The Formula to an Ideal Nap: Timing, Location & for How Long?
Hear enough productivity experts, and it’s tempting to think that napping is a secret weapon: more than a band-aid following a bad night’s sleep, but a shortcut towards a better memory, a brighter outlook and perhaps a faster 5k run time. Premier League soccer players do it regularly – along with musicians, mixed martial artists & media moguls. However, if you lack a dedicated nap-room or a career that permits regular snoozing, can there *honestly* worthwhile perks to a quick nap to justify the effort? Can you find a dependable method to get to sleep quickly enough? Plus, is it possible to honestly promise you will arise feeling refreshed, rather than worse?
Identifying The Drive to Snooze
“We can identify three primary motivations for napping in the adult population,” says an expert sleep science researcher. “Firstly, there's what we call compensatory napping, that is what happens when you’ve had poor sleep the previous night. The second is preparatory napping, which involves anticipating a sleep deficit ahead, for instance when working graveyard shifts. The third is called “hedonic napping”, which simply boils down to desire: there is a moment to nap during the day, and it feels nice to do it.”
The primary task to consider, so, is consider your reason for napping. “Daytime sleep can be truly beneficial when overnight rest is being disrupted because of factors beyond your control – for instance, for a parent of a newborn, or you’re recovering after being ill or intense exercise,” explains a sleep specialist. “Yet when you’re napping because your night sleep feels fragile or poor, that can be an indicator your sleep drive is not where it should be. Under those circumstances, napping can become part of the problem, instead of the fix. Employ naps as a temporary measure for short-term problems – the main goal must always be a solid and consistent overnight rest.”
The Optimal Nap Length
Therefore that napping must not be long enough to disrupt your nighttime sleep, and best are not recommended after about 3pm (based on when you retire overnight). What's a reasonable length? Guidelines are mixed. In one of the most referenced research regarding daytime sleep, researchers at Nasa found that space travelers experienced a boost of up to 54% in attentiveness and a 34% boost in task performance after a 26-minute nap (in detail, this involved a six-minute sleep onset time). “I’d suggest setting an alarm for half an hour or less – the majority fall asleep in under ten minutes,” says a sleep coach. “There’s a lot of recommendations regarding the perfect length of time, but that tends to lead individuals to become more worried than anything else – and the least helpful action one can do when trying to nod off is worry about it.”
If you’re going to take an extended nap, steer clear of the period between 45 and 60 minutes that induces that sluggish feeling, that spaced-out feeling when you awaken. “The science indicates it is preferable to have an extended nap lasting 60-90 minutes compared to a medium-length nap,” explains the sleep scientist. “45 minutes is long enough to put you into a deep sleep stage making it more likely to feel disoriented when you wake up – however, if you extend it a little longer to an hour or 90 minutes, you will probably to be on the end a natural sleep cycle and will probably wake up feeling more rejuvenated. Though if you’re sleeping for an hour and a half, it may impact the quality of your sleep later that night.”
Finding the Right Nap Environment
Regarding specific techniques, recommendations vary. A few professionals suggest using comparable habits you’d use to encourage quality nighttime sleep: a peaceful area, a comfortable bed and maximum darkness as you can manage. Others suggest that you should just doze on the sofa with ambient lighting is available – both to discourage post-nap grogginess and to “protect” your bedroom as the place your brain links with *real* sleep. “Sleep is quite challenging to command,” says a sleep coach. “If you don’t have any drowsiness, it is tougher to get comfortable and practically tell yourself to go to sleep. There’s got to be some drive there to start the process in the first place. For me, it's possible to snooze in broad daylight and naturally wake up alarm-free, however, what assists a lot of people is to anticipate a time where they feel naturally slightly tired and calmly relax into it.”
Experimentation is key, and when your choices are limited – for example, when aiming to squeeze in some shut-eye during a commute or in a soundproof office pod – it is perfectly fine with bringing sleep aids. “When I’m working with footballers, I recommend that they not rely on napping in bed, since they’re going to have|they will
