I used to sleep the normal 7.5 hours a day. Over the last 180 days I have slept an average of 5 hours 57 minutes per day.
So, after 2 years of experimentation and occasional deep dives into the scientific literature, here are my theses on sleep:
Conversation
wow this is fascinating. i'm not all the way through yet but do you know about anecdotes where advanced meditators need less sleep? iirc i've heard meditation can get you down to 4 hours a night which tracks with the numbers here!
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re: sleepiness indicating the boringness of the environment, ime it goes deeper than that. sleepiness can become a psychological defense against many uncomfortable emotions and "boredom" is often hiding one or more of these
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i've heard it called "emotional narcolepsy" and i think some people really do have it bad enough that they will literally fall asleep if they try to feel certain feelings
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this happened to me regularly while working on my book (which was emotionally challenging to write), I would wake up bright and fresh in the morning, shower, have a coffee, sit down to start work and then be beset with narcolepsy
I’m also coming around to “…maybe that’s good?”
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because I would go ahead and take those naps too and I think I went through quite a bit of internal psychological/emotional remodeling during those naps
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yeah one of my old housemates said something similar - specifically if they needed to work on mathematical research their need for sleep dramatically increased so they just took naps until they felt ready enough to work
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i have definitely experienced and seen in other people that sleep is a really crucial part of reconsolidation after having a big emotional experience etc., not that i can claim to understand the details. would know more
I sometimes work w/ adolescents who are very moody or emotionally dysregulated. The ones who internalize their stress more than they lash out often get stressed and just sleep. It’s too overwhelming to manage otherwise, until they develop better coping skills.
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I used to do it too when I was younger, so I can relate. If ppl can nap then move on that’s great. Many get caught in less healthy ways of managing those emotions once they’re free or old enough to.
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