What is polyphasic sleep?
How is it possible to sleep this way?
What can I do to start a polyphasic sleeping pattern?
Why would people put themselves through that torment!?
Who else is crazy enough to actually try this?

What is polyphasic sleep?

Most adult humans sleep for about eight hours per day, in one block, usually at nighttime. (Think of it as a really long nap.) Some people may take a short nap during the afternoon - this is a form of biphasic sleep, which isn’t technically the same as polyphasic, but many people think they fall under the same category.

Polyphasic sleep is a schedule which, by definition, includes three or more blocks (phases) of sleep - e.g. one 4-hour “nap” and two 90-minute naps.

While any sleeping pattern with three or more phases would be included, “Uberman” and “Everyman” (terms coined by PureDoxyK) are a couple of the more common ones. Uberman refers specifically to six 20-minute naps per day, each one four hours apart - that’s a total of two hours per day, for the mathematically challenged. Throughout this page (and this website) I refer primarily to the Uberman schedule.

How is it possible to sleep this way?

Short Answer: I don’t know. Doctors don’t know. Nobody knows - but it does happen.

Long Answer: There are quite a few theories, ranging from those which suggest elimination of NREM sleep, to those which suggest elimination of REM sleep, to those which suggest a compression of sleep cycles or even dividing up the stages between naps (e.g. Stage 4 in one nap, Stage 3 in another nap…). The most common theory (which I personally am not convinced by) is that the brain learns to skip its normal cycle of NREM sleep and jump straight into REM sleep, supposedly the most crucial stage, at the beginning of each nap.

However, it’s worth noting that virtually no scientific studies have been done on patients who follow an Uberman sleep pattern, so take any and all claims with a grain of salt. 90% of everything I know about polyphasic sleep may be found simply by Googling. The abundance of blogs are the closest we have to hard science on this topic, but they suggest a difficult transition which pays off in the end.

What can I do to start a polyphasic sleeping pattern?

I’m glad you asked! Start by breaking that ugly habit of hitting the snooze button every morning - you’re going to need to jump out of bed at the sound of an alarm clock. Once you’ve accomplished that, take at least a week off of work/school (preferably two weeks or more). Then… prepare to become zombified. Make yourself a to-do list the length of your arm, then have your significant other/boss add an extra 50 things to it. Then double the length again. Seriously, you’re going to need to keep yourself busy at all times (preferably with physical activities), or you’ll have a tough time staying awake. This probably goes without saying, but books (at night, anyway) are out of the question.

Assuming you’re doing the Uberman schedule, figure out a set of six naps, four hours apart, and stick to them like glue. Keep your naps to between 20 and 30 minutes (consensus varies). Don’t oversleep - it’s going to happen anyway, but do everything in your power to avoid it. (I’ve found that rigging an alarm to dump water on my face works well. ) Don’t move naps, and definitely don’t skip a nap. Some people have claimed that following a veg(etari)an diet helps the transition, but I don’t know that any science has proven this. I can say, however, that eating somewhat healthy - e.g. a chicken sandwich instead of a Big Mac - has boosted my energy levels tremendously.

The transition has been reported to last anywhere from three days to two weeks. The way I understand it is that by Day 3-4, you’ll have hit the low point. After that, your alertness will gradually improve until you can function normally sometime between the first and second weeks.

Why would people put themselves through that torment!?

Besides the obvious benefit of having an extra six hours every day, some polynappers have claimed various mental benefits (clarity, creativity, etc.)

Polyphasic sleep could most definitely interfere with having a normal work/social life, so it may not be for everybody. But if you’re like me, with a part-time pick-your-own-hours job and an any-time-of-night social life anyway, you’ve got nothing to lose… except maybe your sanity.

Who else is crazy enough to actually try this?

PureDoxyK, Steve Pavlina, Stu Hogton, Ted Pearlman…

Oh, you mean you were looking for people you’ve heard of? How about Leonardo da Vinci, Buckminster Fuller, or Lord Byron? All are reported to have slept polyphasically in some form.

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