Tune into plenty of self-improvement podcasters, and you'll be easy to believe that a nap is a secret weapon: rather than a quick fix following poor sleep, but a shortcut towards a better memory, better spirits and maybe a faster 5k run time. Professional soccer players are all at it – along with concert pianists, UFC champions and media moguls. But if you haven’t got a dedicated nap-room or a job that allows daytime sleep, are there *really* enough benefits to a burst of shut-eye to merit the hassle? Can you find a dependable method to fall asleep fast? And can you truly ensure you’ll wake up feeling refreshed, rather than worse?
Exploring The Drive to Snooze
“There are three key drivers for taking a nap in the adult population,” notes an expert sleep and circadian science researcher. “Firstly, there's known as make-up sleep, that is what you do after experiencing a lack of sleep overnight. Secondly, there's pre-emptive sleep, when you are preparing for sleep loss coming up, for instance during on night shifts. The third is called “hedonic napping”, which essentially comes down to desire: you have a chance to doze in the afternoon, and it feels nice to do it.”
The initial step to consider, so, is to examine why you want to nap. “Naps can be really helpful when overnight rest gets interrupted due to causes beyond your control – for instance, if you’re a parent of a newborn, or recovering from sickness or strenuous activity,” says a sleep physiologist. “Yet when you nap since your sleep at night feels fragile or unreliable, that is frequently a sign your sleep drive is not where required. Under those circumstances, naps can become part of the problem, not the solution. Utilize daytime sleep as a short-term solution for short-term problems – the priority should still be a robust and regular night’s sleep.”
The Perfect Nap Duration
This means that daytime sleep shouldn’t be long enough to affect your nighttime sleep, and preferably are not recommended in the late afternoon (contingent on the time you sleep in the evening). What duration is wise? Guidelines are mixed. From a prominent study about napping, experts discovered that crew members had a boost of up to 54% in attentiveness plus a 34% rise in task performance following a nap of 26 minutes (technically, this counted a six-minute sleep onset time). “My advice is setting an alarm for half an hour or less – many individuals doze off in under ten minutes,” notes a sleep expert. “There is plenty of advice around about the ideal number of time, but that tends to lead individuals to become more worried than anything – and the most counterproductive thing one can do when attempting to nod off is to stress over it.”
Should you decide to take an extended nap, bypass the period between 45 and 60 minutes that promotes that sluggish feeling, that foggy state when you wake. “Research suggests it’s better to have a longer nap of 60 to 90 minutes than a medium-length one,” says the sleep scientist. “Three-quarters of an hour is sufficient to send you into slow-wave sleep and it is more probable to feel sluggish when you wake up – whereas if you take it a little longer to an hour or 90 minutes, you will probably to be on the end a natural sleep cycle and should get up feeling more refreshed. Though if you’re sleeping for a long period, it can influence the quality of your sleep later that night.”
Finding the Right Sleep Space
When it comes to precise methods, recommendations vary. Some experts propose adopting similar routines you’d use to encourage restful sleep: a peaceful area, a supportive surface and maximum darkness as you can manage. Some advise that you should just doze in a chair with ambient lighting is present – to prevent that groggy feeling and to “protect” your bed as the space your brain links with *real* sleep. “Sleep is something really tricky to will,” says a specialist. “If you don’t have any drowsiness, it is more challenging to get comfortable and basically instruct yourself to go to sleep. There must be some drive present to bring the sleep on to begin with. Personally, I can often take a nap in broad daylight and awaken on my own without a timer, however, what assists a lot of people is to wait for a time that they’re naturally somewhat sleepy and calmly ease into sleep.”
It’s worth experimenting, and should options are scarce – such as, if you’re trying to grab a quick nap on a train or at the office – it is perfectly fine to use a few tools. “When I’m working with footballers, I suggest that they don’t get used to napping in bed, as they’re going to have|they will
