Polyphasic Sleep

[Paul]

Also known as Uberman's Sleep Schedule, Polyphasic Sleep is a sleep pattern specification intended to compress sleep time to 2-5 hours daily. This is achieved by spreading out sleep into short (around 20-45 minute) naps throughout the day. This allows for more waking hours with relatively high alertness.

To begin, most people try a nap every 4 hours (ex. 2am, 6am, 10am, 2pm, 6pm, 10pm) which takes about 25 mins of actual sleep. The people who have done this have claimed amazing results such as: higher levels of energy, alertness, clearness of mind, feeling MORE rested and enjoying the freedom from the constraints of daily time as one flows into another. This allows you 22 hours of time in your day to use and schedule as you see fit.

Some people find that they start paying more attention to what they eat, are eating healthier, focusing on excercising more, have more time for themselves and projects and overall just feel better. They also found that they recover at the same rate from weight lifting, but they have better mental and physical endurance.

Having read the entire 30 day journal of Steve Pavlina and being in a position already where taking a quick 20 minute afternoon nap wouldn't conflict with work, I decided to give this a try. I'm 24 hours in and taking a look at what I'm in store for in the next while.

The first week is the hardest as your body does the transition from molophasic to polyphasic sleep. You find yourself being a bit drowsy and your reflexes slow. This can continue (depending on the person) anywhere from 5 days to 10 or more, but what makes a huge difference is your diet. There are certain tricks that some people have found to work, such as eating AFTER you nap, not before; eating grapes and drinking grape juice which replenishes chemicals missing from regular sleep; never oversleeping, which won't happen once you get into the rythem anyway; use a digital countdown timer; excercising and staying active in the night hours which will increase your energy, etc. There are plenty of more tips in the links provided above, if you're interested in the subject, I've found the information contained there to be invaluable.

What I'm doing here is providing a day by day guide for the next while, to see how I do at this, what I've done right and wrong and to answer questions/discuss as I go along. I invite you to let me know what you think of the project, express concerns, share ideas, whatever you feel. If this works out, I'll have some more spare time to answer them.

[Paul]

I've been up now over 24 hours, since Friday morning and I've had 4 naps so far (didn't read the article until well after the time for the first one). At this moment I'm feeling surprisingly good, as compared to other times I've stayed up for an extended period of time. My arms are a little sore at this moment however, partly from lifting some free weights I believe and maybe the way I slept. My matress is horrible and I'm definetly going to have to see the chiropractor this week for my monthly visit and alignment.

I'm not tired at this moment, my eyes were a little tired awhile ago but all seems well now. I've been eating fruit, doing some reading, went to the mall, did some laundry and will probably go do some grocery shopping shortly. Staying active has really helped, I don't think just sitting at the computer will do me any good so I'm going to take the opportunity to do some cooking because I'm horrible at it and would love to learn something new. As Steve did in his experiment (which he is on day 84 of), I'm going to chop up vegetables and follow recipes as it's simple tasks I can handle during the transition, while being a bit groggy.

If anything, I've been a lot more productive today, I've really seen the benefits to doing this and look forward to being able to do some different things with my time for as long as this experiment lasts. I told my brother and friend about it, they've both been interested and encouraging, wanting to see my results before trying it themselves I think. It IS a bit crazy but from everything I've read from the people who suceed at making the transition, it's the only way to go and they wouldn't change it for anything, to the point where one guy changed jobs to one that would accomodate his lifestyle. Now that's a testimonial!

[Merika]

I can see how this would work....but only for a single person. I'll keep reading along to see how you are progressing.

[Paul]

Actually, this Steve Pavlina guy has a wife and 2 kids. :shock: His wife has even posted her insights into how the experiment is going and how it affects the family, I'll link here exact comments here:
http://www.stevepavlina.com/blog/200...s-perspective/

But I think it really depends on the person and situation, either way it's going to be interesting I think.

[Merika]

Well...I'll continue to support your endeavor....but I can't say that I understand the benefits yet.

[Duke]

At first glance I thought this topic was about sheep.

[Paul]

Yes Duke, it's about sheep... just the lack of them :P

I'm doing surprisingly well right now, had a rough spell yesterday evening but the last 8+ hours have gone off without a hitch. I'll do a longer update tomorrow but I just wanted to mention something.

Some of the discussion I've seen has revolved around the quality of sleep that one gets in those 20 - 30 minutes. I'd have to say that for me, they've been pretty good. Some people have a really tough 4 hours after a period where they didn't sleep enough or they slept to long. Except for one incident I feel I've gotten the proper amount of sleep to wake up feeling refreshed, if not a little groggy on a couple of occasions, which quickly passes.

