How do you often relax at home after a long day at work? A recent study reveals that watching an exciting or a favorite movie is preferred by many as a form of relaxation. They usually look forward to reach home after a hectic day, have dinner and then slump down on their couch to be entertained. After watching few hours of Television, they retire for the night and instead of falling asleep, they mostly waste quite a few hours rolling around in their couch. This is because they are suffering from insomnia.

Why do we suffer from insomnia? Sleep comes at a point when our mind is relaxed and calm. But this doesn’t happen as it becomes difficult to relax ourselves after watching something exciting or thrilling on TV as our adrenaline gets pumped up. Usually in such cases we suffer from insomnia and will wake up the next day saying we had little or no sleep at all. But we very often associate the lack of sleep or insomnia with what we did during last evening or in night. We ascribe it to problems at our workplace or other issues or problems.

Television indeed has a direct influence on an individual’s feelings and the scenario is different where we have watched a horror movie just before going to bed. Your heart and mind might have raced enough that you may find difficult to simply fall asleep.

Now, you may ask this question, "How the hell am I going to relax then?" I would suggest you to find another activity that will assist you in getting an entire eight hours of straight sleep.

Activities I would suggest:

• Read a book, magazine or even that day’s morning newspaper. Read something that you are sincerely interested in and this will definitely help you to relax and will subsequently help you to fall sleep.

• Spending time with your family by playing a board or card game is the most ideal way to chill out your day.

• Do some yoga or take a warm bath. These will help you to relax your muscles and soothe your mind and will aid in sleep.

• Do some exercises. This not only will help you to keep fit but also will make you exhausted at the end of the day that you will quickly drift off to sleep.

There will be moments in our day where we need to be mentally stimulated and needs to be completely awake and alert. For our mind to be mentally fresh and stimulated, we need to get a good night’s sleep. Therefore, be choosy while doing something in the evening before going to bed.

By: Bob Willson