus, physical contact allows you to focus on your loved ones and the positive feelings they give you.

Hugs and physical touches can also help with positive communication in your relationships. When you’re stressed, communicating effectively is hard, but physical contact makes it easier. You’ll also build trust in your relationship as you bond through snuggling and communicating better.

9. It Helps a Woman Bond with Her Baby

Oxytocin strengthens your relationship bond, which is typical for a mother and baby. Skin-to-skin contact makes parents feel closer to their baby and helps their child develop a secure attachment. As a mother cuddles her baby during a feeding, the mom feels relaxed and enjoys her time with the child.

As the baby grows, the time spent snuggling during their early months can help their development. They will be more confident, embrace individualization, and feel safe to explore. Plus, they will naturally show empathy to others, develop healthy social relationships, and cope with stress better than others.

It’s also important to note that oxytocin helps parents in other ways. The hormone makes breastfeeding easier, encourages sleep, leads to less crying, and reduces discomfort.

10. It Prevents Weight Gain and Curbs Cravings

Weight gain can occur for many reasons, and giving in to cravings is one. Another reason for weight gain is hormonal imbalance, indicating low levels of oxytocin or serotonin. Snuggling boosts these hormones, helping curb your cravings and avoid gaining weight.

Snuggling with someone you care about also makes you feel satisfied after meals. It promotes healthier food choices and can help prevent binge eating.

Serotonin also helps with proper digestion and signals to your brain when you’re full. It’s also essential to note that a lack of serotonin can lead to digestive issues such as irritable bowel syndrome. Cuddling daily makes you less likely to have problems like this.

Additionally, the more serotonin you produce, the better your body digests food. It helps process the food, taking in all the nutrients and vitamins. Cuddling won’t heal current digestive issues, but it can prevent them from occurring and help with symptoms.

Who You Should Cuddle With

Many people think they must have a romantic partner to cuddle with daily. However, you can cuddle with anyone you care about, and it’ll produce the same effect. You can cuddle with a friend, pet, child, or anyone you like.

Other Options

You have another option if you’re not much for snuggling or can’t find someone to cuddle with. You can schedule a professional massage, achieving many of the same benefits as cuddling with a loved one.

Another option is to massage your own shoulders or tense muscles. Find a quiet place to sit still and rub your muscles until you feel better. You can also take a warm or hot bath because feeling the warmth and experiencing the sensation on your skin will release oxytocin.

Final Thoughts on Reasons Cuddling Every Day Is So Important

Cuddling isn’t just a fun way to relax with someone you care about. It offers many physical and mental health benefits, allowing you to live a happy and fulfilling life. You’ll experience less pain, stress, and other sources of negativity. As a result, your positive experiences will increase.

The power of touch can do so much for you, and you’ll never be sorry about how you spent your time snuggling. It’s relaxing while improving all areas of your life. Find your favorite cuddle buddy and spend some time together so that you can embrace the many benefits.

8 Soft Skills Employers Look for in Employees Without Saying So

March 12, 2022 by Deborah Tayloe

One constant image in science fiction is a new world automated by robots. While modern technology and robotics have improved production in many fields, it still depends on people. That irreplaceable human touch is what separates hard skills from soft skills.

The skills you’ve learned for a specific job are hard skills–you can learn them and measure them. Computer capabilities, machine operation, and a certificate or degree are good examples. You received these through classroom instruction and training. In fact, the job description probably lists these as the main qualifiers for your job.

On the other hand, soft skills are your “people skills” and are difficult to quantify. They reflect how you relate to other people professionally or personally and are often called interpersonal abilities. These skills link to personality traits. Instead of measuring them, you must display or exhibit them. Employers may work with a temp agency that has the tools and skills needed to look for job candidates that exhibit these people skills along with the technical skills required for the job.

These talents extend to everyone in your circle of influence. So by observing your actions, people can quickly tell if you have these abilities or not. In fact, how you relate to others speaks volumes about who you’re as a person.

If you are overly sweet to your supervisors and mistreat your fellow workers, you lack people skills. Conversely, being kind and accepting of everyone shows maturity and leadership capabilities. Both soft and hard skills are necessary for any career path you follow.

The Best of Both Skillsets

Your interpersonal skills are just as essential to your employer as your hard skills. It doesn’t matter if you’re the most brilliant accountant in a firm if you can’t get along with coworkers and clients. Conversely, extraordinary people skills alone wouldn’t qualify you to be a physician.

