# Sleep and Dreams > Sleep and Health >  >  Definition Of Polyphasic Sleep

## asher

From Wikipedia:

Polyphasic sleep is a term used to describe several alternative sleep patterns intended to reduce sleep time to 25 hours daily. This is achieved by spreading out sleep into short naps of around 1530 minutes throughout the day, and in some variants, a core sleep period of a few hours at night.

The process of adapting to a polyphasic schedule can involve a mentally and physically very difficult one- to two-week transition period, especially for the variant known as Uberman sleep. Thereafter, independent testers claim to experience no apparent drop of cognition or alertness, despite the few hours of sleep attained each day. On the other hand, polyphasic sleep typically requires adhering to a rigid schedule, which makes it unfeasible for many people.

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## pj

Ok... the BIG questions on all our minds...

Do you dream once fully established in polyphasic sleep?  If so, how vivid are your dreams and how good is your recall?

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## ShYne123

Supposabily Lds with this pattern are amazing and you can WILD at all times basicly. Pretty much its really hard to get into the sleep pattern first becuase you are getting barily any REM sleep which is the sleep that rests your brain. After your body get used to it you stop going through other sections of sleep. So basicly all you get is REM sleep. So in all you end up getting about the same ammount of REM sleep as a 8hour sleep cycle. So your brain gets just as much rest. This sleep cycle is good for business people that dont do much physically. I go to the gym every morning so this wouldnt work for me sense your physical body doesnt get much rest at all.

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## asher

> Ok... the BIG questions on all our minds...
> 
> Do you dream once fully established in polyphasic sleep?  If so, how vivid are your dreams and how good is your recall?[/b]



This has varied for me quite a bit. Right now I&#39;m working on increasing the number of times I sleep and decreasing the total hours and my dreams are either missing (completely unmemorable) or somewhat tumultuous. In the past when I get fully into the cycle they can be quite vivid. Can&#39;t speak about LD possibilities as I haven&#39;t tried to deliberately induce them (yet).

I run several times a week and do Yoga. I find that when I am pushing hard to get to the next level I need more sleep, but otherwise running gives me more energy and less desire to sleep. I think that happens to a lot of runners once they settle in.

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## pj

> Supposabily Lds with this pattern are amazing and you can WILD at all times basicly.[/b]







> This has varied for me quite a bit. Right now I&#39;m working on increasing the number of times I sleep and decreasing the total hours and my dreams are either missing (completely unmemorable) or somewhat tumultuous. In the past when I get fully into the cycle they can be quite vivid. Can&#39;t speak about LD possibilities as I haven&#39;t tried to deliberately induce them (yet).[/b]



Thanks to both of you.

Asher... have you started working on dream recall in preparation for learning to LD?

I concur with Asher&#39;s experience with the sleep/exercise thing.  In the winter months when I&#39;m not doing as much physically, I seem to need a lot more sleep.  Once I get my exercise routine re-started the need drops - and there&#39;s the added benefit of sleeping faster and deeper.  (I&#39;m hoping to experience a correlation to my LD frequency and paying attention this time.)

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## asher

> Asher... have you started working on dream recall in preparation for learning to LD?[/b]



Not yet. I&#39;ve begun reading the docs on this website though, will try to get through all of them before I begin any deliberate LD experimentation.

Well, server/site seems to be fine, so I&#39;m off to bed. Thanks guys for getting the new forum off to a good start&#33; Keep the posts coming.

-asher

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## pj

Smooth transition indeed - and cute way to let us early risers know what was going on at 5:00 this morning.  Bravo... sleep lucid&#33;

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## Artelis

Next big question.  What exactly is the sleep patern you&#39;re supposed to follow?  Or how would one go about setting this sort of schedule up?  Another thing that concerned me; just how important is it to rigidly stick to your schedule once it&#39;s set.  Seems like it would make it difficult to make an impromptu plans, eh?

