stories, these dream images have often
appeared in Steve’s work: that facial
hair imagery found its way on to some
background characters in a children’s
book that he recently illustrated.
However, as anyone who’s dealt
with insomnia will understand, it’s
not all fun and Bowie. When Steve
has especially bad nights with little
to no sleep, it naturally affects his
creative work – particularly when
he’s “having to come up with new
things, or creating the initial roughs or
thumbnails for a new book, or getting
started on a project,” he says. “If I’m
really tired, even just drawing can be
difficult from a technical standpoint:
things that should be easy aren’t, or
you just don’t like what you’ve done
because you can’t concentrate.”
Shuhua agrees, and describes
insomnia as “both physically and
mentally draining, if you don’t deal
with it right. I also think there’s always
a root to insomnia. It’s a signal from
your body.” A few years back, she
went through a “very bad” phase of
insomnia. She tried everything from
melatonin, to lavender tea, a no-phone-
before-bed rule, yoga and meditation.
“Nothing helped,” she says. “I
would get anxious even going to bed,
worried that I wouldn’t be able to
sleep. I would force myself to clear my
head and shut my eyes, but your mind
is never clear when you deliberately
ask it to be. I would check the time
every time I gave up and opened my
eyes – time goes both slowly and fast.
I saw the sunrise many times during
those few months, and it upset me
knowing that the next day was ruined.
Like Jessica, after a while Shuhua
gave up and ended up putting those
sleepless nights to use. “I would get
up and walk outside when I was living
alone. It’s very nice out at around
3 or 4am,” she says. That stressful
insomnia period also proved to be a
turning point in her career. “That’s
when I picked up drawing again. I
painted a horizon with a flat black
foreground one night at dawn. Around
then I was given an old iPad that had
the Procreate painting app installed
on it. I started drawing digitally under
my blanket.”
Sleep experts agree that the
amount of sleep people need is different
for everyone, but Penny Lewis, a
professor in the School of Psychology
at Cardiff University, says
that a simple measure is
that if you don’t feel tired,
you’re getting enough
sleep – whether that’s eight
hours, 10 hours, or for a
small minority, as little as
five or six. The key aspect is
sleep regularity: make sure
you go to bed and wake up
at the same time every day.
“Some people may be ‘night owls’
and there’s nothing wrong with that,”
Penny says, but warns that particular
unusual hours – say, going to bed at
5am and waking at 1pm, even if that’severy day – could lead to depression
and social problems.
How much sleep we need and our
sleep patterns also vary throughout
our lives. School-age children and
teens need an average of about 9.5
hours and adults between seven and
nine hours each night, while those
over 60 tend to have shorter, lighter,
more interrupted sleep. Dr Eric Maisel
focuses much of his work on the
nature of creativity. “It’s a cliché, but
sleep is really important, especially
for creative people who are often in
a semi-manic state,” Eric says. “If we
start to obsess about our work we can
get racing thoughts and veer on the
manic side, and the best home remedy
for mania is getting enough sleep.”SLEEP CYCLES AND
CREATIVE THOUGHT
Many people report that their most
productive hours – when they come
up with the best ideas – are those
first thing in the morning. This
makes sense on a practical level:
you’re less likely to be distracted by a
rapidly filling inbox, clock-
watching, or getting into
a panic about encroaching
deadlines. But it also makes
sense from a sleep science
perspective. REM sleep
cycles – the phase where we
dream; the brain forms new
associations, memories and
connections; and the eyes
and body still have some
movement – are longer in the second
half of the night than the first.
University of San Diego researchers
found that comparing three groups –
one which rested but didn’t sleep, onePOWER OF SLEEP
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“You can double your creative thinking or creative
output by realising you think while you sleep!”
DR ERIC MAISEL
Prof. Penny Lewis.Author and life coach Dr Eric Maisel.