It would help if you had an appropriate balance of hard skills and people skills to succeed on the job. Not only does it create a more positive work atmosphere, but it cultivates a bond between you and your customers. This balance also can help your workplace be more productive.

Eight Soft Skills Employers Want to See

Knowing what an employer expects makes it easier to understand where you need to improve. Most interpersonal skills involve relating well to others and treating them how you want to be treated. These are eight soft skills that employers want to see from their employees.

1. Communication Is Perhaps the Most Fundamental of the Soft Skills

Regardless of your job title or industry, excellent communication skills are crucial. Actively listening to your clients can differentiate between a sale or a missed opportunity. Plus, it’s one of the people skills you need to relate to your supervisors and coworkers. These are some of the components of communication skills:

Clear and concise language
Active listening
Excellent written communication
Non-verbal communication: Social cues, receptive body language, facial expressions, tone of voice, and gestures

2. Group Dynamics

People are more valuable to employers when they understand team players. According to an article published by the University of Michigan, working together can bring a better outcome. Everyone contributes their skills, experience, and talent to achieve a common goal.

Being an effective team player includes respecting others and getting along with your colleagues. Working in a positive environment allows your team to brainstorm and solve problems better. Everybody works together and doesn’t allow egos to cause division and negativity.

How do you relate in a brainstorming session at work? Do you demand the center stage, or do you shy away into the shadows? Good interpersonal skills help you be an influential team member while respecting contributions from your fellow employees. Group dynamic skills involve these abilities:

Coordinating efforts
Negotiation with all interested parties
Delegating tasks and responsibilities
Coordinating schedules and tasks
Collaboration
Conflict management
Getting along with and respecting others

3. Adaptability

How flexible are you mentally and emotionally? Adaptability is one of the people skills employers need in an ever-evolving work field. It would help if you were open to changes in policy, procedures, technology, and the environment.

While it’s essential to abide by rules and standards of operation, you must be flexible. If not, you may lag when a sudden change happens at your job. Inflexibility can cause problems down the road and may even result in job loss.

For example, technology is constantly changing and making present technology obsolete. What if your company announces a new computer program for the staff? If you’re adaptable and willing to learn new concepts and procedures, you’ll continue to evolve with your company. These are skills that make you more adaptable:

A positive attitude, especially toward change
An open mind
Motivation skills
Organization
Self-management
Constructive curiosity
Quick decisiveness
The ability to stay calm and lower your stress level

4. Impeccable Work Ethic

Interpersonal skills also include your work ethic, which is your pride in your job. You take a vested interest in each task and your role in the company. A good work ethic will take you far in whatever career you choose. Some examples of work ethic skills include:

Dependability, which is your best ability
Integrity, at work, home, and public
Self-discipline
Initiative, self-starter
Professionalism
Self-motivation
Ability to manage your time wisely

5. Professional Relationship Skills

Soft skills relate to your character and actions and your interpersonal abilities. How do you relate to your peers, colleagues, supervisors, and clients? Are you friendly, approachable, and respectful, especially those under your authority?

Your people skills should involve these essential aspects:

Empathy
Patience, with others and yourself
Sensitivity to others and delicate situations
Tolerance and acceptance
Networking
Excellent public speaking skills
A good sense of humor
Mentoring skills

6. Creativity

Creativity is not only an asset in artistic fields, but it’s also valuable to any workplace you choose. In his article published by the Journal of Creative Behavior, Dr. Michael D. Mumford explains the necessity of creativity in business. It’s the key for the evolution and growth of organizations, says Mumford.

It often takes creativity to solve problems and inspire a new direction. It’s the ability to gaze beyond the ordinary to see the extraordinary. Your creative skills consist of these:

Divergent thinking, or “coloring outside of the lines.”
Innovation
Inspiration
Imagination
Understanding concepts in a different way or reframing
Curiosity

7. Leadership Skills

You have a unique opportunity to share your leadership abilities if you’re a supervisor. You work with your staff to build camaraderie and workplace pride. Remember that influential leaders lead by example as well as by direction. Soft leadership skills have these characteristics:

Trust from your staff and for your staff
Humility is the only difference between you and them in your roles.
Empathy
Versatility
Self-Discipline
Genuineness
Active listening
Active mentor

8. Time Management One of the Key Soft Skills

Your supervisors want to know that they don’t have to micromanage you every second. Thus, time management time is a soft skill crucial for your job-related tasks. That’s because once you learn how to set deadlines for yourself you can avoid procrastination.

