“Massage reduces pain because the oxytocin system activates painkilling endorphins. Massage also improves sleep and reduces fatigue by increasing serotonin and dopamine and decreasing the stress hormone cortisol. So if you’re feeling out of sorts, get a massage. You’ll be actively triggering the neurotransmitter systems that work to make you happier.”
Source: The Upward Spiral: Using Neuroscience to Reverse the Course of Depression, One Small Change at a Time
“My body is sore. I’m not very good at the sport called Sleeping. Like a waddling duck is to a marathon runner, so I am to a kitten. I need to practice more, maybe multiple times a day.”
Source: BearPaw Duck And Meme Farm presents: Two Ducks Brawling Is A Pre-Pillow Fight
“I am careful not to wake this girl who enfolds me. Her feather-yellow hair covers her eyes. The beat of her heart presses against my back. Her name is Amelia, and last night she snuck in my window to be with me.”
Source: Every Day
“How can I sleep with my eyes closed when there are thousands of beautiful stars above me?”
“I feigned sleep until my mother left for school, but even my eyelids didn't shut out the light. They hung the raw, red screen of their tiny vessels in front of me like a wound. I crawled between the mattress and the padded bedstead and let the mattress fall across me like a tombstone. It felt dark and safe under there, but the mattress was not heavy enough.
It needed about a ton more weight to make me sleep.”
Source: the bell jar
“I hadn't slept for seven nights. My mother told me I must have slept, it was impossible not to sleep in all that time, but if I slept, it was with my eyes wide open, for I had followed the green, luminous course of the second hand and the minute hand and the hour hand of the bedside clock through their circles and semi-circles, every night for seven nights, without missing a second, or a minute, or an hour.”
Source: the bell jar
“I was playing a lot of sports, and that actually changes dopamine signaling in the brain, which helps make life more enjoyable. And going to class not only altered the habit circuit in my brain, but it also meant that I had to spend some time out in the sun on my way to and from classes, which boosted my serotonin and regulated electrical activity in my brain during sleep.”
Source: The Upward Spiral: Using Neuroscience to Reverse the Course of Depression, One Small Change at a Time
“Getting a massage is also a great way to relax your muscles. Massage reduces pain, stress, and anxiety, and it improves sleep. The wide-ranging effects likely result from the fact that massage boosts your serotonin and dopamine levels and decreases cortisol. Sometimes it’s even helpful to give yourself a massage with a tennis ball by lying on it, leaning against it, or rolling it firmly against your muscles. It probably doesn’t have all the same effects as getting a massage from a person, but it’s cheap and quick, and it can still feel great.”
Source: The Upward Spiral: Using Neuroscience to Reverse the Course of Depression, One Small Change at a Time
“Thinking, thinking—a wheel I cannot stop; pure want of sleep it is that turns it.”
Source: The Piazza Tales
“Have you ever had a prophetic dream about my duck farm being as successful in the future as The Spicy Chicken Sandwich? No? Well, try harder! For better results, sleep longer.”
Source: One Out of Ten Dentists Agree: This Book Helps Fight Gingivitis. Maybe Tomorrow I’ll Ask Nine More Dentists.: A BearPaw Duck And Meme Farm Production