02-01-2014, 05:56 AM
Coincidentally I listened to a talk about some new research about our circadian rhythms and came away with a few points that might be interesting to think about.
- Our circadian rhythm or internal clock isn't dictated by the 24 hour earth cycle alone. It is usually either somewhat faster or somewhat slower than this, which leads to two things:
-If your clock is slower you tend towards being an Owl (up late to bed late)
-If your clock is faster you tend towards being a 'Lark' (up early, to bed early)
-We aren't all necessarily one or the other but can be in between.
-The clock isn't a one time set and forget thing. It actually does shift somewhat depending on our age. From infancy to adolescence the clock tends to be that of a Lark. In teenagers, the shift towards being an Owl happens (this is why it's so hard to get them out of bed for school). By early 20s it is starting to shift back towards Lark. Then older people up to seniors the clock tends to shift more towards being a Lark again.
-What your clock is naturally set at is hereditory to some degree. If there is a tendency for Larkness in your family, you are more likely to be one.
The research showed that people are more productive when they are allowed to go about their daily business that aligns with their circadian rhythm rather than fight it. So having a one size fits all time schedule is incredibly unproductive for large numbers of people (hello business world, schools basically everything that is on a standard clock!) The idea of a traditional 9-5 work day is actually a very outdated concept that doesn't work very well. The research also showed that working with your natural rhythms may not make you smarter but it does help with things like emotional resilience and depression, engagement and things like that which definitely affect your wellbeing.
So what I learned was, whatever your current natural Owl or Larkness is, you should try if possible to work with it, rather than against it.
So that's the clock. With respect to the number of hours of sleep to get. Yes we all need different amounts. There is something like an urban myth going around that "genius never sleeps". Tesla slept 4 hours only, DaVinci was awake 22 hours of the day and slept in small chuncks at a time. etc It is mostly impossible to reliably confirm that these stated things are true. Do YOU keep a sleep log and tell people regularly how many hours you sleep? Even if there was truth to them, Correlation does not imply causation. In other words, just because Tesla may have slept 4 hours a night, does not mean you will become a genius if you also sleep 4 hours a night. It may also not be the reason he was a genius. Maybe he would have been twice the brain if he got 8? Unfortunately most of us are not and will never be Tesla or a genius of any kind and 4 hours of sleep is rarely going to be enough for most individuals.
The idea of polyphasic vs monophasic sleep cycles is also what you guys are talking about a bit. As babies we are polyphasic, ie sleep in shorter blocks throughout the day. Many animals are polyphasic. We shift towards monophasic, or a single block of sleep after our initial development. And actually, there is a lot to show that monophasic is much much better for us. Polyphasic tends to be very disruptive, even more so than shift work or jet lag. In modern society it is practically impossible to implement well, so Lyraina the idea of sleeping less than you need, and doing power naps is actually a poor attempt at Polyphasic sleep, and while I agree that a good 20 minute nap can be rejuvenating, the rest of your sleep would be so bad that you aren't doing yourself any favours in general.
Read this if you want a lot of intersting stuff to do with that
http://www.supermemo.com/articles/polyphasic.htm
@Doolio, IMO sounds like you really need to sort out your sleep patterns. While you say you are getting the correct number of hours...it's more than just hitting a number. It's the quality and the regularity. A huge amount of disruption happens when there is no regularity to your sleep cycles, so I can only assume but am pretty sure it is really affecting your productivity. You may not actually realise it. When I was doing a stupid 5-6 hours sleep a day only, I thought I was coping....I only realised after fixing the balance how much of a zombie I had been. There are a lot of things you can do to get a more healthy natural cycle up and running again, but they do require a small modicum of discipline to try. I can help you with some of those if you want :)
Basically guys a few rules.
1. Know and work to your natural rhythm whenever possible.
2. Get the amount of sleep you require...never less
3. Monophasic beats Polyphasic.
:)
Oh and @Meat: That schedule does look pretty intense. Everyone is different, but it looks similar to what I tried to do when I had nothing but time for 3 months, and for me it was workable but much less productive than it could have been. I only realised this towards the end of the 3 months. Also to keep your day off, half filled with chores....dunno...to me that sounds like a sucky day off :D You could try using chores as a way to actually break up your work day. Going away and working in the garden for an hour is a fantastic way to take a break from the screen! Just keep tweaking it, tweaking it to work...and keep us updated!
With regards to the comic....half of my weekly schedule was supposedly to be put onto a short comic that I was supposed to finish in 3 months. So every day between 1-5pm or whatever, it was comic time. Did I do that...nope. Should I have..yeah probably, but the rest of my schedule screwed it because I was constantly overrunning or running behind. Totally agree with Tyrus on that part....don't be so beholden to the schedule that it becomes a negative factor.
What's funny is that it was only after the 3 months, when I started work again, that I just needed a break from the incessant boring study and even imagination illustration thing, and I banged out the synopsis story and 3/4 of a script in about one week. The key thing was that it was consistent time...not sporadic one day a week. I think that is the key to something as long term as a comic...get excited and then ride the wave. Scheduling in one day a week to work on it just didn't jive with the way I work personally.
