Hear enough self-improvement experts, and you'll be easy to believe that napping is a secret weapon: not just a sticking plaster after a bad night’s sleep, but a shortcut towards enhanced cognition, improved mood and perhaps quicker running times. Professional footballers are all at it – along with musicians, fighters and business leaders. But if you haven’t got a room for napping or a career that permits regular snoozing, is it *truly* worthwhile perks to a short sleep for it to be worth the effort? Can you find a dependable method to get to sleep quickly enough? Plus, is it possible to honestly promise you’ll wake up feeling better, instead of groggy?
Identifying The Drive to Snooze
“We can identify three key drivers for napping among most adults,” notes an expert circadian rhythm specialist. “Firstly, there's termed compensatory napping, that is what happens when you’ve had poor sleep overnight. Secondly, there's preparatory napping, when you are pre-empting insufficient sleep coming up, for instance when working graveyard shifts. The third reason is “appetitive drive”, which basically boils down to wanting: you have a chance to nap in the daytime, and it's pleasant to indulge.”
The first thing to undertake, so, is to think about why you want to nap. “Naps can be truly beneficial when nighttime sleep gets interrupted for reasons outside your control – for instance, if you’re a new parent, or recovering from sickness or strenuous activity,” states a sleep physiologist. “But if you nap since your night sleep seems unreliable or poor, that’s often a sign your body's sleep pressure is not where it needs to be. Under those circumstances, daytime sleep can turn into a contributing factor, rather than the answer. Utilize daytime sleep as a temporary measure for short-term problems – the priority must always be a robust and regular overnight rest.”
The Optimal Nap Length
Therefore that daytime sleep must not be sufficiently lengthy to disrupt your overnight rest, and preferably are not recommended post-3 p.m. (depending on what time you retire overnight). What duration is wise? Advice differs. From the most-cited studies regarding daytime sleep, researchers at Nasa discovered that space travelers showed up to a 54% increase in attentiveness and a 34% increase in cognitive performance after a 26-minute nap (in detail, this involved an initial six-minute falling asleep phase). “My advice is using an alarm for 20 to 30 minutes – many individuals doze off in under ten minutes,” says a sleep expert. “There’s a lot of guidance out there about the optimal amount of minutes, yet that often cause people to feel more stressed than anything else – and the most counterproductive thing you can do when trying to get to sleep is worry about it.”
If you plan to take an extended nap, bypass the 45 to 60 minute range that promotes sleep grogginess, that spaced-out feeling when you wake. “The science indicates it's more effective to have a longer nap lasting 60-90 minutes than a medium-length one,” explains the professor. “Forty-five minutes is long enough to send you into deep sleep and you’re more likely to feel disoriented when you get up – whereas if you extend it a little longer to a full sleep cycle, you’re likely to be completing a natural sleep cycle and should wake up feeling more refreshed. However, if you’re sleeping for 90 minutes, it can influence how you sleep that night.”
Finding the Perfect Nap Environment
Regarding specific techniques, advice differs. A few professionals recommend employing similar routines you’d use to foster quality nighttime sleep: a quiet room, a supportive surface and minimal light as possible. Alternatively, experts propose that one could merely snooze on the sofa in whatever light is present – both to discourage sleep inertia and to “protect” your sleeping quarters as the environment you associate with proper sleep. “Sleep is quite challenging to will,” says an expert. “If you don’t have the urge to sleep, it is tougher to recline and practically instruct yourself to fall asleep. You need a natural inclination present to initiate sleep initially. I can usually snooze in broad daylight and awaken on my own without an alarm, however, what assists a lot of people is to wait for a moment when they are naturally slightly tired and then simply relax into it.”
It’s worth experimenting, and if options are scarce – such as, when aiming to grab 40 winks during a commute or in a soundproof office pod – it is perfectly fine to employ sleep aids. “In my work with footballers, I suggest that they not rely on napping in bed, as they’re going to have|they will
