Nocturnal Effect

End of Everyman Attempt 1

2010-07-17T16:11:00.000-07:00

This whole social thingy makes me really busy. I want to make it clear. Reason is not sleepiness. So I'm back monophasic again but this doesn't mean that I will abandon my blog. Acutally I will only write "information" from now on.

This is not the end. I'm planning on a different schedule but this is not the time.

Day 8 - First Big Oversleep

2010-07-16T02:50:00.000-07:00

I missed my second (8:00 PM) nap and at my core sleep I slept until 10 AM.

Mental: 8
Physical : 9
Social: 10
Alertness: 8
Will: 8 - I feel like I'm back at beginning
Hours slept: 7 hours 50 minutes.

Day 7 - Sleepy

2010-07-14T21:53:00.000-07:00

I'm feeling very sleepy at the moment. Everyman kinda sucks. When you can become uberman why become everyman? I'm afraid I have to go with everyman.

Mental: 8
Physical: 9
Social: 9
Alertness: 6
Will: 9
Hours slept:5 hours 10 minutes

Sorry guys!

2010-07-13T23:57:00.000-07:00

Sorry guys I couldn't update my blog past 3 days. I even hardly come to my house let alone blogging. Past 3 days were routine. Hours I slept:

day 4: 5 hours
day 5: 6 hours 20 minutes
day 6:5 hours 10 minutes

Also I'm feeling pretty awake and well. I know that difficult days are still ahead of me.

I will try to update my blog from day to day. Not every 2-3 days.

Day 2 and 3

2010-07-10T21:41:00.000-07:00

Day 2
I slept for an extra hour and woke up because of the noise outside. I couldn't sleep at my first nap but the second one gone as planned. I was really sleepy when I woke up but I felt better around the midday.

Mental: 9
Physical: 10
Social: 10 - Everyman is very flexible
Alertness: 7 - just like yesterday

Day 3
Day 3 is this day. I just woke up and I'm feeling very sleepy. I hope I'll get better quickly.

Mental: 8
Physical: 10
Social: 10
Alertness: 6

Day 1 - Good Start

2010-07-09T15:44:00.001-07:00

Day one gone as planned. I didn't miss any naps. I woke up from my core sleep easily. Napping was difficult. I was at the border of sleeping but I couldn't fall asleep. I drunk 2 beers but I'm not really feeling drunk. Another great thing about everyman is that if you drink too much it doesn't really matter since you will have a core sleep. I will try vodka in two days. I hope that won't be a problem.

Mental: 10
Physical: 10
Social: 10
Alertness: 7 - I'm not really sleepy but I feel like I'm ready to sleep whenever I lie down
Will: 10
Total hours slept. 4 hours 50 minutes. Perfect day.

Everyman Schedule

2010-07-07T15:38:00.000-07:00

My new everyman schedule is this:

schedule2
2:00AM-6:30AM core 4.5 hours
<6>
12:00PM-12:20PM 20
<8>
8:00PM-8:20PM 20
<6>
total:5 hours

Sleeping for 20 minutes and getting up is easy but sleeping for 4.5 hours and getting up is difficult. I don't have enough alarm clocks (Actually I have only one and it's very quiet) so it may be bit difficult.

End of Uberman Attempt 1

2010-07-05T15:59:00.000-07:00

I'm bringing and end to my first uberman attempt. I will try everyman from now on. The reasons are

-It's almost impossible to balance your life if you are a social person
-I can't fix my oversleeping problem. Maybe this will help
-Other personal issues

This attempt was not a waste. I learned a big deal about polyphasic sleep. I managed not to sleep more than 7 hours a day and it's a big feat for me. Since I sleep for 10-12 hours a day. Now it's time for everyman. I'm thinking about starting my Uberman attempt 2 around the end of Summer.

I will post my schedule next day. I'm still thinking about it.

Day 14

2010-07-04T19:35:00.000-07:00

Everything is okay. I didn't oversleep and didn't miss any of my nap. Except for 8:40 8:40 PM nap.

Mental: 9
Physical: 9
Social: 7
Alertness: 7
Will: 9
Hours Slept: 1 hour and 40 minutes. Actually I don't sleep right after I start sleeping but I write every nap as 20 minutes.

Day 12

2010-07-03T17:53:00.000-07:00

This must be end of 12. day. I couldn't write about other days. I don't really like writing these days. Writing information is better for me. Past days were pretty routine. I will write information mostly from now on.