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## Man of Shred

lol there&#39;s  part in Neil Strauss&#39;s "The Game" where he and some guy try this.





> When I felt my teeth to check my braces, I knew I&#39;d passed over the edge of reason. I hadn&#39;t worn braces since junior high.
> 
>  "I&#39;m going to sleep," Herbal finally said.
>  "We can&#39;t," I Told him. "If you go to sleep, I won&#39;t make it by myself."
>  "Watch out for the toothpicks," He said.
>  We both started cracking up. He&#39;d just had a micro sleep. Dreams and reality were blurring.[/b]

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## asher

> Next big question.  What exactly is the sleep patern you&#39;re supposed to follow?  Or how would one go about setting this sort of schedule up?  Another thing that concerned me; just how important is it to rigidly stick to your schedule once it&#39;s set.  Seems like it would make it difficult to make an impromptu plans, eh?[/b]



Definitely some of the big issues. Things like the the Uberman sleep schedule are pretty rigid, and you have to sleep for 20 minutes every 4 hours, all day, every day (you can take one longer sleep once per day). I tried that for a while. Was very hard to maintain, in part because of what you mentioned, it makes it hard to have flexibility with your day. Plus, you are programming yourself to get *very* sleepy every 4 hours, which can make things difficult if you have to delay a sleep session.

Right now I&#39;m not doing much of a rigid schedule, kind of an improvised sleep schedule LOL. But I am trying to follow the general idea of more naps, and a much shorter night&#39;s sleep. Seems to be working well so far, although hearing the alarm go off at 2 am is never a happy moment  ::?:

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## Artelis

I&#39;m thinking about trying this, but I&#39;m one of those guys who really likes his sleep.  It might prove difficult.  So you just take naps when you get the time throughout the day, then go to bed at, say, midnight and get up at 2am?

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## asher

> I&#39;m thinking about trying this, but I&#39;m one of those guys who really likes his sleep.  It might prove difficult.  So you just take naps when you get the time throughout the day, then go to bed at, say, midnight and get up at 2am?[/b]



Pretty much. I *really* like my sleep too, but I must say when I&#39;m only getting a few hours a day I like what I&#39;m getting even more   ::rolllaugh::  

It&#39;d be nice to just nap whenever I what, but that&#39;s not completely possible because of my schedule. Basically I have a few times a day when I know that I can fit in a nap if needed. And right now I am taking a couple longer sleeps from about midnight to 2 am and at 5am.

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## White Shirou

I am not bound by kids, jobs, school, or a husband; ah, the life of a home schooled teen. Could you just turn to your cat for a sleep pattern and take cat naps with them? Though, I think cats sleep more than even the Uberman sleep schedule suggests. 

I have to be pretty tired to take a nap though, or I&#39;ll just lie on the bed/couch staring at the ceiling. 

Anyway, interesting stuff...

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## ShYne123

Hmm, im the opposit, now that i go to the gym every morning i need more sleep. 
I dont mind this thought i love sleep too.

Also, asher, if your a runner or do alot of pysical activity i dont think this could be good for you, the whole point in this sleep pattern is so your mind learns that when it sleep it imediatily goes through the REM cycle, (the part that freshens the brain) And skips the whole body resting part. This way, in 3hours of sleep you get the same ammount of REM as 8 hours.

Ramma: --Awsome book, i read it in...5days? Lol and i NEVER read.

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## l3xicon

Good day to you all,

Before you take on such a lifestyle choice as Polyphasic Sleep, because it is a lifestyle choice, there are many things you need to ask yourself.  It may sound like a cool idea, but the ramification of such an act will soon become clear.
Ask yourself:

1.	Is this right for me? This can be useful to many people, such as people that work from home or have flexible working times or schooling hours. 

2.	Do you have family, social, school or work ties that could make this hard or are such things coming up in the future? If you get into such a sleeping hold the change back to Monophasic or Biphasic sleep (normal sleep to you and me) would be a hard, obviously just as hard as getting into Polyphasic Sleep.

