Polyphasic Sleep: Yellow Brick Road to Productivity? Mental Breakdown?
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So I’ll be testing out a system of Polyphasic Sleep. This is a system of taking strictly scheduled naps throughout the day, in my case for 20 minutes every 4 hours. Basically the idea is that over time, (around 2 weeks), your body will adjust to the new schedule, given that it is rigidly adhered to, and will start skipping the first few stages of sleep and go straight into REM sleep, which is apparently the only one you really can’t do without.
My sources tell me that on the normal 8ish hour sleep schedule, one only gets about 1.5 hours of REM spread throughout, whereas with this polyphasic schedule I should eventually be getting close to 2 hours of REM per day. Supposedly this means that I will feel healthy and alert after my body adapts to the major slap in the face. So I’m looking forward to 2 weeks of dangerously spaced out delirium, during which I should begin posting here regularly again. 
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April 5th, 2006 at 3:05 am
lets us know how that goes prob better than oversleeping
April 5th, 2006 at 6:56 pm
Yeah, I really want it to work, not sure if it’s worth making a log though… Pretty much it would consist of zombie sounds and self-deprecating excuses for relapsing.
So far I have discovered that it’s really not easy to get into at first. I have been doing it (trying to do it) for 3-4 days now, and my major problem is falling asleep right away when it’s time to. I’ll basically lie there for 15 minutes and fall asleep during the last 5, and then the alarm rings and it seems like no time has passed… after doing this for 4 or so phases I get super tired by the last couple during which I fall asleep faster and wake up feeling even more tired.
So I’ll have to experiment… maybe taking 10 minutes before the hour to slow down, and read or something to ease the transition. I may even break out a Christmas present from many moons ago: an alarm clock that makes “sleepy sounds” including “ocean waves” that sound like a busy intersection, and “crickets” that sound like the typical Psycho Knife scene music, (EET EET EET EET and so on).
I have had a few phases that worked very well though, I jumped up with the alarm and felt quite spunky, so I have hope that it can work. I probably should have started this a long time ago though, not when I absolutely need it in order to meet major deadlines… Live and learn.
April 27th, 2006 at 12:10 am
*Zombie sounds* I saw another comment from someone here but it seems to have gotten deleted with the wave of new comments that ended up being spammers… =/. Annoying.
The sleep thing is going fairly well. It was a rocky start, I quickly came to realize that even with supposedly “full control” over my schedule, it is still hard to take a nap exactly at the right times, so I ended up shuffling times around a lot. However, I eventually realized that I was waking up feeling alert and often jumping out of bed (or chair) feeling fine. Also I started dreaming a lot which I suppose is a good sign of REM. So it does indeed work! It’s strange, but I actually look tired even though I don’t feel tired. Hopefully my body will catch up with this pattern fullyish soon so that should go away.
Anyway, the real reason I haven’t updated is that my computer sortof got brokey for a while and now it’s fixy. I hope it stays that way. So if anyone emailed me, I may not have gotten it. Feel free to send again.