Are you a devout Christian whether you are Catholic, Baptist, or Eastern Orthodox and you struggle to sleep? At the same time, you have a family member or coworker, or friend who is an atheist or agnostic and you are jealous about how much more sleep they get than you do? Does that seem like a coincidence that they sleep better than you do? Well, the answer is that no, it is not a coincidence at all. Studies have found that non-believers sleep much better than Christians (and those who follow other organized religions as well).
Studies have shown that at least 73 percent of non-believers or atheists and agnostics sleep more than seven hours each night whereas 63 percent of Catholics and 55 percent of Baptists sleep for the same length of time. It was also found that Christians take longer to fall asleep than non-believers. Why would it even matter that your belief would have an impact on how well you sleep? There is one reason for that, and that is because Christians feel more pressured and stressed than non-believers. Therefore, they are the ones who are more likely to struggle with sleeping as well as falling asleep.
Mental Health Is Tied To This Fact
When you are dealing with more pressure and stress, you know that it can have a negative impact on your mental health. Therefore, those who are struggling with their mental health will have a difficult time falling and staying asleep. Is that to say that atheists and agnostics don’t suffer from mental health problems? Not at all, and they would struggle with falling asleep as well. However, Christians feel pressured to be a certain way and to do certain things that are dictated by their churches and that has a significant impact on the quality and quantity of hours of sleep they get. The belief in getting into heaven or hell has a lot to do with that too.
In churches, mental health is a significant topic for discussion. However, sleep health is not. If sleep health was discussed more at church, then perhaps Christians would have an easier time sleeping. The test was conducted by a student at Baylor University and those were their findings. The student is religious herself and made it clear that the loss of sleep can undercut many human abilities that the church considers as core values. Christians want to make sure that their conscience is clear and they also put pressure on themselves to ensure that they are coming from a place of love and acceptance rather than anger and aggression. The pressure they put on themselves as mentioned before will have a negative impact on their sleeping habits.
However, the one thing that came from the study was that atheists and agnostics do not have that kind of pressure on them. Therefore, they don’t worry about those morals and are less stressed as a result. That means they are more likely to sleep better at night. Atheists and agnostics are not as likely to wake up earlier and will only do so when it comes to going to work. Christians may set the alarm early so they can also have time to pray before they work. That also means lifestyle can have a significant impact on how Christians struggle with sleep more than non-believers.
There need to be more studies conducted on this topic. However, it would be essential for churches to start talking about sleep health as they can give tips on how their members can sleep better. There is a lot of information online from reputable sources that can help to provide anyone with tips on how to sleep better at night.
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