Polyphasic Sleep Experiment: Goals
As I dig further into the very odd world of polyphasic sleep, it occurs to me that I never made it clear what I, personally, was trying to accomplish by performing this bit of life hacking.
In my prologue post, I implied briefly that I feel slightly trapped with my life situation and wanted to be able to devote more time to personal projects. That obviously is one of the goals. But there are a few other conditions that I wanted to make sure to include:
Do it without minimal impact to the rest of my life. I’m not heavily changing the quality of my diet. I’m not changing what many of my activities are. I’m not really increasing my activity levels (though I may pick up playing DDR again…). Some polynappers have suggested that these things should be done to help contribute to the success of a polyphasic sleep experiment, and they very well may be correct in that claim. In fact, they’re not bad things to do for health in general. But I’m skeptical that they actually do anything directly to affect my success in the experiment. For now, I’d like to give a go with minimal other changes to my lifestyle, to see what it does to and for me. If it seems that I will need to modify other aspects of my life to succeed, then I will investigate that further. For now, though, let’s keep most of my life constant.
No real rigid schedules or rules. Casually and curiously was how I wanted to run it. I may take an extra nap or two. I have and will float the timing of the naps to accommodate the rest of my life. The idea being that I can demonstrate that one employed in a standard desk job can adopt a polyphasic sleep schedule as well, without necessarily having complete control over one’s schedule.
No matter what happens, I’ve always got a net gain. As long as I’m doing this, I want to make sure that I’m getting something out of it. I don’t want to continue if it looks like the health or sanity costs will outweigh the extra time / personal insights. This is probably the one most likely to give me trouble, as I’ve been known to occasionally stubbornly hold on to a personal project well after most say I should have dumped it.
I may think of more things that I want to get out of this, and I’ll update this list as time goes on.
-sean
In my prologue post, I implied briefly that I feel slightly trapped with my life situation and wanted to be able to devote more time to personal projects. That obviously is one of the goals. But there are a few other conditions that I wanted to make sure to include:
Do it without minimal impact to the rest of my life. I’m not heavily changing the quality of my diet. I’m not changing what many of my activities are. I’m not really increasing my activity levels (though I may pick up playing DDR again…). Some polynappers have suggested that these things should be done to help contribute to the success of a polyphasic sleep experiment, and they very well may be correct in that claim. In fact, they’re not bad things to do for health in general. But I’m skeptical that they actually do anything directly to affect my success in the experiment. For now, I’d like to give a go with minimal other changes to my lifestyle, to see what it does to and for me. If it seems that I will need to modify other aspects of my life to succeed, then I will investigate that further. For now, though, let’s keep most of my life constant.
No real rigid schedules or rules. Casually and curiously was how I wanted to run it. I may take an extra nap or two. I have and will float the timing of the naps to accommodate the rest of my life. The idea being that I can demonstrate that one employed in a standard desk job can adopt a polyphasic sleep schedule as well, without necessarily having complete control over one’s schedule.
No matter what happens, I’ve always got a net gain. As long as I’m doing this, I want to make sure that I’m getting something out of it. I don’t want to continue if it looks like the health or sanity costs will outweigh the extra time / personal insights. This is probably the one most likely to give me trouble, as I’ve been known to occasionally stubbornly hold on to a personal project well after most say I should have dumped it.
I may think of more things that I want to get out of this, and I’ll update this list as time goes on.
-sean
posted by Sean @ 11/18/2005 05:10:00 AM
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