All-nighters are bad. Not just kind-of bad, but catastrophically bad …
I cannot even begin to count the number of times I’ve heard startup success stories that refer back to the early days wherein the words pizza, coffee, basement, code, deadlines, funding and all-nighters are the most frequently used words to describe their heroic feats. Unfortunately, it’s likely that the all-nighters alone had single-handedly caused the variety of problems which they heroically overcame by pulling even more all-nighters and likely caused an entirely new cascade of problems they don’t tell you in their little tale.
The problem with all-nighters is that they are the exact opposite of healthy sleep. Healthy sleep is necessary for an optimally functioning brain. Even lacking a few hours can dramatically decrease your problem solving abilities, creativity, productivity, and a vast array of other cognitive abilities which are vital for effectively running a business. Even missing a few hours of sleep can take several days for your brain to get back to baseline.
Missing an entire night’s worth of sleep, however, will cut your cognitive abilities in half at the very least. The worst part is that it takes days (in some cases weeks) for your brain to re-establish cognition baseline. This means that pulling just one all-nighter can leave you at 50% capacity for the first day, 40% the next couple of days, 20% for the following day or two after that, and a sustained sub-par functionality as it slowly creeps back to nominal.
The severity and frequency of costly mistakes increases exponentially in relation to the individual’s sleep deficit. This means that missing four hours of sleep is not twice as costly as missing two hours – but several times more so.
People functioning on less than optimal amounts of sleep have no idea they are not at their best. Their own ability to judge their own productivity has been completely blinded. This can lead to even more problems and poor decision-making.
As a new business owner, the best ideal to live up to is to maintain a healthy, 8 hour per night sleep schedule no matter what is going on with the business. This can be difficult, which is why a regular meditation schedule is encouraged.
Proper sleep, along with a regular meditation schedule, are just two of the many component armor pieces expressly recommended for entrepreneurs and business leaders.
A healthy lifestyle elicits healthy business practices.
There is no substitute for sleep. There simply is not. No pill, no drug, no magical crystal amulet … nothing. Sleep is sleep is sleep and nothing but nothing can replace it in any way, shape, or form.
Healthy sleep is at the foundation of a healthy business. Period.
