One thing you might want to take into account: your baseline might be bad. Some of the people taking part might already be chronically sleep deprived or have a sleep disorder of some kind or another already.
I always did wonder why more people with serious insomnia don’t try polyphasic sleep. It’s a lot nicer to lie in bed for 20 minutes not falling asleep than it is to lie in bed for 120 minutes not falling asleep.
I always did wonder why more people with serious insomnia don’t try polyphasic sleep. It’s a lot nicer to lie in bed for 20 minutes not falling asleep than it is to lie in bed for 120 minutes not falling asleep.
Because if you are suffering from insomnia the last thing you want to do is reduce your daily sleep to potentially 0 minutes since you can reasonably expect to not be getting any sleep from those naps. Additionally, because many people haven’t heard of it and because if you are treated by a doctor for your insomnia you will be unlikely to get your doctor’s support for it.
She. And the idea that this is actually something you can get out and train yourself to do wasn’t really out there before, even though stuff like Dymaxion sleep had been documented.
Because if you are suffering from insomnia the last thing you want to do is reduce your daily sleep to potentially 0 minutes since you can reasonably expect to not be getting any sleep from those naps.
Your expectance to get some sleep in will probably go up even with most insomnias once you start building up enough sleep deprivation. And there are middle and terminal insomnias that have you able to fall asleep but unable to stay asleep the whole night.
Thank you for the “she”. ;) Also, I agree that simply taking data from willing polyphasers means a higher likelihood of your baseline being abnormal for one reason or another, the presence of already-screwy sleep definitely among them. However, the research has gotta start somewhere, and I’m thrilled that voluntary groups are starting to form—it’s a great step, and LW are just about the perfect people to be on it IMO. <3
(I did “just name it”, but before I started writing about it in ’00, there was no data other than Dr. Fuller’s, which was really only recorded / disseminated in a tiiiiiiny Time Magazine blurb in the 80′s; and Dr. Stampi’s work on naps generally, which is excellent but limited and doesn’t discuss polyphasic sleep as a lifestyle. I didn’t know this at the time—I thought I was just writing my experiences with something that surely other people had written more about elsewhere...which I mention to excuse the rather slipshod quality of my early work. It’s why I tried so hard to improve the book and to make my site more comprehensive later...I hope I’ve made up for some of the early lapses.)
One thing you might want to take into account: your baseline might be bad. Some of the people taking part might already be chronically sleep deprived or have a sleep disorder of some kind or another already.
Those people may have a better chance of succeeding.
Puredoxyk, who originated the Uberman idea, was suffering from various sleep disorders when she developed the technique.
I always did wonder why more people with serious insomnia don’t try polyphasic sleep. It’s a lot nicer to lie in bed for 20 minutes not falling asleep than it is to lie in bed for 120 minutes not falling asleep.
He just coined the name.
Because if you are suffering from insomnia the last thing you want to do is reduce your daily sleep to potentially 0 minutes since you can reasonably expect to not be getting any sleep from those naps. Additionally, because many people haven’t heard of it and because if you are treated by a doctor for your insomnia you will be unlikely to get your doctor’s support for it.
She. And the idea that this is actually something you can get out and train yourself to do wasn’t really out there before, even though stuff like Dymaxion sleep had been documented.
Your expectance to get some sleep in will probably go up even with most insomnias once you start building up enough sleep deprivation. And there are middle and terminal insomnias that have you able to fall asleep but unable to stay asleep the whole night.
Thank you for the “she”. ;) Also, I agree that simply taking data from willing polyphasers means a higher likelihood of your baseline being abnormal for one reason or another, the presence of already-screwy sleep definitely among them. However, the research has gotta start somewhere, and I’m thrilled that voluntary groups are starting to form—it’s a great step, and LW are just about the perfect people to be on it IMO. <3
(I did “just name it”, but before I started writing about it in ’00, there was no data other than Dr. Fuller’s, which was really only recorded / disseminated in a tiiiiiiny Time Magazine blurb in the 80′s; and Dr. Stampi’s work on naps generally, which is excellent but limited and doesn’t discuss polyphasic sleep as a lifestyle. I didn’t know this at the time—I thought I was just writing my experiences with something that surely other people had written more about elsewhere...which I mention to excuse the rather slipshod quality of my early work. It’s why I tried so hard to improve the book and to make my site more comprehensive later...I hope I’ve made up for some of the early lapses.)
Thanks!