I generally wake up at about 7am because that’s when my cat, Roscoe, commences his campaign to get me to fix his breakfast. If you were to ask Roscoe — and if he could speak English — if 7am is a fine time for Louis to have his dreams rudely interrupted, I believe Roscoe would answer: “Hell, yes.”
Easy for him to say. He sleeps whenever he wants, wherever he wants, for as long as he wants. I doubt Roscoe has ever wondered, “Is there a right way to sleep?”
The obvious converse being, “Is there a wrong way to sleep?”
Some folks at the World Economic Forum, with headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland, have apparently developed an interest in these two questions, and they posted a brief video lecture on their website, which suggests not only that there are indeed ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ ways to sleep, but also that we would all be a lot richer if people knew how to sleep the right way.
Or maybe they are actually telling us that the rich would be richer. The video isn’t exactly clear about who would be richer.
Regardless… someone would be richer… if we all slept better.
Like, about $411 billion richer.
This information comes from scientists and economists. Hopefully not the same scientists and economists who were responsible for the COVID disaster.
Of course, the World Economic Forum (WEF) has an avid interest in economics. Otherwise they would have chosen a different name for their organization. And apparently, how people sleep, and how much they sleep has important economic implications. (The video does not touch on the sleeping patterns of cats.)
The video — which is, conveniently, in English — features two specific types of images of images: people sleeping peacefully, and people who obviously didn’t get enough sleep.
My cat Roscoe normally sleeps alone, although there have been occasions when I wake up to find him snuggled on my pillow, wrapped around my head, purring. Possibly, this is unhealthy, in terms of my own sleep patterns, and could be contributing — without me even knowing it — to the 1.2 million days of work lost, annually, here in the U.S.
Roscoe, meanwhile, has never worried about losing a day of work.
Or about the room temperature.
Or about much of anything, for than matter.
Underrated writer Louis Cannon grew up in the vast American West, although his ex-wife, given the slightest opportunity, will deny that he ever grew up at all.