So what does that look like? These are also components of good time management:

Prioritization, from most urgent to the least.
Setting reasonable goals and meeting them
Planning, short term, and long term
Organization
Managing stress effectively
Decisive, and not constantly second-guessing yourself
Delegation: You don’t overload yourself or anyone else on the team.
Focusing on the task at hand
Self-motivation
Coping with things you can’t change

How You Can Improve Your Soft Skills

As you review the list of interpersonal skills, you’ll be able to identify your strengths and weaknesses. Everyone has room to grow and can discover ways to improve their skills. These are some helpful suggestions:

Be honest with yourself and do a self-inventory on your interpersonal skills.
Write a list of the skills you want to improve and ways to practice them.
Ask for honest feedback from a trusted colleague or friend.

So please use this information as a guide for improvement after making your list and receiving feedback. Try not to be defensive when your friend or colleague is honest with constructive criticism. They are only trying to help you see more opportunities to grow.

Besides these tips, you can work with a mentor or a professional life coach if necessary. That helps because these professionals know how to help others reach their potential. They’ll demonstrate good interpersonal skills while offering constant feedback.

Highlighting Your Soft Skills for a New Job

It’s easier for potential employers to see hard skills on a resume than your interpersonal skills. If you have the same hard skill qualifications as another applicant, your people skills may be the deciding factor. Be sure to list all these skills on your application and resume and discuss them in the interview.

Final Thoughts on Soft Skills that Employers Expect–Even if They Don’t Vocalize Them to You

Employers want to hire employees who have the hard skills to get the job and the people skills to keep it. Thus, you need to balance these two skill sets no matter where you work. Blending knowledge, skills, and effective interpersonal relations are what you need to succeed in the workforce.

Researchers Reveal Why A Night Light May Disrupt Sleep in Preschoolers

March 12, 2022 by Kristen Lawrence

A study by CU Boulder researchers finds that a night light may disturb sleep in preschoolers. Even exposure to low intensities of light an hour before bedtime can disrupt melatonin production. As this sleep-inducing hormone decreases, it makes it difficult to fall asleep.

Furthermore, the study found that a night light may negatively impact sleep for hours after bedtime. The findings were published earlier this month in the Journal of Pineal Research.

Funded by the National Institutes of Health, the research marks the latest in a series investigating the circadian rhythm of young children. The study suggests that preschoolers have a higher sensitivity to night lights, with some showing more physiological impacts than others.

“Our previous work showed that one, fairly high intensity of bright light before bedtime dampens melatonin levels by about 90% in young children,” said first author Lauren Hartstein, a postdoctoral fellow in the Sleep and Development Lab at CU Boulder. “With this study, we were very surprised to find high melatonin suppression across all intensities of light, even dim ones.”

Light impacts our circadian rhythm more than any other biological or environmental factors. Our central body clock regulates many functions in the body, from sleep to hunger to body temperature. When light hits the retina, a signal travels to a brain region called the suprachiasmatic nucleus. This coordinates rhythms throughout the body, including melatonin production each night.

If light exposure occurs during the evening when melatonin naturally increases, it can slow or even inhibit the hormone. Then, the body and mind become confused, thinking it’s still daytime, even late at night.

University Explains Why A Night Light May Disrupt Sleep in Preschoolers

This impacts preschool children even more because their eyes have larger pupils and more translucent lenses. Therefore, light can more easily travel into their eyes. In fact, one study found that 1.2 times more blue light streams into a 9-year-old’s eye than an adult’s.

“Kids are not just little adults,” said senior author Monique LeBourgeois, an associate professor of Integrative Physiology. She’s one of only a handful of researchers worldwide studying the circadian rhythm of young children. “This heightened sensitivity to light may make them even more susceptible to dysregulation of sleep and the circadian system.”

To study their vulnerability to night lights, the researchers collaborated with Colorado School of Mines mathematician Cecilia Diniz Behn for the study. They recruited 36 healthy children between the ages of 3 and 5. The nine-day study required the children to wear a wrist monitor, keeping track of their sleep and night light exposure.

Parents ensured their children stuck to a stable bedtime routine for seven days, so their circadian rhythm remained stable. This way, their melatonin levels would start increasing around the same time each night.

On the eighth day, researchers turned the childrens’ rooms into a “cave,” as they jokingly called them. They covered the windows with black plastic and dimmed the lights to do this.

