Trying Polyphasic Sleep and Meditation: The Productivity Journal

I'm sure I'm not alone in this but the quarantine has made me learn the harsh difference in being able to work from home and having to. Normally I have offices to go to or at least a coffee shop. The groundhog day we have going on just now has been fucking with my productivity.

It does seem like a good opportunity to test out abnormal sleep schedules though. My girlfriend is in another country and I've no clients with set hours. Worst case I'm a bit grouchy and go through some extra coffee.

Normally I'm a night owl. I'll sleep around 2-4AM and get up around 9AMish. This works for me but something else might work better.

So Here's the Plan:

Rather than sleeping in one chunk throughout the night - I'm going to try the Everyman 2 sleep schedule.


That's a 4 1/2 hour 'core' sleep from 11PM to 4AM and two 20 minute naps at 8AM and 2.30PM.

I had a quick flick through and there's some interesting science behind all this which I'll look more into as we go (if I survive) but I knew someone doing something like this who was a lot more productive than I have ever been.



But there's more than just breaking up my sleep pattern and sleeping less.

I have pretty bad sleeping patterns in general. For over a decade I've fallen asleep with the TV on I'm so used to the background noise but that makes for shit sleep quality so I'm cutting that old cold turkey.

I can also have a bad habit in the mornings. I don't scroll through social media but I tend to check analytics and important projects from bed the moment my eyes open. By itself, not so bad, but having the screen there makes it more likely I then wind up watching Netflix or something. I've taken the laptop and Switch away from my bed and I'm replacing it with just a dim lamp and a Kindle.

Next up when I do wake up at 3.30 I need to actually get out of bed. Going to be using the Headspace app. I have little experience with it already but meditation, in general, is supposed to help with focus and gives me a set goal each morning to start with.

TL;DR: I'm going to try to sleep less, sleep better and start meditating in the mornings.

This journal is to serve as accountability. If I quit and don't update the thread in the next couple of weeks then call me out on it and get anything on my KGR BST for free. Getting up at 3AM is horrible. The concept of working for free is worse so that should keep me motivated.

It also might be interesting for some. I've tried a bunch of productivity hacks but I've never really looked at fucking with my sleep schedule quite this much.

Thanks to @BassTrackerBoats for the inspiration on this one.


Day 0:

Chose a good day to start with. I slept around 2-3, woke up around 7 but stayed in bed with Netflix and the Switch until the back of 12. No productivity all day long.

Currently, a little after 4PM and I'm knackered. I've missed the nap window and this also means I can't have coffee if I'm aiming to be asleep by 11. My productivity chances for today are shot so I'm going to finish the entirely essential stuff then call it quits for the day.

Expecting day 1 to be hell. Genuinely worried about being able to fall asleep by 11PM but the plan is to start my day with meditation at 3.30. Going to finish up work then setup my alarms and the Headspace app.

Wish me luck. Please send coffee.

SEOMadHatter said:

TL;DR: I'm going to try to sleep less, sleep better and start meditating in the mornings.

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Best of success. I could never make naps work. I either fall asleep and then am more tired than before or if I just lay there it helps a tiny bit, not enough to gain more energy for the following hours.

Something different following

Me too doing meditation but need to make it consistent

Day 1 was... interesting.

Upgraded Headspace for the sleep section between that, a little exercise and already being shattered I fell asleep on time easily enough. Woke up naturally at 3.20AM by sheer luck. Easy start no fighting with the alarm I’ll take it.

20 minutes with the Headspace app. I’d forgotten how tough it was to start meditating but I’m fairly sure I have some form of ADHD so I really should stick with it. The ability to improve my focus alone would make this all worth it.

Starting work while it was pitch black outside was... interesting. All the sane people were asleep so there were no distractions. Ticked off my important stuff before 7AM.

Was able to fall into the naps quickly enough. Felt... fairly good after them but the middle of the day was certainly rough. Wasn’t expecting it to be easy right away.