Day 10 - 3.5 hours slept (missed some naps and overslept
Day 11 - 2 hours (missed some naps and overslept)
Day 12 - 1 hour (didn't overslept missed some)

I miss naps because I can't fall asleep.

Day 8 and Day 9

2010-06-30T15:56:00.000-07:00

Day 8
2.5 hours of oversleep at 12:40 AM nap. Other than that it's perfect. I still have difficulty at falling asleep though

Mental: 10
Physical: 10
Social: 8
Alertness: 9
Will: 7 - I'm not making any progress.
Hours slept: 3 hours - I slept well on 3. nap and I think I slept a bit at my 4. nap.

Day 9
2 hours of overlseep at 8:40 AM nap. slept 30 minutes at 4:40 PM. I couldn't sleep other naps

Mental: 9
Physical: 10 - it was a tiring day and I'm not even tired
Social: 8
Alertness:8
Will:8
Hours slept: 2.5 hours

Day 7 - End of Week

2010-06-29T17:47:00.000-07:00

My second biggest oversleep. I slept at my chair and overslept at my 4:40 AM nap and woke up at 7 AM. I couldn't fall asleep at other naps (I tried sleeping on a chair). Also I tried sleeping on a bed to fall asleep easily and overslept at 8:40 PM and woke up at 12:30 AM. So I slept for 6 hours and 10 minutes. That's not my longest. But when I was monophasic I was sleeping for like 12 hours so this isn't that big to me.

It's end of the week. Let's take a look.

As you can see whenever I slept a good ammount of hours (2 hours) I always oversleep next day. To avoid this I will be more careful when I sleep well. This week was like preparation period. I will reduce my oversleeps next week. Wish me luck!

Mental: 10 - Sleepy but I can read books easily. I got a lot of reading done these days
Physical: 10
Social: 7
Alertness: [6 after first nap] [9 after last nap]
Will: 8
Total hours slept: 6 hours 10 minutes.

Day 5 and Day 6

2010-06-28T18:03:00.000-07:00

Day 5
I couldn't fall asleep at first naps but I wasn't feeling tired too. Everything was fine until last nap. I slept from 12:40 AM to 2 AM. When I woke up I felt really groggy.

Mental performance: 7
Physical performance: 10
Social performance: 9
Alertness: 6
Will: 8
Total hours slept: 3 hours 10 minutes

Day 6
My day started fantastic. At my 8:40-9:00 nap I actually saw a dream. That means ... REM sleep!. I couldn't sleep at my 2. 3. and 4. nap. I don't know if I slept at my 5. nap. See, if you don't have the REM sleep it's very difficult to rembember if you slept or not. It's like microsleeps. But that morning nap was great. Dream was very vivid and strange I still laugh whenever I rembember it. It was about to turn into a lucid dream. At the last nap I slept for an extra hour. I always oversleep at the last nap. Also until the last nap I felt really sleepy. My alertness hit 4 (If you need to know the number) and I was like "aaah there are only 17 minutes left". My eyes were tired so much, I wanted to sew my eyes shut. I was too sleepy to go to chair I ended up sleeping at my long sofa.

But that sleepy and groggy feeling I got after my last nap means I'm adapting. Didn't make any sense? When you are monophasic if you take short naps like 20 minutes you won't even feel the sense of sleeping. You might be refreshed a little bit if you managed to sleep. But when you are polyphasic if you sleep for long hours you will feel groggy and much more sleepy. Whenever I slept for 1 hour or more than 1 hour I felt better. But now I feel awful.

Mental performance: 10 (after last nap 6)
Physical performance: 10 (after last nap 8)
Social performance: 7 - I have a reputation for weirdness
Alertness: 10 (after last nap 4)
Will: 8
Total hours slept: 2 hours 40 minutes

About that social performance thingy. Now people around me started hearing about what I do. Most of them know one thing about sleeping and it's wrong. "WE NED 2 SLEEP 8 HOURS EACH DAI. THAZ WUT SCIENCE SEZ" So it's a pain in the ass the explain all this. I start explaning from zero and at the end of it I get the "GTFH and get some sleep" look.

A six-year study of more than one million adults ages 30 to 102 has shown that people who get only 6 to 7 hours a night have a lower death rate. Individuals who sleep 8 hours or more, or less than 4 hours a night, were shown to have a significantly increased death rate compared to those who averaged 6 to 7 hours.
Stole this one from here

Sleep less, live longer? Sleep is full of mysteries.

