Biphasic Sleep Guide

Today (actually yesterday, it’s 1 AM now), is the day before the day that I will start my journey. I took a nap 20:30 to 22:50, included 20 minutes to fall asleep despite the excitement of changing my life. Unfortunately I didn’t wake before the alarm clock rang, but I suppose that’s normal in the beginning. I did feel a bit drowsy, but my planned biphasic sleep schedule cannot be the cause of it: I haven’t started yet!

I’m going to sleep soon, and my plan is to sleep 1:30 to 7:30. Let’s see how I feel tomorrow.

So, why am I writing this blog?

When I was doing some research on polyphasic/biphasic sleep, I encountered few blogs dedicated to that matter. Most blogs on the subject were on personal development, such as the one by Steve Pavlina and Devin Reams’s polyphasic sleep FAQ. I decided that in writing this blog, I would contribute by another bit of empirical evidince (or refutation?) and original research.

Another reason is a bit more selfish: it will serve as a diary for myself, so that I can look back and see that I am really making progress. I believe that keeping a diary when making a change of this magnitude to your life is a good way to see that you’re heading in the right direction and to show that you’re careful about your life.

It might help to know more about me, since I suppose that daily habits affect the way biphasic sleep affects us.

My name is Tim, and I’m a 16 years old student in the second part of the first year of my studies in the International Baccalaureate. During my free time I play chess three hours a week, and I conduct no physical activites. Also, I’m on a normal diet, although I’m slightly below recommended weight with a BMI of 18.7.

Before today I’ve slept very irregularly. Days prior to school, I used to get to bed at midnight and sleep until 07:10, and I could sleep up to 10 hours on holidays except when I forced myself to stay awake for more than 24 hours, after which I’d crash and sleep a lot. I figured that this isn’t an especially healthy way to go, and so I’m going to try this whole thing about biphasic sleep.

I first read about polyphasic sleep in a comment to a Slashdot-story about medicines that reduce the need for sleep. Since I’ve always been a bit skeptical about taking pills — the big companies have almost no incentive to avoid long-term health-risks — I wasn’t interested at all by the article, but that comment got me going. I kept reading, both on Wikipedia and on several blogs, and the potential advantages seemed to far outweigh the potential health-risks: I would just be able to set my biological clock back if sleep-deprivation would creep up on me, wouldn’t I?