There’s a lot of big names known for polyphasic sleep patterns which was cool to see. The downside was I’m used to 2-3 cups of coffee a day and going cold turkey is rough. I managed to hold out until after the second nap and there are 7 hours before the main sleep core which enough for *most* of the caffeine to go so I had a cup then. If I’m able to sleep early enough still I’ll be doing that again.

The day seemed *very* long but I got a lot done with most of it. I might try extending the main core sleep adding another 90 minutes in the end and pushing the naps back a bit. Might make it easier to focus during the middle section and I can remove it again later on if I’m able to get used to it.

The concept seems interesting to me. Cut down on the diminishing returns of light sleep. Spend less time sleeping and be more productive during the extra waking hours? Good deal.

I tried this was, unintentionally actually, with one 5 hours sleep and one 90 min naps per day. What's interesting even though you sleep less than 8 hours you feel better than if you had selpt 8 hours

It's pretty rough adapting to these sleep schedules, generally adaption only happens after you've built up a bit of sleep deprivation. Seems like you're already doing a lot better than I did when I was trying this though. Took me almost a week to fall asleep during the nap periods.

The naps I don't seem to have had a problem with so far. I'm out pretty quickly.

That said - I've swapped to a biphasic strategy instead for now. Managing multiple naps throughout the day was a pain for people around me one would just be easier and also easier to sustain once I can get back to training properly. The mid-day lull was also killing my productivity for the last two days and this is meant to have an easier adjustment period.

So at the moment, I'm on 11PM-4AM then a 90 minute nap at 1PM. This one is easier to adjust so when the world opens back up if I'm hanging around night owls I can shift that back a few hours easily enough. These times are based on natural rhythms though so I'll be trying to stick to it. The morning and evening is easy enough it's the mid-afternoon where I'm really feeling it at the moment but hopefully, that'll be gone within a few weeks.

This is day... 3? 4? Quarantine is groundhog day. Who knows.

Vivid dreams during the core which is supposed to be a good sign. Woke up twice (nightmares) but quickly back to sleep and then woke up naturally a few minutes before the 4AM alarm. Perfect. It's now a little after 7AM and I've got more finished than I would have got done in a day last week. Part of it might just be trying to give some more structure to the day but part of it is certainly feeling more alert and focused.

Loving meditation. I start within a few minutes of waking up and I do about 20 minutes with the Headspace app. It's been entrepreneurs telling me to try this and I can see why. I've still a long way to go but I think I'm starting to see why it's golden for being productive.

My coffee use is tactical rather than habitual now. Suffering a drop in caffeine in the middle of the day but if I can survive this stage I think it'll be for the better. I have one after the afternoon nap which carries me through to the evening.

The adaption period is pretty hit and miss.

Yesterday was crazy productive. Had all my urgent stuff finished by 7AM, fixed some code in the morning then build a funnel I'd been putting off after the afternoon nap. Even late into the evening I only stopped working because I ran out of to-do list. Most productive I've felt in a good while.

This morning has been a lot rougher. I just about got up but meditation was tough and my eyes are sore from being awake from the extra waking hours. Might try some drops just for the short term while they adapt because working like this is a pain.

SEOMadHatter said:

The adaption period is pretty hit and miss.

I just about got up but meditation was tough and my eyes are sore from being awake from the extra waking hours. Might try some drops just for the short term while they adapt because working like this is a pain.

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Good journey OP I am following.

About your eyes, I suggest you every 1 hour or 2 hours of working on the computer screen you should rest them for a few minutes and look 6-7 meters away and blink your eyes twice. Also, cut two slices of cucumber from the fridge and put them in your eyes for 15 minutes and relax it will help. Protecting your eyes from the computer screen and keeping your posture straight while sitting it's vital.

This is the kinf of thread i love to see here:
Always been interested in productivity and bio hacking,wish you luck man

Nice OP.. keep us updated on whether your performance increases. Particularly interested whether you feel more or less mental clarity throughout the day. GL

Very Interesting journey.
Good luck, man! You'll do it!