Something else that is really interesting is that when I sleep, it doesn't seem like 20 - 30 minutes has passed, it feels like a much longer spell, more like an hour or two. I don't know what this means in regards to the deepness of sleep, whether I'm hitting REM or not, but within 5 minutes of laying down I'm very much unaware of my surroundings, usually until the alarm clock rings.

There has been much discussion about dreaming, people having lucid dreams that are very detailed and being very aware of them upon waking up. This is usually after at least a week so I don't expect to anything like that but I can't truely say that I've dreamed anything at all although I think maybe once I did.

Very surprisingly, my body doesn't feel worn out. I've been neglecting my excercise a bit until recently and would think that this would have a noticeable affect on simply being able to have prolonged motor functions or simply keep my eyes open but I've underestimated my body. About 40 hours in and at this moment I feel no worse then if I had just woken up from an 8 hour sleep, a little groggy but fully functional.

I'm really intrigued now about how long I can keep this up for. As I mentioned before, Steve is now 87 days in and says he'd never go back, that's very exciting for me. From what I've read, most people don't survive the transition, for that reason alone I will, but I also want to look at what about this experiment and the people taking it would allow one person to succeed and another fail. What has been a real benefit for me is my very flexible schedule, I have had the luxury of sleeping whenever I want and had naturally adapted a nocturnal routine that works for me. I've also worked a lot of night shifts in the past 3 years, for these reasons, I think I'm better suited to be able to do something like this without as many of the repurcussions that others would have, especially on thier lifestyle. Simply being able to stay awake at night is hard enough for some people.

Merika, you mentioned that you were wondering what the benefits to this would be. This is very early for me to say what benefits I have felt so I'll just say a couple I have experienced thus far and what I foresee as being beneficial:

1. The mere fact that I'm not spending 8 hours a day (or more as was sometimes the case) in bed, means I have that much more time to do things that I normally couldn't, like post here more. I've had more freedom, in that when someone wants to do something, I most likely can no matter what time of day, because I won't have to worry about night/sleep time cutting into it. Now in regards to sleep times and the strictness thereof, from what I've read you can pretty much stretch the time in between your naps up to 7 hours, but this is something that people have been doing it for awhile have claimed and I will be sticking to a strict schedule until I make it through the transition. Steve has even claimed now that during the day, he doesn't have to take nap at an exact time but he knows when he's ready because he gets this feeling, much like when you have to go to the washroom. He says he can hold it for awhile but at a given point, much like using the washroom, there comes a time when you can't hold it any longer and the body takes over. He mentioned that it's a bit different at night, the drowsiness will come quicker but since he's introduced some excercising into his schedule it hasn't been as bad. As it stands, I'm sitting at a computer and not being very active so it's probably not helping me much but as this goes on and I'm more comfortable with this method of sleeping, I intend to fill my time with doing more active things like going to the gym and walking.

2. The people who have done this so far have claimed to feel a hightened state of awareness, more clarity of thought, increased motor functions, stamina and the benefit of more private time while others are sleeping. I can't speak for most of those yet but the last one definetly rings true, I like having time to myself while most people are asleep, it's so quiet and there are very little distractions that I don't control myself.

I'm going to do some more reading, I'll post again later about some of the things I'm feeling and experiencing personally.

[Weiser]

That sounds cool and I'd like to try it out, unfortunately my schedule (work) would not allow for that at all. Good luck with it.

[Luba]

Since there are so many things I'd like to be doing instead of sleeping (which I also love to do) I wish I could try it. Being away from home almost 10 hours a day and working would make it difficult to try at this time...

Good luck to you, Paul...sounds like it's really working for you!

[Paul]

Originally Posted by Weiser

That sounds cool and I'd like to try it out, unfortunately my schedule (work) would not allow for that at all. Good luck with it.

I hear ya Weiser, this definetly wouldn't be possible if I wasn't in the situation I am right now! Thanks for the support!

Originally Posted by Luba

Since there are so many things I'd like to be doing instead of sleeping (which I also love to do) I wish I could try it. Being away from home almost 10 hours a day and working would make it difficult to try at this time...

Good luck to you, Paul...sounds like it's really working for you!

It's kinda restrictive unfortunately but perhaps someday you'll have the time to give it a try!

Today around lunch time was ROUGH and that's putting it mildly, I had a bit of naseua but now I'm feeling fine. I found that I need to eat a LOT more then normal, which is good because I need to put on some weight anyway. Also I need to be active, no sitting at the computer for 4 hours straight, you just end up feeling like crap and wanting to go to sleep.

