Five Distinct Stages Putting You Into Sound Sleep
The brain emits various electrical patterns at various times of the day. When you are awake and in a busy thinking state, your brain emits what is known as beta waves. As you go through the various stages of sleep, your brain emits different electrical patterns as follows:
1. Eyes barely move, muscle activity slows and you drift in and out of slumber. You can easily be woken at this stage. Often you are in alpha state (the same state as when meditating) just before falling asleep.
2. Eye movements almost stop, brain waves become slower. You will need to be prodded to be woken.
3. This is considered one of the stages of deep sleep. Extremely slow brain waves called delta waves can be measured in this phase.
4. No eye movements at all, muscles are relaxed, blood pressure is at its lowest and heart and breathing rate are at their slowest. This is the stage when the body repairs itself with the aid of hormones.
5. REM (Rapid Eye Movement) occurs approximately 70-90 minutes after you fall asleep and recurs throughout the night. Breathing becomes more rapid, irregular and shallow. The heart rate increases and blood pressure rises. Brain waves break up and begin to look like those measured when you are awake. However, while your brain is very active, your body does not move at all in this phase.