Cheers guys. Glad you're interested wasn't sure if this would fit in here. There is some other stuff I'd like to experiment with but I'll give it a while, already changing quite a lot at once just now.

It's tough to measure productivity exactly. I go between content marketing, code and customer service in the same couple of hours so there's nothing concrete but the days where it's feeling good I've had more hours in the day and certainly felt more focused than I was before.

That said I have massively fucked up today. My eyes were hurting so bad I just had to rest them while telling myself I wouldn't fall asleep - and you can guess how that went. Slept for about 30 minutes and apparently that was enough to kill my chances of the proper 90-minute nap. I've just had a coffee instead and I'll try and hold on until 11. I've work to do but I'm not expecting a ton of productivity today. Hopefully, it's not going to completely destroy tomorrow as well but that hour is a big chunk of my sleep.

kiks said:

Good journey OP I am following.

About your eyes, I suggest you every 1 hour or 2 hours of working on the computer screen you should rest them for a few minutes and look 6-7 meters away and blink your eyes twice. Also, cut two slices of cucumber from the fridge and put them in your eyes for 15 minutes and relax it will help. Protecting your eyes from the computer screen and keeping your posture straight while sitting it's vital.

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Normally I'm better with resting my eyes away from the screen. I've been using the Pomodoro pretty strictly the last couple of days so I'm getting regular breaks from looking at it but this is a common side effect of being awake for longer hours. I'd have better luck getting gold bars for my eyes than fresh veg during the quarantine just now but I've got some eye drops which will work for now.

Adding structure to the day. meditation first thing in the morning and a nap in the afternoon is absolutely helping with productivity.

If anyone is going to try adding a nap in the middle of the day I'll tell you it feels far better than a cup of coffee. Just manage the timing properly. A 20-minute nap is good for a few hours, 90 minutes will keep you going well past the evening. If you oversleep somewhere in the middle of that you wake up from slow-wave sleep - that's when you feel worse for taking a nap. Between 1-3 in the afternoon is a perfect time because we're naturally looking for a nap there.

We're not actually genetically wired for a 9-5.

I'm in two minds about cutting the hours of sleep so heavily though. There are potential health risks that aren't fully understood yet and I haven't decided if I want to take that risk. Considering extending the core a bit and doing 11pm-5am then a 20-minute nap in the afternoon. Still productivity benefits without being quite as harsh on the risk of cutting out slow-wave sleep.

6 hours sleep at night seems like a lot compared to the 4.30 I was doing but it's still less time spent in bed and more productive overall.

Having the main core sleep at 11-5 seems like a long time in comparison to the first week but I think it's giving my days the structure and focus without the sleep deprivation. It's easy to fall out of the routine though and move things around by an hour or two which makes it tougher.

Been out of sync for the last 3 days and missed a day of meditation. Resetting today and going back to the strict timetable.

I definitely notice a difference in my ability to focus. I've been working on one of the most boring projects. Never easy to focus on the ones you stop enjoying but that's slowing getting there and I'll be able to work on some of the better projects I have lined up.

very interested to see how this works out. my experience was that I was totally screwed as soon as I missed one of my rest periods.

Wow..this is something different I'm sure it will improve productivity and focous.

hey, would you create a video re upload bot? if so how much would you charge?

Bu Gaosuni said:

very interested to see how this works out. my experience was that I was totally screwed as soon as I missed one of my rest periods.

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It's all about keeping the routine down.

The last two nights I got caught up and shifted to the core sleep by an hour and it threw me off entirely. Skipping the nap internationally today so I make sure I sleep earlier tonight.

Khalil Jamhour said:

hey, would you create a video re upload bot? if so how much would you charge?

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I don't know how you got to this thread for that but probably not sorry. I'd charge a whole lot more than you're going to want to pay.

i coud not find where to send you a message. but thanks! know any site that has that type of software? ( ill delete the comments)