Hear plenty of performance gurus, and you'll be simple to think that a nap is a powerful tool: not just a quick fix following restless night, but a route to improved recall, improved mood and possibly improved athletic performance. Professional footballers do it regularly – and so are concert pianists, UFC champions & high-profile executives. But if you haven’t got a dedicated nap-room or a job that encourages daytime sleep, can there *honestly* sufficient advantages to a quick nap to justify the hassle? Is there a dependable method to get to sleep quickly enough? Plus, is it possible to honestly promise you will arise feeling improved, rather than worse?
Exploring Your Reasons for Napping
“We can identify three primary motivations for daytime sleep in the adult population,” notes a professor of sleep science specialist. “One is what we call recovery napping, essentially what happens when you’ve had insufficient sleep overnight. Secondly, there's prophylactic napping, where you are anticipating sleep loss ahead, for instance when working graveyard shifts. Finally, there's “pleasure-based sleep”, which simply is about wanting: you have an opportunity to sleep in the afternoon, and it feels nice to do it.”
The first thing to consider, then, is consider your nap motivation. “Naps can be genuinely useful when night sleeping gets interrupted because of factors you cannot change – for example, when you are a new parent, or recovering after being ill or heavy physical exertion,” explains a sleep physiologist. “But if you take a nap because your night sleep seems unreliable or broken, that is frequently an indicator your need for sleep is not where it needs to be. In such situations, daytime sleep can turn into part of the issue, instead of the fix. Use napping for brief periods for short-term problems – the priority should still be a strong and predictable sleep at night.”
The Optimal Nap Length
This means that daytime sleep ought not to be sufficiently lengthy to disrupt your overnight rest, and ideally shouldn’t take place post-3 p.m. (contingent on the time you retire in the evening). How long is sensible? Advice differs. In one of the most-cited studies regarding daytime sleep, space agency scientists found that space travelers had up to a 54% increase in alertness plus a 34% rise in task performance after a 26-minute nap (technically, this included a six-minute sleep onset time). “My advice is using an alarm for 20 to 30 minutes – many individuals are asleep within 10 minutes,” says a specialist. “There is plenty of guidance out there about the optimal amount for sleeping, yet that often make people feel more stressed above all – and the most counterproductive thing one can do when trying to get to sleep is to be anxious.”
If you plan to sleep for longer, steer clear of the 45 to 60 minute range that promotes sleep grogginess, that spaced-out feeling when you awaken. “Research indicates it’s better to have a longer nap of one to one and a half hours compared to a medium-length nap,” explains the professor. “Forty-five minutes is long enough to send you into deep sleep making it more likely to feel sluggish when you get up – while if you nap for a bit longer to 60 or 90 minutes, you will probably to be completing a natural sleep cycle and should wake up feeling more refreshed. Though if you nap for 90 minutes, it can influence how you sleep in the evening.”
Creating the Right Sleep Space
When it comes to precise methods, suggestions are diverse. Some experts propose adopting similar routines you’d use to encourage a good night’s sleep: a quiet room, a comfortable bed and minimal light as possible. Some advise that one could just doze on the sofa with ambient lighting happens to be around – to avoid that groggy feeling and to “protect” your sleeping quarters as the space your mind associates with nighttime rest. “Sleep is something really tricky to command,” explains a sleep coach. “Without any sleepiness, it becomes harder to lie down and basically command yourself to nod off. There’s got to be some sleep pressure present to initiate sleep initially. I can usually snooze during the day and wake up naturally without an alarm, though, what aids a lot of people is to look for a time that they’re naturally feeling a bit drowsy and then simply ease into sleep.”
Trying different approaches is valuable, and if your choices are limited – for instance, when aiming to fit in a quick nap on a train or in a soundproof office pod – it is perfectly fine to employ a few tools. “In my work with footballers, I suggest that they don’t get used to sleeping in their bed, as they’re going to have|they will
