Listen to a few productivity experts, making it simple to convince yourself that a nap is a powerful tool: rather than a band-aid after restless night, but a shortcut towards a better memory, a brighter outlook and perhaps improved athletic performance. Elite soccer players are all at it – and so are concert pianists, fighters and high-profile executives. But if you haven’t got a dedicated nap-room or employment that allows daytime sleep, can there *honestly* enough benefits to a quick nap to merit the effort? Can you find a dependable method to fall asleep fast? And can you truly ensure you will get up feeling improved, not worse?
Identifying The Reasons for Napping
“We can identify three main reasons for daytime sleep among most adults,” explains a leading sleep science researcher. “The first is known as make-up sleep, that is what you do when you’ve had a lack of sleep overnight. Secondly, there's pre-emptive sleep, where you are anticipating insufficient sleep in the future, such as when working overnight shifts. Finally, there's “hedonic napping”, which basically is about desire: you get a moment to nap during the day, and it feels nice to nap.”
The initial step to undertake, then, is to examine your nap motivation. “Daytime sleep can be genuinely useful when nighttime sleep is disturbed because of factors outside your control – such as, if you’re a parent of a newborn, or you’re recovering from illness or strenuous activity,” says a sleep physiologist. “Yet when you take a nap as your nighttime sleep seems unreliable or unreliable, that is frequently a signal your need for sleep is not where it should be. In such situations, daytime sleep can turn into a contributing factor, instead of the fix. Utilize daytime sleep for brief periods for temporary issues – the focus must always be a robust and regular sleep at night.”
The Ideal Nap Duration
This implies that naps shouldn’t be long enough to disrupt your sleep at night, and ideally should not occur post-3 p.m. (contingent on the time you retire at night). What's a reasonable length? Advice differs. Among the most-cited studies regarding daytime sleep, researchers at Nasa noted that astronauts had a boost of up to 54% in attentiveness and a 34% boost in cognitive performance after a 26-minute nap (to be precise, this counted a six-minute long falling asleep phase). “I’d suggest using an alarm for 20 to 30 minutes – the majority fall asleep in under ten minutes,” notes a sleep expert. “There is plenty of recommendations about the optimal amount of time, but that tends to cause people to feel more worried than anything – and the worst thing you can possibly do when trying to fall asleep is to be anxious.”
If you plan to sleep for longer, avoid the 45 to 60 minute range that promotes sleep inertia, that spaced-out feeling when you awaken. “The science would say it is preferable to opt for a lengthier snooze of 60 to 90 minutes than a medium-length one,” notes the professor. “45 minutes is sufficient to plunge you into slow-wave sleep and you’re more likely to feel sluggish upon awakening – however, if you extend it a bit longer to an hour or 90 minutes, you will probably to finish a natural sleep cycle and will probably get up feeling more alert. However, if you nap for an hour and a half, it will affect your sleep that night.”
Creating an Ideal Sleep Space
When it comes to precise methods, advice differs. Certain specialists propose adopting comparable habits you use to foster restful sleep: a silent space, a comfortable bed and as much darkness as is feasible. Others suggest that it's fine to simply nap on a couch in the existing light happens to be around – to avoid that groggy feeling and to preserve your bed as the space your brain links with nighttime rest. “Sleep is notoriously difficult to will,” notes a specialist. “Without any drowsiness, it becomes harder to lie down and basically command yourself to go to sleep. You need some drive available to initiate sleep initially. Personally, I can often snooze during the day and awaken on my own without an alarm, but what helps many individuals is to look for a time when they are naturally feeling a bit drowsy and calmly relax into it.”
Trying different approaches is valuable, and when you have few options – for example, if you’re trying to fit in 40 winks on a train or at the office – there’s nothing wrong with bringing a few tools. “Coaching professional sportspeople, I recommend that they not rely on sleeping in their bed, because they’re going to have|they will
