“Some old fashioned things like fresh air and sunshine are hard to beat”. Natural sunlight has several benefits and thus should always try to make optimal provisions for the passage of sunlight into our house. When you have the luxury of basking in the warmth of natural sunlight and when the rooms in your home receive an abundance of sunlight, you should surely enjoy a lot of positivity and zeal in your abode. We, humans, need natural sunlight just like plants and trees need sunlight to become luscious and green. Before you explore how you should inculcate enough sunlight in your house, let us go through the overall importance and benefits of natural sunlight.

Importance of natural sunlight 

The prime benefits of natural sunlight are:

1. Importance of sunlight on focus and productivity 

Sunlight can impact your overall productivity and focus positively as per the research from various researchers. A study conducted by Harvard Business Review concluded that exposure to natural sunlight improves the productivity and contribution of the employees by 5-40%. This helps the employees and students in increasing their capacity of retaining information better. Moreover, this has also been observed that those who usually work under natural lighting were also stimulated to be creative and productive at work.

Also, another study found that employees who have been working from home and in airy rooms with bright and natural lighting at work reported 84% lesser eye strains, headaches, blurred vision as compared to the ones who are working in artificial lighting.

In a scenario where most of the people are now working from home during the pandemic, rooms that are airy and receive ample sunlight are very necessary for staying motivated. Along with the same, carefully creating a mindful workspace would surely boost your overall efficiency and productivity at your home.

2. Natural Vitamin D source

Natural sunlight has endless benefits of which the most prominent benefit is that it contains Vitamin D. Our skin produces Vitamin D naturally when exposed to sunlight. Thus, Vitamin D is also referred to as “sunlight vitamin”. This particular vitamin considerably helps in properly regulating your immune system & also facilitates the optimum absorption of phosphorus and calcium. Certain extensive studies have proved that the right amount of Vitamin D is helpful in keeping away heart diseases and flu at bay. This also helps in boosting your weight loss.

Sunlight is indeed considered as one of the naturally occurring and best sources of Vitamin D and thus you should make the best use of the same. However, there are certain Vitamin-D rich supplements and foods that are also rich sources of vitamins. This summons that you should plan your house’s ventilation with glass doors and large windows wherever possible.

3. Keeps your natural body-clock healthily going

The human body is equipped with a naturally-built biological clock by default that instructs you from within in eating, resting, sleeping, waking up and performing other internal functions. This particular clock has a natural mechanism and is well-coordinated depending on the receipt of sunlight. This very well determines the circadian rhythm that is in the schedule of your body for performing all the day-to-day activities. Moreover, you would be able to notice very prominently the overall effect of natural sunlight that occurs on the body when travelling and your body tends to adjust itself to the wake & rest that is to a large extent dependent on the availability of your environment’s natural lighting.

With the massive exposure to several forms of artificial light emitted from TVs, phones, fancy light in houses and other screens; your body is thrown off the rhythm at times. For your body to necessarily absorb the benefits of sunlight, this is very crucial to allow proper ventilation in your rooms all through the day.

4. Natural lighting saves a considerable amount on power cost 

There are several benefits that you can reap by allowing natural sunlight to enter inside your home. So, proper ventilation in your house is very necessary. This also is good for your wallet. A major portion of our monthly expenses at our home comes for paying the electricity bills. With the right introduction of a source of natural light, your power bills can decrease up to 47%. If you supplement this with other practices of energy conserving at your home, then the cost can reduce considerably. Thus, the major advantages of sunlight that you reap from your body, mind and wallet are something that you should not ignore under any circumstances.

How do you make provision for natural lighting inside your house?

• Placement of furniture – You should place the furniture in your home in such a manner that this does not end up obstructing the sunlight that comes through the windows in your house. You can also opt to place some low-raised desks near your window still so that you are working on the spot near the natural source of sunlight.
• Place mirrors inside your room strategically– Sunlight usually finds its passage to your room through the large windows and doors. For ensuring that you receive the maximum benefits of natural sunlight in your room, you can place a large mirror on the wall that is the source of light. This mirror would reflect the gleaming rays & eventually bask the entire room with adequate light.
• Use lighter shades on the walls – As light colors absorb a considerable amount of light, you necessarily need to make sure that the particular room where you usually work or you spend the maximum time should be colored in very light and pleasant pastel colors. Also, you can use soft curtains or drapes to cover the bigger windows in your house rather than using heavy fabrics which end up hindering the entrance of sunlight inside the room.
• Installing larger windows or skylights – In order to maximize the ventilation of your house, you can place a strip of an awesome skylight which would make your room look modern and contemporary and also soak in that indispensably nourishing sunlight. If you find investing in skylights tough to invest in, then you should ideally consider dedicating one specific side of the room’s wall for bigger windows for welcoming sunlight inside the room.