3.	Are you a highly active person? If you work out a lot or are very active youre probably not going to be able to adjust to it.

There are many up sides to this method of sleep but many down sides too. If we look at someone like Ellen McArthur, who currently holds the record for solo sailing around the world, she has stated that she got around 20-30mins sleep about every 4 hours, so Polyphasic Sleep has worked wonders for her.  Socially this cant work, the ties of the modern world are too great and we sleep at the same time so we can work together so we can move on as a society. Research has shown that people who have formed a Polyphasic sleeping habit have, in later years, converted back because of such social ties, it may seem like a good idea now but something may change in the future. 

 With Polyphasic sleep if you miss a nap or a couple you can become very drowsy often at times having no control over when you just might drop off, the results from this can be very concerning.

As Lucid Dreaming concerned, is actually quite good, you enter REM as soon as you fall to sleep which makes WILD s very easy to accomplish and dreams are very clear a coherent, um maybe not coherent because many dreams arent   ::wink::  ,

Im not trying to stop you from doing this, Im just putting this out there. I for one have tried Polyphasic Sleep and it just didnt work for me. I sleep in a Biphasic Sleep pattern, which lets you have one 1 hour nap during the day and at night I sleep for like 5-6hours, this pattern of sleep fits with the body temperature which basically controls your bodys body clock which controls when we need to sleep, its how many scientist believe is the most natural way to sleep.

Sweet Dream,

Honyagenga

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## Man of Shred

> Ramma: --Awsome book, i read it in...5days? Lol and i NEVER read.[/b]




 read it in two days&#33;

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## Vex Kitten

I&#39;ve spent many nights chatting with Placebo about polyphasic sleep. He&#39;s like a walking talking encyclopedia on the subject. 

I was going to try it about a year ago and to prepare I first wanted to hack down my sleeping hours and find the minimal amt of hours I could sleep and still wake up feeling rested. Turns out that was 5 hours. I was going to cut that down to four and then eventually switch over to poly phasic, napping every few hours to get my total four hours sleep during a 24 hour period. And while this probably wasn&#39;t the route to go in preparation for  polyphasic I&#39;m glad I did it because I&#39;m still sleeping the 5 hours a night and my dream recall is consistent. 

I still will attempt polyphasic one of these days, probably when I finallly start working out of my home. That way I have no bosses to answer to when I&#39;m taking a nap at 2 in the afternoon.   ::content::

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## Namaste

If I sleep during the day it makes me feel ill  :Sad: 

Namaste

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## Drk Pwnr

So basically, polyphasic sleep is probably the best for lucid dreaming, but only recommended if it doesn&#39;t harm one&#39;s schedule.

I would love to have this sleep pattern, but my current lifestyle doesn&#39;t comply. Maybe I&#39;ll convert to biphasic then ^_^

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## Lucid Warrior

How exactly does one convert to Biphasic?
Polyphasic wouldn&#39;t be feasible for me, as I have school to worry about, but I&#39;d be able to fit a one hour nap in every day sometime.

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## l3xicon

The problem with the nap part of Biphasic, is that you need to have it whem you start to feel sleepy during the day and this can happen any time, manly just after noon, obviously this depends on what time you get up.

If thats not a problem then its easy to adapt to.

Ill take you though what i do.

Wake up at 7am

Nap anytime around 12am-2pm (for 1 hour)

Go to bad anytime around 1am-2am (sleep for 5-6hours)

you have to be very strict with yourself with the time you get up in the morning, this is the most important part of maintaining this sleep pattern. Also the amount of time you sleep at night varies from person to person, so this may be good for me, but not so good for you, play with it and see what is good for you.

suprisingly after doing this, after having a monophasic sleeping pattern, my energy level what right up.

