The Polyphasic Sleep Experiment

Today is day 4 of my new sleep system. The MB heard me preach about it yesterday but I still have a lot to say.

Polyphasic sleep (there’s a good entry at Wikipedia) is sleep that spreads itself out in little naps throughout the day instead of going for one big 8-9 hr hibernation every night. The legend is that DaVinci took 6 30-minute naps spread throughout the day, without ever having a long sleeping period. Buckminster Fuller was an advocate, as was Edison, perhaps, and others.

The idea being that you can substitute a full 90-minute sleep cycle with a 20-minute power nap if you get down into REM sleep immediately.

One also becomes forced to consider the length and duration of his cycles. Sleeping 7 hours will make one feel way more zombiefied than only sleeping 6 (because 7 hours has you waking up in deep stage four sleep, sabotaging you with all of that sleep intertia, whereas coming up after 6 has you emerging right as you come out of light sleep).

A lifetime of naps is pretty hardcore, however, so after considerable reading I decided on a hybrid system:

4 ½ of core sleep nightly (12am to 4:30am)
3 20-minute naps (roughly every 4 ½ hours)

That’s it.

The gf thought it was insane, but now approves, and says I actually seem more rested, and certainly happier.

The Cons:
--This may work but might not be healthy for the body in the long run. There’s probably a reason why the human body defaults to an 8-hour long sleep if left to its own devices without alarm clocks around. I plan to do a fortnightly 9-hour reboot just to give my body some of the missing deep sleep it craves.
--I could very well feel like a zombie from days 3-8 as the body adjusts to this new sleeping methodology. I admit, this morning was hard.
--Normal people think this is strange behavior…and don’t get why I have to retreat for naps all day long.
--A normal job situation makes this difficult unless you can nap at lunchtime every day.

The Pros:
--Over 18 hours of pure productivity every day.
--Daily exercise, cooking, film watching, reading, and blogging because of these extra hours.
--Alcohol consumption down to zero, immediately (it’ll screw up my sleep schedule)
--Coffee consumption down to 16 oz a day, immediately (about a third of what it was)
--Drinking gallons of water throughout the day to flush my body so I can sleep during my naps.
--More time freed up to spend with the GF
--Fewer hours of sleep, but better quality sleep, so feeling more rested.

Anyway, I’m going to post a little footnote everyday to monitor progress. I might need this thing to stay on target. So please indulge Condiment and his Daily Sleep Index if you will….

A random side note: We saw Ratatouille last night and it was AWESOME. Just great. The GF and I were remarking that it might have been the first time both of us had wanted to actually go to the same movie... Pixar and its people just blow my mind. I was reading somewhere (the New Yorker?) that Ratatouille gets better, more believable, more moving performances out of its animated characters than 99% of live-action movies do from their real actors. That’s about right, I think. The best part: a flashback near the end which had me howling with genuine laughter, the gf bawling her head off, and the kids in the audience gaping in wide-eyed wonder. All at the same time. Really great. Highly recommended.