I recoil at the words, at the sound they make, at the message they send, at the ethos they ooze: I'll sleep when I'm dead.

It's said mostly in jest -- mindlessly, with a smirk, hardly looking for a reply. But it can be said as a challenge to the damning suggestion that one might need rest. That phrase, the one that stings my eardrums, can be weaponized against a friend, a family member, a stranger who dares acknowledge the limits of human strength -- physical, emotion, or otherwise.

"I'll sleep when I'm dead," she said with a scowl at his suggestion that her ambitions were driving her mad.

"I'll sleep when I'm dead," he snapped at a colleague who could see the toll of the brutal workday.

"I'll sleep when I'm dead," the student told a roommate whose jokey concern had gradually mutated to real worry.

The charge that sleep is unnecessary -- or can be delayed until one is cold and pulseless, lying underground -- can be traced to the protestant work ethic that rules our culture today as ruthlessly as it ever has. And it fits in quite nicely with capital's requirement to grow or die, and for you to work harder all the time. The implication is clear: sleep is for the weak, the lazy, the undisciplined, the unsuccessful. Sleep is an abdication of responsibility. Sleep is the opposite or work and must be shunned.

From business tycoons to pop stars to superstar athletes, we're told that sleep is extraneous and reserved for those uncommitted to excellence. No one makes money while they sleep (except for magnates with massive investments that take in more interest in eight hours than you make in one year) and no one improves their craft while they slumber (except for artists who cite research showing the mind if most creative when properly rested) and no one can best the competition after bedtime (except for the coaches who create strict sleep schedules for their players and install nap rooms in team facilities).

President Trump, before he won the White House, sold himself as a candidate in part by promising voters he would never rest. He didn't mean that in the way most politicians do -- "I'll never rest until Washington is working for you!" -- but quite literally. Trump brags about sleeping three or four hours a night, every night. Check his wretched Twitter account if you don't believe him. He'd boast to reporters that he had slept for a single hour between a late-night campaign event and an early morning meet and greet. An important part of candidate Trump's campaign snake oil was the idea that he was immune from the rigors of human frailty, including the need to sleep six to eight hours every day. Forget for a moment that the man who speaks so fondly of using nuclear weapons is almost certainly suffering from the most extreme kind of sleep deprivation, which diminishes memory and basic cognitive functions, reduces daytime alertness by as much as 32 percent, and makes it more difficult to interpret other people's reactions and emotions.

The president, who couldn't remember which country he attacked with dozens of missiles, recently called the speaker of the House Ron Ryan, and once thanked the heroes of Seven-11 instead of 9/11, is a fine spokesman for Team Sleep When I'm Dead.

Saying sleep is for the dearly departed is an efficient way to sever the indisputable link between a healthy life and slumber. Insisting that sleep is but a pesky distraction from life and its varying daily missions drives home the underlying idea that -- as absurd as it may sound -- a sleepless life is a happy life. Sleeplessness, in this demented universe of drudgery worship, is something to be achieved. It's something to pursue -- a goal worth chasing. Because you know who doesn't sleep? The person who wants your job, who wants your money, who wants the life you've built: the nightmare of the have-some-want-mores who have scraped together what they can in our Mad Max economy.

The dismissal of sleep as essential to a functioning, healthy body and mind is fear based. It bubbles up from our brain's overactive fear center that does so well in tricking us into destructive behavior. The terror of not working, of resting, sends the message that your little life could fall apart if you make like those scared-stiff teenagers on Elm Street and drift off despite your best efforts. Freddy's coming for your checking account (a rejected sequel idea, no doubt).

I have a complicated relationship with sleep, one that I'll detail one day. Maybe next month, maybe next year. My visceral reaction to "I'll sleep when I'm dead" is directly related to my experience without sleep. It's an utterly miserable existence, one in which the day is the only thing worse than the night. You feel half a person. I can say without equivocation that there is no well being without sleep. To separate sleep from the equation of a decent life is as intentional as it is unfounded. The real link between sleep and death is that you feel half dead -- with your brain half alive -- when you don't sleep.

Excelling, dominating, succeeding -- doing whatever you do to fulfill yourself -- isn't just related to sleep; it hinges on it. I didn't speak to that point in "96 Ways to Rise And Grind," but the concept underlies most of the book's foreword and many of the 140-character entries. Don't save sleep for the grave. Sleep now.