Then, they took saliva samples from the children every half-hour, beginning in the early afternoon until after bedtime. This allowed scientists to measure the children’s melatonin levels and document when their biological nighttime began.

During the final day of the study, the preschoolers played games on a light table in the hour leading up to bedtime. They sat about a foot from the light table, similar to a person using a phone or tablet. The children were exposed to varying light levels, ranging from 5 lux to 5,000 lux. For perspective, a candle about 3 feet away emits one lux of light.

Children More Susceptible to Sleep Disruptions from Night Lights

As expected, their melatonin production fell drastically compared to the nights with minimal light exposure. After using the light table, the children’s melatonin levels declined by 70 to 99%. However, the researchers didn’t notice a correlation between light intensity and melatonin suppression. On the other hand, studies on adults have found an intensity-dependent response.

Even when children had dim light exposure of 5 to 40 lux – much darker than normal room light – melatonin declined by 78%. What’s more, even after 50 minutes of darkness, melatonin didn’t increase in over half of the children tested.

“Together, our findings indicate that in preschool-aged children, exposure to light before bedtime, even at low intensities, results in robust and sustained melatonin suppression,” said Hartstein.

Despite the findings, parents don’t need to shun night lights and transform children’s rooms into “caves.” However, it’s vital to monitor children’s screen time before bed in the age of technology. Have rules in place, so kids know when to shut off electronics and wind down for bedtime.

By dimming the lights an hour or two before bed, children will learn healthy sleep habits and enjoy better quality sleep. Keep in mind that a tablet emits up to 100 lux when turned to full brightness and held 1 foot away in a dark room.

For children who already have a hard time falling and staying asleep, it’s even more crucial to instill sleep hygiene.

“They may be more sensitive to light than other children,” said LeBourgeois, noting that genes — along with daytime light exposure — can influence light sensitivity. “In that case, it’s even more important for parents to pay attention to their child’s evening light exposure.”

Final Thoughts on How Night Lights Impact Melatonin in Preschoolers

A recent study by CU Boulder researchers revealed that preschoolers’ sleep might suffer when a night light illuminates their room. Shockingly, the team found that the children’s melatonin levels declined by 70 to 99% when they used a light table before bed. Light intensity ranged from 5 to 5,000 lux, but even minimal light exposure suppressed melatonin by 78%. Therefore, children need to adhere to a bedtime routine and put away electronics before bed.

Today, many young children use electronic devices at bedtime, but we shouldn’t normalize this practice. As children have vulnerable, developing brains and bodies, they need all the rest they can get. If you’re a parent, make sure to talk with your children about the importance of prioritizing sleep. It’s never too early to teach them about fostering healthy habits.

5 Principles as a Path to Peace and Joy

March 12, 2022 by Joshua Kramer

Are you looking for a path to peace and joy in your life? For many of us, we seek an approach or methodology that will lead us to feel lighter in all areas of our lives. But to be light, we first must be solid.

And that’s why it’s necessary to create a firm foundation on which to build our lives, a foundation that will tell us who we are and how we can achieve a more free-flowing way of life. It’s by laying a foundation for being rather than doing, that we’re able to act more naturally, without having to overthink what we do.

The truth is that we’re so inwardly focused and directed at self, that we constantly feel overwhelmed by cares, worries, and anxieties. Instead, it’s essential that we remove the focus on ourselves and understand the importance of selflessness, which becomes the unifying thread between each of the following five principles.

Five Principles That Lead Us to Peace and Joy in Life

1 – Kindness

In many ways, kindness is the key to all of the other principles – and everything else in life. As the fourteenth Dalai Lama has famously said,

“Be kind whenever possible. It is always possible.”

It doesn’t get much simpler than that. Kindness is guided by compassion and achieved by letting go of judgments and allowing for emotional vulnerability. Kindness lightens both our minds and burdens and becomes its own reward. Indeed, it may be the kindest thing you can do for yourself.

2 – Gratitude

The feeling of gratitude builds directly off of kindness, creating a natural flow for being. Ultimately, gratitude depends on developing an awareness of what you have in life and the good that is already around you.

By helping us become more in tune with the things we should be thankful for, gratitude helps us become more present in the moment. When we develop a mindset that things happen “for me, not to me”, we let go of the need for controlling the events of our lives, which allows for a more light and free sense of being.

