Drug ZzZ for performance enhancement

 

As a MOE Wellness Ambassador, I was invited to attend a sharing session by Dr Ricco at the Treasury auditorium last week. He is really quite knowledgeable and highly experienced. He shared that sleep or drug ZzZ was a performance-enhancing secret that even academic or corporate athletes can perform better due to it. He highlighted how some of the worst crises or disasters happened due to sleep or more accurately lack of sleep (or deprivation) and he mentioned Chernobyl. 

if only naps are part of schooling hours like they are in some other Asian countries

He noted how Singaporeans sleep an average of 6.5 hours, which is less than the recommended average, ranging from 7 to 9 hours. He went into the differences in sleep required as a human grows and he spoke about how as babies we needed routines to sleep and we actually still benefit from having routines before sleep like writing to-dos or wearing socks and such. He suggested that those who lacked sleep should start by going to bed 15 minutes earlier and repeat it until they are able to get about 8 hours of rest. Although sleep debt is not exactly a thing, he did share that sleep binge-ing or sleep recovery can help the mind and body feel more at ease. Below are some other tips that he showed us. 

I also got to wrap up my role as a facilitator for the Citizens' panel on Youth Mental Health at Republic Polytechnic which I spent several weekday evenings and Saturday mornings on since March 2022. The conversations and discussions were rich and the youth I helped to facilitate were really bright. We came up with suggestions to improve school mentorship as part of project rebound and we pitched to community partners and some (like SOS Singapore - remember 1767) were keen to pursue some of our ideas further together.

As all of our meetings were online (on Zoom), it was nice to finally meet everyone in person at Republic Polytechnic. We took some selfies and I learnt more about the RP students. Most of them in my team were from the Human Resource (HR) course. There was an older student who was also a Youth Corps volunteer and a passionate entrepreneur. I hope we would keep in touch and that they continue to be aware and proactive in the space of mental health and well-being.

Last but not least, I had the chance to offer my perspectives to MOM and NCSS folks at a Focus Group Discussion for the Interagency Taskforce on Mental Health and Well-being. Another educator facilitated my group's discussion and there were representatives from PSD, NTUC, HPB's School outreach team and a former teacher turned counsellor turned social enterprise (MindfulBear) founder.  

We discussed the struggles we face at work advocating for better mental health/well-being matters and spoke about the power of the individual as well as the importance of support from the top/management. I feel like this past weekend was truly quite enriching as I learnt more about what I can do to help others with mental health conditions or simply to improve others' mental well-being.