Almost forgot, drink lots of water, like 2-3 litres a day, this helps you maintain a good body temperature which helps your body clock work more efficiently and helps you determine when you need to sleep. Research has found that some people suffering from insomnia are just not drinking enough water.

hope this helps

sweet dreams.

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## asher

> The problem with the nap part of Biphasic, is that you need to have it whem you start to feel sleepy during the day and this can happen any time, manly just after noon, obviously this depends on what time you get up.
> 
> If thats not a problem then its easy to adapt to.
> 
> Ill take you though what i do.
> 
> Wake up at 7am
> 
> Nap anytime around 12am-2pm (for 1 hour)
> ...



Good comments. I did the one-nap-per day thing for years. After lunch does usually work best for that, though I find if I eat too much I end up groggy after waking up. I picked up the noon nap habit up in south america. In lots of cultures these siestas are a big part of life, and the reason you see restaurants which don&#39;t even open for dinner until 9pm.

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## NewAge541

I wish I could remember or find the name of this person. But, he was able to sleep 1.5 hours a day, by taking 15 minute naps at certain intervals. Someone tried mimicking him, but was only able to get about 2.5 hours a day.

I don&#39;t suppose you would happen to know the name... From what I heard, he was pretty famous, but kinda old..I Think he was a painter or something... I can&#39;t remember.

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## asher

> I wish I could remember or find the name of this person. But, he was able to sleep 1.5 hours a day, by taking 15 minute naps at certain intervals. Someone tried mimicking him, but was only able to get about 2.5 hours a day.
> 
> I don&#39;t suppose you would happen to know the name... From what I heard, he was pretty famous, but kinda old..I Think he was a painter or something... I can&#39;t remember.[/b]



You&#39;re probably thinking of the most famous painter of all: Leonardo Da Vinci. He supposedly slept in no more than 15 minute intervals. Don&#39;t know whether that&#39;s really true or not, but it would explain how he was able to be more productive than anyone else in a 500 year time span except for Shakespeare and a couple mathematicians.

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## NewAge541

Thats right, I think it was him.

Anyway, just imagine what we could get done if we could go on 1.5 - 2 hours of sleep a night... there would be so much more time in the day to do things... lives would be so much more productive.. I might give this a go for a month or 2 and see if I can do it.

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## asher

> Thats right, I think it was him.
> 
> Anyway, just imagine what we could get done if we could go on 1.5 - 2 hours of sleep a night... there would be so much more time in the day to do things... lives would be so much more productive.. I might give this a go for a month or 2 and see if I can do it.[/b]



If you are going to try it keep a journal thread here in the "Alternative sleep patterns" forum? That way we can see what you are trying and how well it works (or doesn&#39;t).

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## FluBB

this all reminds me of that seinfeild episode where kramer trys this and then he ends up staying up all night and crashing randomly... is this possible?

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## asher

> this all reminds me of that seinfeild episode where kramer trys this and then he ends up staying up all night and crashing randomly... is this possible?[/b]



Haven&#39;t seen that one. Vid link?

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## Placebo

Sorry for the late arrival - didn&#39;t realize this was made. And I haven&#39;t had much time, what with burglars and deaths.
Anyway..

That Seinfeld episode was quiet amusing.
Unfortunately it&#39;s not a small snippet, the mini-plot is sustained through most of the episode.

As I recall, Kramer walks in all excited about &#39;Da Vinci Sleep&#39; and decided to try it.
As the episode progresses, he becomes steadily narcoleptic - falling asleep at crazy times and looking like a complete zombie.

Let&#39;s just say that there&#39;s a little truth to it - but only if you go &#39;cold turkey&#39; on something extremely radical like uberman (6x20 minutes a day)

Someone asked about dreams and the ability to lucid dream when polyphasic.
In my case, the answer is both good and bad.
Once adapted, I can lucid dream many of my naps, by WILDing. It seems like 80% of them, but probably a bit less.
The bad news is that I could never get a WILD to be as vivid and engrossing as a dream induced LD.

