Optimizing Sleep and an Introduction to Pzizz

Published on Tuesday 6th of June, 2006

As part of the Experiment in Making Time, I am looking to optimize my sleep. Now, I do not have trouble sleeping, but I do often find myself a little tired and I'm sure my production, training and recovery suffers because of it.

A good night's rest

Sleep is a hot topic, at least in the places where I hang out:

• From A to Zzzzz
• How to Get Up Right Away When Your Alarm Goes Off
• Calculate your sleep debt

So after doing some reading and research, I'm going to try a few things that I'm hoping will help me to optimize my sleep:

1. Sleeping in a dark quiet room
2. Going to sleep at the same time every day - 11:00pm
3. Waking up at the same time every day - 5:00 am
4. Get up and have a good stretch first thing when the alarm goes off
5. Use napping as a tool to stay fresh and alert

How will this optimize anything?

Well, the theory goes that our bodies like a routine, so going to bed and waking up at the same time, whenever possible, should produce a good routine. In addition, having a dark quiet room (I mean pitch-black-can't-see-the-back-of-my-hands-dark) should help to signal my body to get to sleep; waking straight up in the morning with a good, body waking stretch should send a signal to wake up.

My hope with the experiment is to gain time, so what I would like to do here is set up my body with some base sleeping hours and then top up when needed with a good nap. I'm also hoping that by improving my ability to nap, I will be able to use naps more effectively as a recovery tool when I get into the hard training ahead of me.

Napping

Napping is something that most triathletes do simply because of the amount of physical exertion involved in training; napping also increases the rate of recovery after workouts. Add in the fact that I live in a country where napping is a national pasttime, and I think it's safe to say that I am used to napping.

But even though I'm used to it, I haven't been napping effectively. I would nap when training exhausted me, or the heat of the day and lunch would wipe me out. All this has changed, though, since I met Pzizz... (Thank you Lifehacker)

Using Pzizz to optimize my rest

Pzizz is, well, here's something from the website:

pzizz combines Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP), enchanting music, sound effects and a binaural beat to achieve a wonderfully relaxed state in the listener, similar to that experienced during the Rapid Eye Movement (REM) stage of sleep.

Now, for those of you who are raising your eyebrows, let me put it another way: pzizz makes music that will help you relax as you listen to it. There's a bit more to it, but the clincher for me was this bit from another website:

Your brain cells reset their sodium & potassium ratios when the brain is in Theta state [...] After an extended period in the Beta state [awake] the ratio between potassium and sodium is out of balance. This the main cause of what is known as "mental fatigue". A brief period in Theta (about 5 - 15min) can restore the ratio to normal resulting in mental refreshment.

What that says to me is if you put your brain into theta state, which is what pzizz aims to do, you will be able to recover from feelings of mental fatigue. If you've ever felt tired at around 3:30pm and had a nap, only to wake up super refreshed - that's what we're talking about here.

So, why don't I just nap?

I have some more posts lined up about my experiences with pzizz, but the simple fact is this: the music and voice really do help me to nap, and nap for shorter times.

It took some work, but where I used to write off 40 minutes to an hour of my day to lay down, get to sleep, and get back up and running from a nap, now I can do it in 20 minutes, and wake up feeling fresh. This translates to 2-3 naps where there was once only one.

If you're hot on the idea of pzizz, head on over and try it out. They offer a one hour free trial, which is a bit tight to get a good feel for it, but it can be done. I'll be posting some tips to getting the most from the free trial in the next day or so, so if you can hang on until then, it may be worthwhile.

Tags: life-hacks, making-time, napping, personal-development, productivity, pzizz, sleep

Centripedal is a website about balancing Life and Multisports. More…