Day 4 - Fatality

2010-06-27T00:57:00.000-07:00

I slept on my comfy chair at 1:40 and rolled into my bed which is quite far away from my chair and slept until 7:15. Not much to say I guess.

Mental: 10
Physical: 10
Social: 7 - Oversleeping makes me angry
Alertness: 10
Will: 9 - I have 2.5 months to succeed. I will do it one way or another.
Total hours slept: 6 hours 45 minutes

I guess it's time to tell the way I sleep monophasicly.
When I was monophasic I slept for 10 hours each day. If I have an exam I sleep for 7 hours and take a nap at class. I take naps if we don't have any lessons. If we have I just microsleep until the day is over. At weekends I sleep for 12 hours. To change this weekend-laziness, I tried sleeping at 12 and didn't set any alarms to see if I was going to wake up early myself. It didn't work. It doesn't matter when I sleep. I slept at 12 AM and get up at 12 PM. I slept at 3 AM and get up at 1 PM. I slept at 5 AM and get up at 2 PM. I sleep for 12 hours at weekends because I don't want to leave a warm, comfy bed and throw myself into cold, ruthless world. Sometimes I just be like "Oh shit, another boring, monotous and stressful day is starting. I better wait in my bed until this is over" I cover all my body and my head with blanket and draw the curtain. But I'm not in depression. These are just my low-days. In my high-days I go out and live the life. But I had a lot of low-days past months. I had so much things to do I was multi-tasking like crazy.

And now I'm sick of it. I'm sick of spending an hour or two in the bed to fall asleep. I'm sick of waking up at the midday. I'm sick of feeling sleepy at day and feeling energetic at night. I'm fucking sick of my delayed sleep phase syndrome shit. If this doesn't work I'm gonna take sleeping pills or something. I said my will is 9, but it's 10 now. I'm declaring war on my brain.

Day 3 - Oversleeping

2010-06-25T17:37:00.000-07:00

I couldn't sleep at my 1. 2. and 3. nap. I slept at my 4. and 5. nap. Overslept on my 6. nap for 2 hours. I can't find a way to avoid oversleeping. I don't even rembember touching my clock. I set it off unconciously and go on sleeping. Sleeping on chair didn't help much. I don't know what I'm gonna do...

Mental performance: 9 - maybe a bit bad
Physical performance: 10 - did lotsa tiring stuff today. I don't even feel tired.
Social performance: 9
Alertness: 8 - I could say it was high until 4. nap. After the last nap I felt very groggy
Will: 8 - I can't find a way to avoid oversleeping
Total hours slept: 2 hours 40 minutes.

Day 2 - Getting Better

2010-06-24T17:07:00.000-07:00

I couldn't sleep for first 3 naps. But I think slept at 3. nap (8:40). Also at the 4. and 5. But it's not really clear. At the last nap I slept for 2 hours.

I tried this "Isochronic Tones" thingy today. At my 3. 4. and 5. nap I think that's what helped me get up. First I listened to a tone named "Sleep" after that "Adreline Rush" and I think "Adreline Rush" really did wake me up.

http://www.iso-tones.com/tones.html

Summary
Mental performance: 9 - I was confused after my last nap. I'm feeling groggy now.
Physical performance: 8 - got tired easily this morning when I was walking.
Social performance: 10
Alertness: 6 - Very groggy and sleepy
Will: 10 - My overslept only left me wanting to fight more.
Total hours slept: 2.5

I will start sleeping on chairs now. Since I'm sleepy falling asleep isn't really a problem.

Beating Sleep Deprivation

2010-06-23T17:40:00.000-07:00

Sleep deprivation can have serious effects on your health.

-Impaired moral judgement
-Memory loss
-Tremors and aches
-Impaired immune system
-Hallucinations

Dealing with sleep deprivation is really difficult. I never overslept consciously. Some of the things I do to deal with sleep deprivation:

-Don't wear comfy clothings. Wear tight jeans or something like that.
-If you are standing in a room and if there is a bed inside there, get out of there. You will "lie down a bit" and sleep eventually
-Drink water
-Take a cold shower
-Don't read a book. You will fall asleep quickly. That happened a lot to me.
-Listen to metal music or anything that makes a lot of noise.
-Drink caffeinated drinks

But the best things to do when you are in zombie-mod are these:
-Jogging. This really helps. Go outside and take a walk when you get up from your nap. Be careful, when you are in the zombie-mod you sometimes forget what were you doing

-Let's assume something happened and you are stuck in a room. If there is TV watch it but don't watch it like stupid. Think about everything you see. Watch commercials and find their flaws.

