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Tune into plenty of self-improvement podcasters, making it simple to believe that a nap is a secret weapon: more than a quick fix after poor sleep, but a route to improved recall, a brighter outlook and perhaps improved athletic performance. Professional soccer players do it regularly – as do musicians, mixed martial artists & high-profile executives. But if you lack a room for napping or employment that encourages daytime sleep, are there *really* enough benefits to a quick nap to justify the effort? Does there exist a reliable way to get to sleep quickly enough? Furthermore, can you really guarantee you will get up feeling refreshed, not worse?

Identifying Your Nap Motivation

“There are three primary motivations for napping for many people,” notes a leading circadian rhythm professor. “One is termed make-up sleep, essentially the action you take when you’ve had poor sleep overnight. Another is pre-emptive sleep, when you are pre-empting a sleep deficit in the future, such as when working graveyard shifts. The third is called “hedonic napping”, which simply boils down to wanting: there is an opportunity to nap during the day, and it's enjoyable to nap.”

The initial step to undertake, therefore, is to examine your reason for napping. “Napping can be genuinely useful when night sleeping gets interrupted due to causes you cannot change – such as, if you’re a parent of a newborn, or you’re recovering from sickness or strenuous activity,” states a sleep specialist. “However, if you take a nap because your sleep at night is unstable or poor, that can be a sign your need for sleep is not where it needs to be. In those cases, daytime sleep can turn into part of the issue, instead of the fix. Utilize daytime sleep for brief periods for temporary issues – the main goal must always be a robust and regular sleep at night.”

The Perfect Snooze Time

Therefore that napping ought not to be long enough to interfere with your nighttime sleep, and best are not recommended after about 3pm (contingent on when you go to bed at night). What's a reasonable length? Guidelines are mixed. From the most-cited studies regarding daytime sleep, space agency scientists discovered that astronauts showed improvements of over 50% in alertness and a 34% increase in cognitive performance following a nap of 26 minutes (to be precise, this involved an initial six-minute falling asleep phase). “I’d suggest using an alarm for 20-30 minutes – most people are asleep quickly,” says a specialist. “There is plenty of advice around concerning the perfect length of minutes, but that tends to make people feel more anxious than anything else – and the worst thing you can do while aiming to fall asleep is worry about it.”

If you plan to sleep for longer, avoid the 45-60 minute window that induces that sluggish feeling, that disoriented sensation when you awaken. “Research suggests it is preferable to take a longer nap lasting 60-90 minutes than a medium-length one,” explains the expert. “Three-quarters of an hour is enough time to put you into a deep sleep stage and it is more probable to feel groggy when you wake up – whereas if you take it a bit longer to a full sleep cycle, you will probably to be completing of a sleep cycle and are likely to get up feeling more refreshed. But if you're dozing for 90 minutes, it can influence the quality of your sleep that night.”

Finding the Right Sleep Space

When it comes to exact methodologies, suggestions are diverse. A few professionals suggest using similar routines you’d use to foster a good night’s sleep: a peaceful area, a cozy bed and as much darkness as is feasible. Some advise that it's fine to merely snooze in a chair in whatever light is available – to prevent sleep inertia and to maintain your sleeping quarters as the space your brain links with *real* sleep. “Napping is quite challenging to will,” explains an expert. “Without the urge to sleep, it is more challenging to get comfortable and basically tell yourself to go to sleep. There’s got to be some sleep pressure there to initiate sleep initially. Personally, I can often snooze in full light and wake up naturally alarm-free, but what helps many individuals is to wait for an instance that they’re naturally somewhat sleepy and calmly allow sleep to come.”

Trying different approaches is valuable, and when options are scarce – such as, if you’re trying to grab some shut-eye while traveling or in a work pod – there’s nothing wrong to employ a few tools. “When I’m working with professional sportspeople, I suggest that they not rely on their own bed for naps, since they’re going to have|they will