Tune into a few productivity podcasters, and you'll be tempting to convince yourself that napping is a powerful tool: rather than a quick fix following poor sleep, but a path to enhanced cognition, a brighter outlook and possibly quicker running times. Professional soccer players do it regularly – along with professional piano players, mixed martial artists & high-profile executives. Yet, when you don't have a room for napping or employment that permits daytime sleep, can there *honestly* sufficient advantages to a short sleep to justify the kerfuffle? Can you find a reliable way to get to sleep quickly enough? And can you truly ensure you will arise feeling refreshed, not worse?
Identifying The Drive to Snooze
“We can identify three main reasons for taking a nap among most adults,” says a professor of sleep science researcher. “The first is known as make-up sleep, that is what happens when you’ve had insufficient sleep the previous night. Secondly, there's prophylactic napping, which involves preparing for insufficient sleep in the future, such as when working graveyard shifts. Finally, there's “appetitive drive”, which simply boils down to desire: there is a moment to nap in the daytime, and it's enjoyable to indulge.”
The initial step to undertake, therefore, is consider your nap motivation. “Napping can be really helpful when nighttime sleep is disturbed due to causes beyond your control – for example, for a new parent, or you’re recovering from sickness or strenuous activity,” explains a sleep expert. “However, if you take a nap since your nighttime sleep is unstable or poor, that can be an indicator your need for sleep is not where it should be. In such situations, napping can become part of the problem, rather than the answer. Employ naps for brief periods for temporary issues – the main goal must always be a strong and predictable night’s sleep.”
The Ideal Nap Length
This means that daytime sleep ought not to be too extended to affect your nighttime sleep, and ideally should not occur post-3 p.m. (contingent on when you go to bed in the evening). What's a reasonable length? Advice differs. Among a prominent study regarding daytime sleep, space agency scientists discovered that astronauts showed up to a 54% increase in attentiveness and a 34% increase in task performance after a 26-minute nap (technically, this counted a six-minute long nodding-off period). “My advice is setting a timer for half an hour or less – the majority are asleep within 10 minutes,” explains a specialist. “You'll find much recommendations regarding the perfect length of time, yet that often lead individuals to become more stressed above all – and the worst thing you can do when trying to get to sleep is worry about it.”
Should you decide to take an extended nap, bypass the period between 45 and 60 minutes that promotes that sluggish feeling, that disoriented sensation upon waking. “Studies would say it's more effective to opt for a lengthier snooze of one to one and a half hours rather than a mid-length nap,” says the expert. “Forty-five minutes is enough time to send you into slow-wave sleep and you’re more likely to feel groggy when you get up – whereas if you extend it a little longer to an hour or 90 minutes, it's likely you'll to be on the end a natural sleep cycle and are likely to awaken feeling more alert. Though if you’re sleeping for 90 minutes, it may impact the quality of your sleep that night.”
Finding an Ideal Nap Environment
When it comes to specific techniques, suggestions are diverse. A few professionals propose adopting comparable habits one would use to foster a good night’s sleep: a quiet room, a cozy bed and as much darkness as possible. Some advise that one could simply nap on the sofa with ambient lighting is present – to prevent post-nap grogginess and to preserve your sleeping quarters as the space your mind associates with *real* sleep. “Napping is quite challenging to will,” says a sleep coach. “If you don’t have any sleepiness, it is more challenging to lie down and practically tell yourself to nod off. You need some drive available to bring the sleep on initially. I can usually nap during the day and naturally wake up alarm-free, but what helps a lot of people is to wait for a time when they are naturally somewhat sleepy and just gently ease into sleep.”
Trying different approaches is valuable, and should you have few options – for instance, if you’re trying to fit in 40 winks on a train or in a work pod – it's acceptable to use a few tools. “When I’m working with elite athletes, I advise that they avoid becoming accustomed to their own bed for naps, since they’re going to have|they will