-Think about everything. Play games that require attention. Count how many steps does it take to the bathroom.

-Shout. That helps a lot. Look at the mirror and scream. That may sound a bit hardcore but you are trying to be polyphasic. Nothing is hardcore after that. If you are sick of adapdation period you can shout like "THIS [bleep]ING SYSTEM DOESN'T WORK" You will feel better.

Day 1 - Bad Start

2010-06-23T15:47:00.000-07:00

There we go. Before I start this is how I'm going to keep writing. First a journalish nonsense that probably you won't care about

My first day. I had to sleep 2 hours but I slept for 3.5 hours. I guess I need more noisy alarm clocks. Oversleeping on my first nap. It sucks but it's not really a big hole in my indestructible iron will. The reason was my first oversleep was "just 5 more minutes". But I gotta act like I have an iron will if you know what I mean. On the other hand I don't feel sleepy. Also on my second nap, my eyelids were closing and I couldn't stop it. I had to keep my eyelids open using my hands. This lasted for like 5-10 minutes. At the final (sixth) nap I felt awesome.

And just a brief part about my day in general.

Summary
Mental performance: 10 - same as monophasic
Physical performance: 10 - same as monophasic
Social performance: 10 - same as monophasic
Alertness: 9 - Maybe a little sleepy
Will: 10 - Bring it on!
Total hours slept: 3.5 hours

I guest that doesn't need any explanation. But I'll tell them about too
Mental performance inculdes things like reading, creativity, learning
Physical performance is about activites like jogging, swimming, fine motor skills
Alertness means how awake I am. Don't confuse it with physical. If physical is high but alertness is low it means I could jog but if I stop I just sleep very quickly.
Will speaks for itself. If it's zero it means I'm giving up or changing schedule.

Tips and Facts

2010-06-21T19:55:00.000-07:00

Some interesting facts on polyphasic sleep and useful hints about adapting

1. Food clock

You know what circadian rhythm means. It's roughly 24 hour cycle which goes like this. Well, there is also a "food clock". I will skip the science stuff and enlighten you with the fact that if you do a fasting for 16 hours your food clock will reset. Which means you will start waking at the time when you had your breakfast.

if you want to start waking up at 2:00 am, you should start fasting between 10:00 am or 2:00 pm the previous day, and don't break your fast until you wake up at 2:00 am. Make sure you eat a nice healthy meal to jumpstart your system.

So, if you are having trouble staying awake in the morning or night. Just change your clock. Works good for jetlag too.

2. Sleeping on a chair
Oversleeping is the worst nightmare of every polyphasic sleeper at the adaptation period. Nobody wants to leave a comfy bed and face with the real life out there. This is why most polyphasic sleepers sleep on chairs or on the floor. If you have just started your polyphasic quest it will be difficul to fall asleep on a chair. But if you are at the zombie-mode you will fall asleep while you are standing up anyway so just find a chair and sleep there. Who needs beds when you are polyphasic right?

3. Classical conditioning
Your subconcious mind is your enemy. To beat your enemy you must practice. When you get up from your 20 minute nap, going all "I'm very self-disciplined! I will use my will and make my mind conscious instantly" won't really help you. Hitting that snooze button and sleeping for "5 more minutes" is what most of us do. Practice getting up from your naps. Go take a nap. You don't have to sleep just think you are asleep for 20 minutes and just daydream. Believe it or not, doing that at the preparation period will help you a lot. If you are thinking I'm crazy, Behold. Using isochronic tones will help your chances with avoiding oversleeping. The idea is, you start listening to certain "tone" that will make you sleepy for 20 minutes. You nap while listening to that. After 20 minutes you switch to another tone which will make you alert. What is a isochronic tone? I guess you can call that a "brainwave entrainment" you can mess with your brain using isochronic tones. You can find a huge list here

Dymaxion and Everyman

2010-06-21T17:34:00.000-07:00

Dymaxion is one of the most difficult schedules. First person who succeeded at this schedule was Buckminster Fuller. He slept for 30 minutes every 6 hours. That's how dymaxion works. Eventually he had to quit. Suprisingly the reason of becoming monophasic again wasn't sleep deprivation. The reason was peer pressure. Usually the reason of quitting is social problems. It's hard to become polyphasic in this monophasic world. Anyway, back to topic. After that most people who tried dymaxion failed. People who tried it and Uberman both, said that Dymaxion is far more difficult than Uberman. Myself, I think dymaxion is very difficult to succeed. 30 minute naps are less likely to suit you than 20 minute naps. 6 hours of gap between naps are difficult to endure. One other thing; I said Uberman isn't flexible and you will feel like shit if you miss a nap. Dymaxion is even worse. If you miss a nap you won't feel like shit. You will feel like bullshit (or holy shit) Don't be scared if you were planning on Dymaxion. Fuller did it for 2 years. So you might be able to do it too.

