Sleep!

SLEEP!

Okay, okay...we all know sleep is important. We all know that we probably don't get enough sleep for our bodies and our crazy schedules. We all know that we're college students, and we clearly don't need sleep. Wait, I take that back. We are college students, and that's exactly why we do need sleep.

How can we expect our bodies to operate for 18 hours a day, sleep for a mere six, and then get up and do it again back to back for 15 weeks? But, somehow, in the matter of 18 hours we make it to our classes, still have our social lives, manage to do all our homework, go to our extracirriculars and still be breathing. We push ourselves to every limit, and then somehow we are still able to go out on Friday and Saturday night to be with our friends. I like to make the famous argument, "Oh, I'll just catch up on sleep this weekend." Like sleeping this weekend is going to help my body when I'm not sleeping during the week?

The National Sleep Foundation says that "Sleep is not merely a 'time out' from our busy routines; it is essential for good health, mental and emotional functioning and safety." They also make sure to point out that "sleep loss has been found to impair the ability to perform tasks involving memory, learning, and logical reasoning. This may contribute to mistakes or unfulfilled potential at school or on the job and strained relationships at home."

I know I wish there were a few more hours in the day, but sometimes it's best to call it night, turn off your brain, leave the homework for the next day, leave the internship search for the weekend and get some sleep. Your body and mind will thank you.