Last night I kept busy and it went well. I did the dishes, washed the laundry, cleaned the kitchen, cleaned the bathroom and bagged some garbage, but I left enough to give me something to do today. Then I set about doing some reading and writing which worked for awhile but after I ended up sitting for too long, my naps became something I longed for and it wasn't fun anymore. It got to the point where I had to toss an extra one in just to recover but after that I got my wind back, ate some food and feel much better.

Right now I'm doing pretty good, in the past couple hours I've been doing some light weight lifting, walking and writing. It's very important to keep active and keep the lights on, no matter what, because as soon as you become to inactive, you start getting drowsy. I'm told this will pass in time but right now it's more evident then it's ever been in my life, I've never been up this long with this little sleep before and it's really interesting to see how I react. My friend and brother were in my room playing computer games on the network with me today and I found my patience to be at an all time low, but after reminding myself to mind my manners, I managed to regain my composure and found the game to be a welcome distraction.

The night is going to be long so I'm thinking that for the next hour I'll probably take a walk, get some food and make something to eat, lie down and then eat the food after I wake up, as it makes it much easier to sleep if you're not digesting the food.

I have a few more things I want to talk about but I'm going to head out now and get the blood pumping.

[Paul]

Well I'm happy to say that I've finally hit REM sleep, and it couldn't come soon enough. :shock: It's been an interesting road so far, I've had 5 hours of sleep since noon Friday and it took the expected 3 days to finally hit REM within 5 minutes of laying down. What I intend to do now is add a couple extra sleep session to my day so have 8 in total, for the next 3 days so that I can catch up on some much needed deep sleep.

Physically I'm doing well, except for the usual lower back pain which I experience, but I'm visiting the chiropractor in the next 4 hour so that will be taken care of. It's a little strange to say but it seems harder to classify things according to day when the day never ends, I just keep judging things in regards to hours and naps. I'm not feeling entirely rested but my head is clearer then it has been up until now.

I've got quite a bit of work on the go to keep me occupied and I've got a bunch of new ideas of things I want to try (business wise) so for productivity, there doesn't seem to be any better way to go about it.

Upon searching into the history of polyphasic sleep, I came upon this article at wikipedia.org: "Claudio Stampi is a founder and Director of the Chronobiology Research Institute in Boston, Massachusetts. He is the foremost researcher of polyphasic sleep. He earned a degree and a doctorate in medicine from the University of Bologna in Italy; he later earned more specialized degrees in neurology and biomedical technologies. He began researching polyphasic sleep when he noticed that a number of his fellow long distance sail boat racing comrades adopted a polyphasic sleep pattern with minimal impairment."

It seems the only thing unknown is the long term effects and side-effects, if there are any. Quite a few people have have adapted to the polyphasic sleep have returned to a monophasic sleep pattern at some point, mostly due to social restraints and the limited possibility of taking naps at needed times while maintaining a full time job.

While at this moment, I'm not over the hump, I feel I'm halfway up it and the next few days of getting some quality sleep should make all the difference on the week following it.

[Paul]

Blah, I was just reading something and realized I had said "livid" dreams when I meant "lucid". :roll:

That being said, I found this article on Lucid Dreaming, what it is, how it works and how you can take control of it. You can view the link here: http://brain.web-us.com/lucid/luciddreamingFAQ.htm Please keep in mind that the information in it is... questionable. You may or may not find it the least bit humorous. :P

I'm actually halfway through Day 4 at this point and I feel pretty normal right now, albeit a little disoriented by the whole concept of days and time. It's really strange to just keep... going, never really stopping for more then a few minutes a few times a day. I'm actually very impressed at how amazingly adaptive the human body is, I haven't even made it past what is considered the normal transition period and yet I feel like I'm well on my way there. Not to declare it a complete triumph yet though, I'm going to continue on and make sure the results are consistent in a few days from now because I'm aware of the possibility of tainting the results simply because one wants to achieve them, which isn't my goal whatsoever. I'm more of the mind - if I can do it, great, if not, fine.

Other then that, I'm eating pretty good, spent some time outside walking the past couple of days and had company over. Not being a good cook at all as I mentioned before, I'm going to try to make a decent meal tonight and make it somewhat edible. I've been very productive in terms of getting a website project done for a friend of mine, I'm not looking at the possibility of doing a podcast for the network and will be doing some writing for the groundwork of what it will consist of. That should be pretty exciting, I think most everyone here would really enjoy that and it's kind of my way of giving back to a community that really gives so much inspiration to me.

Well I'm off for now, feel free to reply here and say anything, like the fact that I'm retarded, it's nice getting everyone's opinions on the whole thing.

[Luba]

I don't think you are retarded at all, Paul!! I applaud you for trying this and telling us how it's going; it's very interesting and informative! As one that is reading this very closely and wants to find more time to do all the interests I have, I need to get less sleep and have more energy! I wish you well!!