- Our circadian rhythm or internal clock isn't dictated by the 24 hour earth cycle alone. It is usually either somewhat faster or somewhat slower than this, which leads to two things:
-If your clock is slower you tend towards being an Owl (up late to bed late)
-If your clock is faster you tend towards being a 'Lark' (up early, to bed early)
-We aren't all necessarily one or the other but can be in between.
-The clock isn't a one time set and forget thing. It actually does shift somewhat depending on our age. From infancy to adolescence the clock tends to be that of a Lark. In teenagers, the shift towards being an Owl happens (this is why it's so hard to get them out of bed for school). By early 20s it is starting to shift back towards Lark. Then older people up to seniors the clock tends to shift more towards being a Lark again.
-What your clock is naturally set at is hereditory to some degree. If there is a tendency for Larkness in your family, you are more likely to be one.
The research showed that people are more productive when they are allowed to go about their daily business that aligns with their circadian rhythm rather than fight it. So having a one size fits all time schedule is incredibly unproductive for large numbers of people (hello business world, schools basically everything that is on a standard clock!) The idea of a traditional 9-5 work day is actually a very outdated concept that doesn't work very well. The research also showed that working with your natural rhythms may not make you smarter but it does help with things like emotional resilience and depression, engagement and things like that which definitely affect your wellbeing.
So what I learned was, whatever your current natural Owl or Larkness is, you should try if possible to work with it, rather than against it.
So that's the clock. With respect to the number of hours of sleep to get. Yes we all need different amounts. There is something like an urban myth going around that "genius never sleeps". Tesla slept 4 hours only, DaVinci was awake 22 hours of the day and slept in small chuncks at a time. etc It is mostly impossible to reliably confirm that these stated things are true. Do YOU keep a sleep log and tell people regularly how many hours you sleep? Even if there was truth to them, Correlation does not imply causation. In other words, just because Tesla may have slept 4 hours a night, does not mean you will become a genius if you also sleep 4 hours a night. It may also not be the reason he was a genius. Maybe he would have been twice the brain if he got 8? Unfortunately most of us are not and will never be Tesla or a genius of any kind and 4 hours of sleep is rarely going to be enough for most individuals.
The idea of polyphasic vs monophasic sleep cycles is also what you guys are talking about a bit. As babies we are polyphasic, ie sleep in shorter blocks throughout the day. Many animals are polyphasic. We shift towards monophasic, or a single block of sleep after our initial development. And actually, there is a lot to show that monophasic is much much better for us. Polyphasic tends to be very disruptive, even more so than shift work or jet lag. In modern society it is practically impossible to implement well, so Lyraina the idea of sleeping less than you need, and doing power naps is actually a poor attempt at Polyphasic sleep, and while I agree that a good 20 minute nap can be rejuvenating, the rest of your sleep would be so bad that you aren't doing yourself any favours in general.
Read this if you want a lot of intersting stuff to do with that
http://www.supermemo.com/articles/polyphasic.htm
@Doolio, IMO sounds like you really need to sort out your sleep patterns. While you say you are getting the correct number of hours...it's more than just hitting a number. It's the quality and the regularity. A huge amount of disruption happens when there is no regularity to your sleep cycles, so I can only assume but am pretty sure it is really affecting your productivity. You may not actually realise it. When I was doing a stupid 5-6 hours sleep a day only, I thought I was coping....I only realised after fixing the balance how much of a zombie I had been. There are a lot of things you can do to get a more healthy natural cycle up and running again, but they do require a small modicum of discipline to try. I can help you with some of those if you want :)
Basically guys a few rules.
1. Know and work to your natural rhythm whenever possible.
2. Get the amount of sleep you require...never less
3. Monophasic beats Polyphasic.
:)
Oh and @Meat: That schedule does look pretty intense. Everyone is different, but it looks similar to what I tried to do when I had nothing but time for 3 months, and for me it was workable but much less productive than it could have been. I only realised this towards the end of the 3 months. Also to keep your day off, half filled with chores....dunno...to me that sounds like a sucky day off :D You could try using chores as a way to actually break up your work day. Going away and working in the garden for an hour is a fantastic way to take a break from the screen! Just keep tweaking it, tweaking it to work...and keep us updated!
With regards to the comic....half of my weekly schedule was supposedly to be put onto a short comic that I was supposed to finish in 3 months. So every day between 1-5pm or whatever, it was comic time. Did I do that...nope. Should I have..yeah probably, but the rest of my schedule screwed it because I was constantly overrunning or running behind. Totally agree with Tyrus on that part....don't be so beholden to the schedule that it becomes a negative factor.
What's funny is that it was only after the 3 months, when I started work again, that I just needed a break from the incessant boring study and even imagination illustration thing, and I banged out the synopsis story and 3/4 of a script in about one week. The key thing was that it was consistent time...not sporadic one day a week. I think that is the key to something as long term as a comic...get excited and then ride the wave. Scheduling in one day a week to work on it just didn't jive with the way I work personally.