3 – Integrity

This foundational principle provides a solid basis for consistent decision-making. It means recognizing and living your core values and forgoing the rationalization that ignores basic truth, honor, and respect. At its heart is decency, as integrity induces us to define our values and take responsibility. By doing so, we build a strong default for decision making, removing much of the grey area and ambivalence we often face.

As Albert Camus famously wrote,

“Integrity has no need of rules.”

4 – Humility

When we think about humility, it has much to do with your perspective on life and how it can recenter your purpose by reducing the size and scope of misplaced self-importance. Humility creates a context for everything we experience by helping to understand our own significance – and insignificance – in the grand scheme of things.

Having perspective is a central value and this is strengthened by cultivating awe. When we allow ourselves to be awestruck by the world around us, we worry less about being awestruck by ourselves.

5 – Acceptance

Coco Chanel once said,

“Don’t spend time beating on a wall, hoping to transform it into a door.”

The principle of acceptance is based on our ability to accept what is and let go of what isn’t. By embracing flexibility, we allow ourselves to cope with change because it roots us in reality and relieves us of impractical expectations.

Acceptance ultimately helps us to acknowledge the truth and change the narrative of the stories we tell ourselves. As a result, we become more sensible, practical, and mature.

And so it’s possible, with open-mindedness, to make a conscious decision to build a foundation for peace and joy in a way that is both manageable and effective. These principles are foundational, and therefore fundamental to our being.

Final Thoughts on Finding the Path to Peace and Joy

Just as important, they are principles that we can incorporate into our lives in a way that feels natural and instinctive, helping us to understand our place in society and our purpose for being. It gives us a perspective for viewing the world around us with an attitude of abundance and objectivity.

Louise Hay once wrote, “I don’t fix my problems. I fix my thinking and then my problems fix themselves.”

With that sentiment in mind, the five principles are intended to offer an adjustment to your thinking.

They will challenge the standards you feel are most important and offer a path to peace and joy through virtues and values that can stand the test of time. It’s a back-to-basics, “Unself Help” approach that simplifies in order to strengthen.

What It Means If You Dream of The Same Person Often

March 11, 2022 by Lakeisha Ethans

Dreams are a widespread phenomenon. Almost everyone experiences dreaming. And even the people who claim they don’t ever dream do. They don’t remember dreaming. Some people have a much better understanding of their dreams, and they can even control them to a certain extent.

You are lucid dreaming when you can control what you or others do in your dreams. But that’s about everything that people know about dreams and how they work. And when other people suggest that plans might have a deeper meaning, they tend to get laughed at.

But dreams have been used to interpret things since the dawn of time. At first, people thought they were visions. Then, they believed they were flashbacks. And now, they are just seen as a figment of your imagination. But psychologists argue that dreams might be a way to confront your emotions. Some think they help to facilitate creative tendencies.

But usually, they are your brain’s way to store memories. But, most often, dreams are your brain’s way to let you know that you forgot something. When you dream of the same person repeatedly, your brain might be trying to tell you that you forgot about their birthday. But that’s just one of the meanings these dreams can have. In reality, dreaming of a person might be the most challenging dream to decipher.

Why Do People Dream?

It doesn’t seem like dreams have a sole purpose or not one that researchers can agree on. Evidence shows that dreams are a way for the body to confront emotional dramas. This seems to be because the brain can take the time to make connections without dealing with the pain. Other researchers seem to think that they happen as a fight-or-flight response.

Because the amygdala is more active during your sleep, it might prepare you to face threats. One theory suggests that dreams facilitate people’s creative tendencies. While you sleep, you don’t use a logic filter, so your ideas aren’t restricted by anything. This theory seems to be backed up by the fact that many people say they had their most significant creative breakthrough after a night of sleep.

But the theory that’s most widely accepted is that dreams are meant to help you store memories. If you learn something new and then sleep on it, you will recall it much clearer when you wake up. But not all dreams are good. Some are nightmares, and they can happen for entirely different reasons. Nightmares can be normal dreams, which have a few more complex aspects.

The Connection To Stress

But they are usually caused by stress, anxiety, or even certain meds. But, if you have frequent nightmares, that means you might be suffering from a sleeping disorder. Besides these theories, researchers have shown that external factors can also affect your dreams. For example, your sleeping patterns can influence how much you dream and what you dream about. Sleep-deprived people are more likely to get into REM sleep, which will make them have more vivid dreams.

