Okay so first of all, this is a long thread but please take your time reading this as it took me hours to write and edit; you won't regret it, I promise you.
So I have recently stumbled upon lots of people here who say "Even though I sleep 8-9 hours, I'm still tired." and a lot of others who just generally believe that more sleep = more energy + better well-being.
This is NOT TRUE.
When you go to sleep, your body enters different "stages" of sleep. There are 5 overall stages and together they count as 1 "cycle". During the night, these cycles keep repeating until you wake up. 1 cycle lasts approximately 90 minutes but it varies from person to person. You might think this is nonsense but keep reading, you will benefit greatly.
THE IMPORTANT THING: There are 2 ways in which you can wake up. Full of energy and positivity or completely tired with a bad mood. These 2 are NOT a result of either sleeping more or less; they are a result of you either waking up at the end of a particular cycle, or cancelling a cycle by being interrupted by an external source. Read below.
If you finish a cycle successfully and wake up, you will feel brilliant, full of energy and positivity. If your cycle is interrupted by an external source (you wanting to pee, parents/friends waking you up), you will feel terrible / grumpy and you will feel like you need "more sleep". Also, if in some mornings you wake up full of energy (which means you have just finished a cycle), and then force yourself to sleep more, there's a good chance you won't finish that newly entered cycle since you're just lazing about for 10 minutes and that will result in you waking up feeling tired again. And this is not just about waking up tired; this is about how your energy will be used throughout your entire day.
Side note 1: Sometimes you will find yourself lucky in a way that even though someone wakes you up which is an interruption, you will be at the end of a cycle so you'll feel good. Don't bet on it though, the chances of someone waking you up right at the end of a cycle is pretty low.
THE WHOLE POINT: The whole point is that even though most people need a particular number of cycles which add up to 8 hours (hence they say "You need 8 hours of sleep minimum"), it doesn't mean YOU need the 8 hours. Everyone is different and there are a few famous people who only need a small amount of cycles in order to replenish their energy, therefore they only sleep 2-3 hours daily which is phenomenal (imagine all the time saved). A cycle usually lasts 90 minutes, so just remember, if you wake up at the end of one, that's when you'll feel like a king. Your body might need 5, 6, 7 hours... You never know... If you naturally wake up earlier than most people (without interruptions), that will mean you need less cycles than most people. In that case, there's nothing wrong with you, you can just get up and enjoy a longer day .
Side note 2: Even if you woke up after 1 cycle (90 minutes), you would still feel energetic even though your body definitely needs a lot more cycles in order to engage in important activities such as muscle growth. Waking up & feeling good isn't everything.
SO HOW DO I KNOW WHEN I'M SUPPOSED TO WAKE UP?
This is easy. You need to eliminate all possible external sources which can wake you, including the urge to pee, so just drink water slightly earlier in the day so you urinate before bed. If there are no interruptions, your body will automatically wake you up at the end of your very own cycle; that's when you should get up.
For the next part I'll be using wikipedia to slightly help me out with the numbers, read only if you're REALLY interested :
*** More Scientific Part ***
Types & Percentages of Sleep In Stages:
• Stage 1 & 2: Light sleep; together, these two stages account for 50% of all sleeping time.
• Stage 3 & 4: Deep sleep; together, these two stages account for 25% of all sleeping time.
• Stage 5 (REM stage) – this stage represents the remaining 25% of all sleeping time.
Stage Functions:
Stage 1: Our heart rate and breathing become slower. If something wakes you up during this stage, you can easily believe that you haven’t fallen asleep at all as you are still highly aware of your surroundings.
Stage 2: This stage defines the beginning of true sleep. This is also the stage in which most people loose their awareness. The muscles become relaxed and the body stops moving.
Stage 3: Similar to Stage 4.
Stage 4: This is the deepest stage of sleep. Blood pressure drops; heart and breathing rate are decreased and stabilized.