[EDIT]
After going through this thread carefully, I picked up some other stuff:

(1) Polyphasic sleep *might* be bad for kids. They&#39;re still growing, etc, and polyphasic sleep most likely buggers around with growth hormones.

(2) Many of you make the statement that your naps become almost entirely REM, and that they always start with REM. This isn&#39;t the case at all, according to research done by.. Claudio Stampi I think it was.
He discovered that on average, you end up having the same percentage of all the sleep stages as you do for monophasic sleep.
What happens is that your naps start alternating between different modes - delta sleep, REM, etc.
And this seems to accurately describe what happens to me. In one nap, I&#39;ll pass out, and in another I&#39;ll be dreaming lucidly.

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## Klace

This is very interesting...
It seems like it would take a while to accomplish, but it also seems that it helps with WILD immensely, though that&#39;s not a good enough reason to rearrange my lifestyle. I&#39;m gonna do some more research on this, It seems like something I could see myself doing in the future, Maybe I&#39;ll convert to Polyphasic sleep for my Summer break, which is four months, plently of time to convert back, if that&#39;s even possible.

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## hnasc

> polyphasic sleep typically requires adhering to a rigid schedule, which makes it unfeasible for many people.



Whew, that poyphasic sleep thing feels like work to me.  Also, I've never been able to nap at all during the day so I'm not sure how I'd ever manage those 15 minute naps.

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## Kal8

I knew a prof who was a sleep specialist. 8 hours a night is the best way to sleep. He said that short naps though out the day will not provide the person with enough rest.

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## Pirate

i think i'm gonna try polyphasic sleep! im gonna write this down on my to do list hanging on my door!
(wich at this moment does not exist)

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## Placebo

> I knew a prof who was a sleep specialist. 8 hours a night is the best way to sleep. He said that short naps though out the day will not provide the person with enough rest.



That's like saying that it's not possible (because long-term lack of sleep would ensure failure eventually)
Then why is it that there are people that have done it for 2 years, and people who do it for a living (solo yacht racers for example)
And they don't suffer any noticeable side effects, other than the social inconveniences.

With all due respect, when scientists tell me that I can't do something, when I've DONE it already, then I give them that look. You know that look.

All that aside, even without a nap-oriented sleep schedule, 8 hours is NOT the best schedule according to myriads of OTHER experts.
Apparently that title falls to biphasic sleep - having a midday snooze / siesta.
This helps curb the natural 'mid-afternoon slump' that most of us get.

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## Pirate

... but what is the sleep schedule to convert to this type of sleep? i dot know how. will it be different if im the type that sleeps all night and that's it?

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## Placebo

Either cold turkey, with a *lot* of determination, or ease into it.
Some try splitting up your sleep more and more and moving them apart and cutting them shorter until you're where you want.
Some try Dr Stampi's method for the artist in his book, which I don't have on hand right now. He also allowed long naps that got shorter over time.

If you really are interested, then I suggest starting your own thread to discuss it, and perhaps sign up on the polyphasic google mailing group and ask there as well - they're pretty helpful.

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## AmazeO XD

does it automatically turn anything that has the world sleep in it red?

sleep
sleep
sleepwalking
sleeping
sleeperdoodledumb

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## skiplasvegas

I am 9 days in to applying the Uberman polyphasic sleep schedule and I am blogging everyday - let's see how it goes!

View my blog at:  

thanks!

Skipo

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## WeiQiangsheng

I have officially been a polyphasic sleeper for 3 days now.  I am using the Dymaxion Sleeping Schedule which was founded by the famous inventor Buckminster Fuller.  I sleep two hours every 24 hour period.  I take a 30 min nap at 6:30 and 12:30 am and pm.  You can see my day-to-day progress adapting to the Dymaxion Sleep Schedule at http://sleeplesslivemore.blogspot.com/.  Don't hesitate to send me your questions, comments, and thoughts.

you can also email me at [email protected]

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