Everyman has got, as you can see, a 'core' sleep. It's like normal sleep just a bit shorter. Everyman is kinda like Siesta but more complicated. Everyman is very flexible. It's so flexible you can set it however you like. It is considered as "less hardcore than others" You won't feel very zombie-like at the adaptation period but it will take more time to feel alert like monophasic people. Uberman takes around 2-4 weeks but it is very difficult to adapt. If you can't handle Uberman but got a lot of free time everyman is better. Now, about the flexibility: I know a guy who experimented with some everyman schedules. He said that the best schedule he had was 4x20+1x170. That means you have 4 naps 20 minutes each and you have a core sleep for 170 minutes. Sometimes people make it 2 core sleeps and 2 naps. I came across a schedule where you have a core sleep for 4 hours and take only one nap. But if it works for someone that doesn't mean it will work for you too. As I said, everybody's system is different. You should create your own schedules and find the one that fits better your lifestyle. A word of advice, 15-20 minutes of naps are the best. If you make it like 30 it will be difficult. Not impossible, but difficult.

Introduction and Uberman

2010-06-21T10:10:00.000-07:00

This part is for people who doesn't know much about polyphasic sleep.

So, let's forget the "we need 8 hours of sleep each day" crap. We need 1.5 hours of REM sleep. Other stages of sleep aren't really that important. But to get to the REM sleep first we need to go through these stages right? Wrong! We can just skip them. To skip them we just need to sleep polyphasic. Which means we need to take naps. Naps are usually 20 minute because that fits humans perfect somehow. Also "4 hours awake 20 minutes nap" schedule fits better. That is called Uberman (more like Übermensch)
An example of Uberman:
00:00 - 00:20
4:00 - 4:20
8:00 - 8:20
12:00 - 12:20
16:00 - 16:20
20:00 - 20:20

Uberman and monophasic (normal) :

You take 6 naps each day. 20 minutes per nap. That makes 120 minutes. But we need only 90 minutes. That 30 minutes isn't a waste. At the "adaptation period" going 90 minutes straightaway is pretty hardcore. You will use that 5 extra minutes to fall asleep. When you are over the hump you will be able to sleep almost anywhere. Your brain will set itself offline when the time is right and you won't need that 5 minute anymore. Some people cut that 5 minutes but some don't. 20 minutes fits perfectly I don't think that's not worth the risk. However, Leonardo Da Vinci slept for 15 minutes every 4 hours. But also, there is a volunteer who decided to follow Leonardo's footsteps. He didn't manage to perfectly adapt like him though. He only managed to sleep 30 minutes each nap. With 6 naps that makes 3 hours. As I said: "Some schedules will work for you, some will not." Everybody is different and everybody has a "perfect schedule"

Uberman sleep schedule isn't flexible. If you miss a nap you will feel like shit or maybe oversleep. Oversleeping is common during the "adapdation period" and it will definietly set you back. You have to get back on your feet and keep up the fight.

Okay, I told you the Uberman but there are some other schedules as well. I will only tell you the important ones. you can see them below.Ciao

Hi!

2010-06-15T13:23:00.001-07:00

This blog is about polyphasic sleep. It will be a little journal-ish but I just want to get the information out there. I will start in a week

This blog is for people who know at least something about polyphasic sleep/read a few blogs about polyphasic sleep/looking for more information about polyphasic sleep. I won't only tell my experience. It won't be only "I slept x minutes, I feel blah blah" I will provide you information about polyphasic sleep while telling my experience. Sleeping isn't easy like "We need 8 hours each day. End of the story." There are lots of things about sleep we don't know yet. Not everybody's sleeping system is the same. Some schedules will work for you, some will not. If it's not working for you it will work for someone else. If you don't know much about polyphasic sleep that's okay. I will start from basics to the brainy stuff. I'm not an expert on this topic myself anyway.

If you want to help... just comment. Reading comments from you will motivate me. Criticize, appraise, anything. Knowing that someone cares about this blog will make my quest easier.