Stage 5 - Rapid Eye Movement (REM): This is a special stage of sleep during which our brains become extremely active. Blood pressure increases, breathing becomes faster and irregular. The eyes start to dart back and forth. Most of our dreaming occurs in this stage. Because we might hurt ourselves while trying to move in response to the content of our dreams, the brain completely blocks our muscles.
The above 5 steps I copied ages ago from a legit site but can't remember which one, now I just edited them and rewrote them so they're more understandable. Don't be surprised if you recognise them. The rest is purely written by me.
I hope you've enjoyed reading this; just thought I'd share some useful information.
Edit: A source that slightly helped me: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sleep
Edit 2: By the way, interruptions may include vibrations of some kind, scary dreams, erections, people waking you up, wanting to urinate, traffic noise, the "biological clock" etc. I studied and experimented with these things carefully a while back as I was greatly interested in sleep cycles, that is how I know everything.
Edit 3: If a cycle is broken (disturbed) and you go back to sleep, that cycle will NOT continue. A new one will begin.
Questions are welcome!
A sticky would be great. Thank you .
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08-22-2010, 06:53 AM #1
About SLEEP - You will be shocked.
Last edited by Agumon; 08-22-2010 at 02:24 PM.
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08-22-2010, 07:00 AM #2
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08-22-2010, 07:07 AM #3
That's all well and good; but your advice amounted to: Sleep until your body wakes you up, which whilst ideal isn't practical as people have commitments (I.E School, Work, Gym)
I'll attach a picture that shows how you can take advantage of the information you put down to reduce your time spend sleeping - definately worth having a look at.
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08-22-2010, 07:10 AM #4
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08-22-2010, 07:21 AM #5
Thanks bro, let me know what you think after you're done reading .
In a way, yes, that's what my advice amounts to, but the point of the long explanation is to give people more in-depth knowledge so they can do certain things like e.g. go for a nap of 2 hours but by knowing about cycles, they will know the times they can wake up in. Plus, you say it's not "practical", with which I disagree because if you know your cycle period and you need to wake up for school for example, you can just set the alarm to an appropriate time so that your cycles fit in well and so that you have time to get ready. That way you won't be late and you will feel energetic .
Thanks for the picture, I will definitely have a look at it later as I gotta go off now, good stuff!
The reason behind that is because you just wanna urinate. Try and squeeze every drop out before bed ... But to be honest, it could also be because of habit. Try and get your body used to peeing at different hours and see where it gets you; if you just wake up randomly and you don't want to pee, go back to sleep; your body will get used to it and won't wake you up anymore.
About the muscle building, you'd have to ask a more experienced BBer for that, but I would say that you still can.
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08-22-2010, 07:25 AM #6
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08-22-2010, 07:33 AM #7
- Join Date: May 2007
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Cant say i was "shocked" but good read nonetheless. I normally feel pretty good on 6 hours sleep so maybe 4 cycles is all i need.
Also, Agumon for 6'2" you are looking huge at 165lbsIt takes years of hard work to become an overnight success.
Formal education will make you a living, self education will make you a fortune.
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08-22-2010, 07:38 AM #8
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Good read. Would your brain adapt over time to wake up after a certain cycle if you had an alarm set for, say a half hour into the next cycle? What I'm trying to ask is if you have an alarm set for 6:30AM, which is 30minutes into the next sleep cycle, would your brain adapt over time to wake up at 6:00AM instead, right after the ending of the last full cycle? I only ask because I've found that during school I'll wake up 10-15minutes before my alarm after a few weeks.
Is breá liom mo eagla.
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08-22-2010, 07:41 AM #9
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08-22-2010, 07:49 AM #10
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08-22-2010, 07:50 AM #11
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08-22-2010, 08:12 AM #12
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08-22-2010, 08:12 AM #13
Thanks
6 hours, sounds good! And yeah I had to go for an interesting title because otherwise no one would bother .
Thank you but the picture was taken when I was slightly bigger and it's to do with the lighting of it too heh (my friend is into this kind of stuff) .