And they are more likely to remember these dreams. One factor that influences dreams is your mental health. If you have anxiety, bipolar disorder, and other mood-related conditions, you are more likely to get nightmares. The food you eat and your mood during the day can carry over in your unconscious state and affect how you sleep. If you sleep worse, you are more likely to be in the REM stage and wake up more. In turn, you are more likely to remember your dreams.

And the daily activities you engage in also affect the way you sleep. Runners and other athletes are more likely to sleep deeper. Thus, they are less likely to be in REM, so they won’t dream or remember their dreams often.

What Does It Mean If You Dream of The Same Person Often?

Here are six reasons why you may dream about someone.

1. You Also Think About That Person When You Are Awake

Dreams are often a continuation of thoughts running through your head while you are awake. Suppose you keep thinking about someone during the day. This might happen because you are worried about a family member. Maybe you haven’t gotten over an ex yet. Perhaps you are thinking about your crush or your best friend.

There are many reasons why someone would be on your mind all the time, but it usually means that there are some unresolved issues between you and the person you are thinking about. Dreaming about the same person over and over again can be your brain’s way of telling you that you need to have a chat with them.

If they are a friend or a family member, call them and work your things out. Or if it’s a crush, call them and tell them how you feel. If it’s an ex, that might get more complicated. It would be best not to contact them, no matter how much you think about them. But it all depends on your situation and what you deem is best for you.

2. You Dream About Someone You Spend A Lot Of Time With

Jung believed that humans become unconsciously attached to other people in their life. This attachment often happens because of their own emotional and personal growth. Even if you don’t think you care about a person, you can become spiritually attached to them when you are always around someone.

Because of this, they will show up in your dreams as a way to play out all the wanted and unwanted things in your relationship. But an even more straightforward explanation is that you are more likely to think about the people you interact with all the time. If you spend most of your day surrounded by the same small group of people, they are the ones who will appear in your dreams.

And there is no deeper meaning behind these dreams. They reflect your reality and continue what happens between the two of you. When you and someone else spend a lot of time together, they will inevitably appear in your dreams.

3. They Reflect Your Feelings

When you dream, you might just be transposing emotions into mental images. That’s why, when you recurrently dream about someone, that can indicate you are trying to process something. Depending on who that person in your dream is, your brain signals that you feel a certain way. For example, if the person who always shows up in your dream is someone dead, that shows you might be feeling grief.

This is a signal that you haven’t gotten over their death yet, and you still need some help. This often happens when someone has just passed. Maybe that person who passed is someone who you looked up to. In that case, you might be dreaming about them when you feel like you need advice. But you might also think about an ex or an old friend. This can be your brain’s way of telling you that you miss them and you still haven’t gotten over them.

It might be time to try and contact those people and get them back into your life. Or, if that’s not possible, it might be the case to try and work on yourself and get over them. People also dream a lot about childhood friends. That doesn’t always mean you miss them. In some cases, it might even be a sign of obsession, which is an issue you will have to deal with.

Sometimes, dreaming about the same person is your brain’s way to signal that you forgot about something. Maybe you forgot about your mom’s birthday, and that’s why you keep dreaming about her. Or perhaps you promised someone you would do something and have since forgotten about that promise.

4. A Dream Could Be a Memory Of Traumatic Events

Sometimes, people associate a specific person with some of the traumatic events they have been through. For example, people who received abuse as kids might dream of the parent who hurt them. Or someone who a bully tormented might be haunted by that memory. The same happens for people who were discriminated against, were injured in any way, or were abandoned by someone they love.

Usually, this is a sign that you haven’t gotten over that traumatic incident yet. And, until you do, you won’t stop dreaming about the same person. You need to understand the connection between the person you’re dreaming about and the trauma. Then, it would help if you tried to solve the trauma from the root. If you do nothing, chances are you won’t get over the incident.

5. Stress Can Impact Dreams

When you are stressed, your mind is probably racing, circling the same thoughts. And, chances are, whenever you feel stressed, there’s also one person who you can blame for how you think. If you are still in school, you have that one teacher who gives you a ton of assignments but no time to do them.

If you work, your boss is probably constantly dumping a ton of work on your back. But sometimes, even friends and family can stress you out. For example, being the maid of honor at your sister’s wedding is a huge responsibility and stressor.

Or organizing a family trip, where you have to make everyone happy, can take a toll on your mental wellbeing. It’s normal to dream about the people who stress you out, as they are always on your mind. And those dreams won’t go away until you get less stressed.

