The Cycles of the Body are Like the Cycle of Peddling a Bicycle

  Tonight, I take you on a bicycle ride. Many a bike rider has injured an ankle, and found themselves peddling with just one good foot. They push down on the peddle, then use that same foot to lift the peddle back up to peddle it again. The job gets done, but not as efficiently.

  If I put a cake in the oven for 15 minutes, and it needs 30, I might have something to eat, but it won't be as good of a cake.

  So, if a body needs eight hours of sleep, and I give it but four, what have we got?

  Think of the body, and of its functions, and how they come in timing cycles. We breath in, we breath out. The heart beats as blood squeezes in series of pumps, in-and-out, in-and-out. Going to the bathroom is often done in regular cycles, each morning, and at set times during the day. 

  Sometimes, when you wake, you stretch. I say "you," because in my life, it doesn't happen as often as in yours. It might be that a body on four hours of sleep isn't ready to stretch. Like a person peddling a bike using just one foot, the job isn't complete with just the one push down. Half a night's rest; Half a peddle of the bicycle.

  So, if you have day-after-day, and month-after-month lacking full sleep, what happens? If months stretch into years, and years into decades, you might think you are surviving -- like peddling a bicycle on one foot -- but at some point, it seems it will catch up with you.

  Of late, I have been getting my eight hours sleep, but it is in parts. Still no eight hours all at once. I wonder if I would do better if I could keep all my sleep in the full cycles the body was intended to have.