I see what you're asking, good question. I find that I also do what you do; but I don't think that's because the brain adapts. In my opinion it's to do with the "biological clock" where the body remembers the sleep patterns. I used to wake up before my alarm, I usually felt pretty stressed and I think that counts as an interruption because I subconsciously knew that the alarm was going to ring soon and my body knew the annoying feeling that occurs when it goes off, so I automatically woke up earlier. If you let the biological clock know that you're interrupted at 6:30AM everyday, it will remember that and IMO it will wake you up beforehand. So in a way, I guess you could say that the brain "adapts".
Really depends on whether you wake up energetic or tired. If you wake up at 6:15AM and you feel good, that must mean it's the end of a cycle, therefore just set your alarm to 6:15 or just go to sleep 15 minutes later (the previous day). If you wake up tired before the alarm like I used to, that must be because of nerves and subconscious fear of the alarm clock.
Basically yes, but don't oversleep for school or work. Try and work out your cycle duration and then keep adding and repeating that duration to the time of when you fall asleep. So let's say you go to bed at 11PM and your sleep cycle is 90 minutes. 11 + 90 mins = 12:30 + 90 mins = 2 and so on until you land on an appropriate hour to wake up in. So let's say your school starts at 8 and you need 1 hour to get ready, keep adding until you land on a time closest to 7 o clock (since you need that 1 hour).
... 2 + 90 mins = 3:30 + 90 mins = 5 + 90 mins = 6:30
... And so you would set your alarm to 6:30, because if you added another 90 minutes, you would wake up at 8 o clock and your teacher / boss would whip yo ass for being late . Alternatively, you could go to bed 30 minutes later the day before, so you exactly wake up at 7AM.
robbie_vlad that ^ applies to you too .
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08-22-2010, 08:37 AM #14
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08-22-2010, 09:18 AM #15
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08-22-2010, 09:28 AM #16
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08-22-2010, 09:34 AM #17
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08-22-2010, 09:38 AM #18
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08-22-2010, 09:40 AM #19
- Join Date: Mar 2008
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I was literally just about to post this.
Lately I've been sleeping until my body wakes me up. which is now 10+ hours due not having class. I wake up extremely groggy. Worse then when I get 6 hours, but it's when my body wakes me up.
But during school I get 6 hours of sleep and I'm and ready to go.It's 4:30 in the morning. You think, "why am I up?" The world is asleep. Your not. Get to it bud, because your better than your boss. Your better than your peers. Your better than that kid that owned you in CoD last night.
Shut up and Squat.
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08-22-2010, 09:59 AM #20
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what if i sleep for 10+ hours and when i wake up naturally i'm still tired? My "cycle" sure isn't that long..
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08-22-2010, 10:00 AM #21
This means that during the summer you sleep through more cycles and during school you sleep through less. Since you feel fine with 5 hours of sleep (I hope you meant "fine" throughout the whole day, not just the morning), then that means you only need 5 hours. The extra 5 during the summer are just extra hours since you have no duty; you still wake up fine because of waking up at the end of a cycle.
Then that means that during school your alarm clock wakes you at the end of a cycle and during summer you must get interrupted by something; it doesn't necessarily have to be a noise; it could be your biological clock waking you up on purpose because your body thinks you have to do something in that particular time... Or it could be a vibration of some sort.. A smell... Really depends.
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08-22-2010, 10:02 AM #22
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08-22-2010, 10:16 AM #23
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08-22-2010, 10:17 AM #24
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08-22-2010, 10:20 AM #25
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08-22-2010, 11:02 AM #26
it's true that you can sleep for 6 hours and feel good after, but just because you feel good doesn't mean its good for you. don't take this as an excuse to only get 6 hours every night, 7.5 or 9 is much better
good article though, i started this a while ago and set my iphone for 9 hours every night, i feel so good
also, there's an iphone app that does this for you (graphs your sleep pattern) i think it's alarm clock pro or somethinghttp://forum.bodybuilding.com/showthread.php?t=125350561 meal plans for 3k, 4k calories, no excuses
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08-22-2010, 11:13 AM #27
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08-22-2010, 11:16 AM #28
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08-22-2010, 11:17 AM #29
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08-22-2010, 11:33 AM #30
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