Final Thoughts on What It Means If You Dream of The Same Person Often

Dreams are a standard part of human life. Some have them less, others more. Some people can remember them, some forget them as soon as you wake up. And some people can even control their dreams and lucid dream. But dreams are usually a figment of one’s creativity, a piece of memory, or your brain trying to tell you something.

When you keep dreaming about the same person, that usually happens because they are always on your mind. Maybe you spend a lot of time with them or share a special connection. Perhaps they’re part of a memory or a sign that you have to work on your trauma. They usually reflect your feelings, telling you something about yourself that you might not have known before. In a nutshell, these dreams are more about yourself than about the subject of your dream.

5 Ways Work-Related Stress Damages Your Health (and How to Beat It)

March 11, 2022 by Sarah Barkley

Work-related stress is common, and many people experience it each day. While it might seem unharmful because of how common it is, it can be detrimental to your health. You’ll experience health issues now, but you’ll also encounter more in the long run if you don’t decrease it.

Having a job comes with daily requirements; sometimes it demands more resources than you have available. While humans are generally adaptable, increased demands over time can cause many problems for your mental and physical health. Eventually, your brain becomes too exhausted to adapt to the emotional strain anymore.

You might receive a last-minute project that you must finish immediately, or the e-mails won’t stop rolling in. The phones might be ringing non-stop, your schedule is full of meetings, or a co-worker doesn’t do their portion of a shared assignment. Whatever the situation is, it can wear on you if it causes strain at work.

With constant work tension, people struggle to maintain a balanced life. The imbalance contributes to the health effects and can cause you to develop bad habits. Find a balance between your career, relationships, workplace, and personal time.

Why Your Body Suffers Negative Consequences from Work-Related Stress

Your body and mind respond to each stressor, even if you try to ignore them. When your body responds, it activates the fight-or-flight response, making your heart rate and breathing quicken. It’ll also cause your muscles to tense, and anxiety can quickly kick in.

While occasional stress is okay, it’s not healthy if it occurs daily. Research shows that 60% of Americans list work as the cause of their distress, and some are at a higher risk. People who work in high-demand jobs have extended hours or experience economic insecurity and suffer more.

Your mind and body both need a break, and constant overwhelm doesn’t allow for it. Even worse, you won’t have time to overcome one stressor before experiencing another one. It eventually becomes too much, and you won’t fare so well.

What is Work-Related Stress

Work-related stress can come in many forms. From a heavy workload to having a cruel boss, anything can fit if it causes overwhelming frustration. If it occurs at work or as a result of work, it’s work-related stress. This type of tension in the workplace is more than occasional frustration because it’ll become unrelenting.

Sometimes your co-workers can cause your suffering. Working with people who insult or belittle others can quickly wreak havoc on your health. Backstabbing can erode your morale, too, as the toxic work atmosphere will be hard to handle.

Other situations like continually having your hard work go unnoticed, can cause frustration. Likewise, when someone undeserving gets a promotion and you don’t, it might make you feel upset. Another situation that can contribute to your distress is feeling unheard by your superiors.

Common Causes of Work-Related Stress:

Some of the other issues that can cause stress from work include:

Lack of job security
Feeling constantly connected to the office
Not getting enough hours
Ageism

When the tension is too much for you to handle, you might have trouble sleeping, making you feel flustered, irritated, or anxious. If you constantly worry about what you have on your plate, it’s a sign that your work life is causing too much hardship.

Employers face issues when their employees experience overwhelming pressure, too. It can cause employees to become less productive, and it can cause high rates of absenteeism.

While it’s essential to have a job to pay your bills, you must be careful of harming your health. If you think it’s taking a toll on your health, it might be time to look for something new. However, try to find ways to address and overcome the issues in your current job.

Signs You Have Too Much Work-Related Stress

Sometimes, the signs of workplace tension are clear, and you’ll know immediately. These signs include heart palpitations and anxiety upon entering the workplace. Other times, the warnings are subtle, and you might not realize that it’s affecting you immediately.

Some of the less obvious signs include:

Constantly feeling depressed
Easily irritable or distressed at work and home
You suffer from fatigue but still can’t sleep
Difficulty concentrating
Lack of interest in things you once loved
You get sick more often
Lack of sex drive
Turning to alcohol or drugs to cope
Inability to relax
Trouble making decisions of thinking logically
No longer enjoying work or decreased commitment to it

How Work-Related Stress Damages Your Health

Here are some of the surprising consequences of stressors on the job.

