THE 8 LAWS OF HEALTH

GODLY TRUST & OPEN AIR

  REST

Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light. Matt.11.28-30

"He rested on the seventh day from all His work which He had made." Genesis 2:2

The greatest remedy for being tired is SLEEP.

The body requires plenty of rest to heal.

Sleep is the greatest rejuvenator; it restores strength to muscles, nerves, and brain.

During sleep the body repairs, reenergizes, and prepares for renewed activity.

One hour of sleep before midnight is equal to 2 hours of sleep after midnight.

During a day of work and activity, toxins build up in our system which cannot immediately be thrown off. These toxins product fatigue—that well-known weariness at the end of the day. Sleep gives the body time to expel wastes and to make repairs.

"The stomach, when we lie down to rest, should have its work done, that it may enjoy rest, as well as other portions of the body. The work of digestion should not be carried on through any period of the sleeping hours."  Ellen White, Healthful Living, p. 84

Rest is not synonymous with sleep. Four types of rest are:

Physical Rest--sitting, lying down, or relaxing. Not eating late at night or before bed.

Sensory Rest--quietness and refraining from using the eyes.

Emotional Rest--a withdrawing from the ups and downs caused by person interaction.

Mental Rest--a detaching of the mind from all intellectual demands or activity.

Your Prescription: First, get the sleep your body needs, 8 hours a day and several hours before midnight. Second, do not neglect that important rest we need, such as taking morning walks, sitting in a garden or other pleasant surroundings, or by a mountain side, looking at a forest or lake, going to the ocean, or reading the Scriptures.

"A life in Christ is a life of restfulness. There may be no ecstasy of feeling, but there should be an abiding peaceful trust. Your hope is not in yourself; it is in Christ. Your weakness is united to His strength, your ignorance to His wisdom, your frailty to His enduring might....Let the mind dwell upon His love, upon the beauty, the perfection of His character.."—Ellen G. White, Steps to Christ, p.

Get adequate restful sleep! An early, light supper, well before bedtime and no eating before bed will help. A relaxing warm bath may help you unwind; avoid stressful and stimulating activities before bedtime. Regular times for going to bed and rising will also help. The best time to go to bed is between 8 and 10 PM. This sounds strange, because in our culture, it almost seems in bad taste to sleep!  100 years ago the average person got 9 or more hours sleep! Now it is more like 4 or 5! Exercise during the day also helps set the stage for restful sleep. Avoid using drugs for sleep as these are harmful and sleep thus attained is of little benefit to your body.  Lack of restful sleep is for many the root of the ‘enervation’ that brings disease. For healing and cleansing to occur much rest and sleep is needed as these actions are done only while asleep!

Those who have trouble falling asleep can try a little hops, chamomile or catnip tea before bedtime. Slow, deep breathing or soaking in a neutral bath with a cup of Epsom salts added for ten minutes may help. Blot the skin dry and move slowly and quietly off to bed.

 REST VS. ENERVATION???

 One of the laws of health is adequate rest and sleep.  Why is this so important?  Well as we study the physiology of the body, we find out that healing, growing, body-cell housecleaning, repair work, brain recovery, and a lot of immune system work, occurs mostly, or only when we sleep!

One of the most destructive attitudes to come on the scene in modern times is that which says—“You’ve got to keep going!  Don’t waste time lying around sleeping!  Don’t dare lay down a take a nap in the day! Get up, go somewhere, do something, socialize more, exercise more!  Be a super person, always on the go!”

Add to this the media entertainment and partying that tends to keep people up late and you have a situation where not 1 in a hundred really gets adequate restful sleep enough to keep his body in proper running order!  Even children commonly are up all hours of the night!

At the turn of the century, people averaged 9-10 hours of sleep, now most try to function on a fraction of that!  The human body has not changed—indeed with the extra stress in our lives and environment, we need more sleep, not less. 

And if you are ill or have chronic disease you need 8-10 hours a day just to keep stable and if you want to get well, you need more!

It takes energy to go to sleep—that is why insomnia is rampant these days, our bodies are so exhausted, we are constantly whipping them with stimulants to keep going, and our minds are overloaded  so that when we do try to sleep, we cannot. Our minds just keep on running!

One of the most important things you can do to keep or restore your health is to turn off the TV, put away the novels and magazines, take a leisurely stroll in the fresh air, a nice cup of catnip tea, and go to bed.  If you cannot go to sleep right away, lie there and talk to God, think of your many blessings, commit your life to Him and rest in his Love.  It will take a while for your body to realize that you are finally going to let it sleep and catch up on all its housework, but persist and it will pay off.

All the running to health clinics and nutrition and exercise and  health treatments won’t accomplish anything for you in the long run if your body is enervated from lack of sleep.

If you have a chronic illness, you are enervated, as chronic illness can not develop until enervation has set in!

Remember, mental work is harder on you than physical work, so watching TV is not rest—it is hard work for your brain!

 Does TV help you Unwind or Unravel?

After a long day at school or at work, do you ever feel like rolling up the sidewalk, turning on the TV, and just “forgetting” about your troubles? It works.  But watch out—You may forget more than you bargained for!  Instead of “unwinding” you may actually be “unraveling!”

Dementia is the clinical term used to describe an “irrecoverable deteriorative mental state.” There are a number of forms of dementia, and various causes.  Mental deterioration can occur as a result of alcohol consumption, certain diseases or drugs, a high fat diet, inactivity, or chronic stress, to name a few.  Now medical researchers are turning their attention to the possibility of excessively television watching as a significant contributing factor in the development of senility.

Why?  TV spectators are exposed to a mass of successive, rapid stimuli with little or no possibility of rationally processing what they are watching.  In addition, much of what they see tends to be stress producing.  Stress causes a biochemical response in the brain.  It stimulates the production of glucocorticosteriods  ( an adrenal hormone) which in large amounts can actually damage the delicate nerve fibers in the hippocampus portion of the brain.  And it is this area that is responsible for short-term memory storage.  Clinicians are now being advised to inquire into suspected dementia patients’ television viewing habits as a possible factor in the development of the disease.  One study suggested that viewing TV four hours a day or more may induce stress-related damage to the brain.

Quoted from Vicki Griffin in Inside Report—October 1995

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