1. It Causes Burnout

Chronic work tension leads to burnout, a psychological syndrome. The warning signs of this syndrome include overwhelming exhaustion, cynicism, and a feeling like you can’t do anything up to your standards.

Burnout can quickly occur when you have too much work or little independence at work. Likewise, inadequate pay, lack of community, unfairness, disrespect, and workplace values that differ from yours can play a role, too.

2. It Can Affect Your Mental Health

Long-term exposure can take a toll on your mental health. Research shows that burnout, heavy workloads, and extreme pressure at work can cause intense anxiety and depression.

When you feel this way, it triggers your sympathetic nervous system to prepare for a fight or flight response. Your body secretes the same hormones as it would during a life-or-death situation. It releases the hormones cortisol, adrenaline, and norepinephrine.

As these hormones get released into your bloodstream, your heart rate speeds up. It also increases alertness, makes you sweat, causes unnatural breathing patterns, and more. Before you know it, your anxiety will be in full swing as you struggle through another workday.

Those hormones also contribute to depression. With a lack of positive moments at work and an increase in hormones, depression can set in quickly.

3. Increases Your Risk of Developing a Disease

High levels of workplace tension increase your risk of developing diseases. When your fight or flight system activates too frequently, it disrupts bodily systems. The disruption increases susceptibility for conditions such as autoimmune disorders, cardiovascular disease, and Alzheimer’s.

Studies show that working in an unfair environment can increase your risk of heart disease. If you aren’t sure what it means to work in a fair environment, you notice the following:

Bosses who consider employee’s viewpoints
Truthfulness
Employees included in decision-making
Equal treatment

Additionally, chronic emotional hardship interferes with your lifestyle choices that affect your disease risk. You might not get enough exercise, eat a balanced diet, or get enough sleep. The fight or flight response also increases blood glucose levels. When this happens often, it can make it difficult to control diabetes.

4. Raises Cholesterol Levels

Those who experience more emotional situations also exhibit increased cholesterol levels. An increase can trigger the body’s inflammatory processes, affecting your behavior and health.

Increased cholesterol levels can stop you from doing what you know is best. You’ll make decisions you wouldn’t have otherwise, including ones that are detrimental to your health.

5. It Damages Mental Processes

Long-term tension at work can interfere with your ability to concentrate. When you’re overwhelmed with work, it causes you to multitask. However, multitasking isn’t beneficial to your concentration.

Frequent multitasking teaches your brain to jump from one task to another. You’ll be constantly distracted, even when you must focus on only one thing. Your attention span will decrease the more often you try to multitask at work.

As your attention span decreases, your memory will, too. Remember that retaining information requires focus, so if you can’t focus, you won’t remember anything you heard or saw.

How to Decrease Work-Related Stress

Now that you know how it damages your health, you must learn how to decrease it. There are many ways to do this, helping you live a happier, healthier life.

Build Positive Relationships

If you build relationships with a few positive people at work, you’ll experience less distress. Studies show that workplace friendships improve job satisfaction, promote productivity, and increase commitment.

Stay Active

Moving around during the day can decrease negative feelings and fatigue. It also eases other negative emotions, helping you stay positive each day. Take a minute to stretch your legs every hour by walking around the office or taking the stairs.

Stay Organized and Prioritize Tasks

When you feel like you’re doing many things at once, take a moment to reorganize. Prioritize the most critical tasks and get started on those. Everything else can wait until later so you don’t feel like you’re in such a time crunch.

Find Something to Laugh About

Look for humor in every situation, especially if negativity creeps in. Laughing during stressful times can ease the negativity and make things seem less severe.

Practice Mindfulness

Practicing mindfulness means paying attention to the present moment. Focus on being curious, open, and accepting of everything around you. It helps reduce tension, depression, and anxiety while also helping you break harmful habits.

Final Thoughts on Ways Work-Related Stress Damages Your Health (and How to Decrease It)

Understanding the health risks associated with work-related stress can help you live a healthy life. Don’t let tension at work take over your entire life. Find ways to cope with it, and look for strategies to overcome it.

It might be time to move on if you feel like you have tried everything. Consider your options and see what would be best for your health and well-being. You deserve happiness, and that includes when you are at work. Figure out what you must do to decrease workplace tension so you can be healthy and happy.

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