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Listen to enough productivity gurus, and you'll be tempting to believe that a nap is a superpower: more than a band-aid following a bad night’s sleep, but a shortcut towards a better memory, improved mood and maybe quicker running times. Premier League athletes are all at it – and so are concert pianists, UFC champions and high-profile executives. But if you don't have a room for napping or employment that allows regular snoozing, can there *honestly* sufficient advantages to a quick nap for it to be worth the hassle? Is there a dependable method to fall asleep fast? Plus, is it possible to honestly promise you’ll wake up feeling refreshed, not worse?

Exploring Your Reasons for Napping

“We can identify three main reasons for napping for many people,” says a leading circadian rhythm professor. “One is known as recovery napping, which is what happens when you’ve had poor sleep the previous night. Another is preparatory napping, where you are pre-empting insufficient sleep in the future, for instance during on night shifts. The third reason is “hedonic napping”, which essentially is about desire: there is an opportunity to sleep in the afternoon, and it's pleasant to indulge.”

The initial step to do, then, is consider your reason for napping. “Daytime sleep can be genuinely useful when night sleeping gets interrupted due to causes outside your control – for instance, for a parent of a newborn, or if you are healing after being ill or intense exercise,” says a sleep expert. “Yet when you’re napping since your sleep at night seems unreliable or unreliable, that is frequently an indicator your body's sleep pressure is not as strong as it should be. In those cases, daytime sleep can turn into a contributing factor, not the solution. Utilize daytime sleep for brief periods for short-term problems – the focus ought to remain a strong and predictable sleep at night.”

The Perfect Snooze Time

This means that napping shouldn’t be sufficiently lengthy to interfere with your overnight rest, and preferably are not recommended in the late afternoon (contingent on the time you sleep at night). What duration is wise? Recommendations vary. Among the most referenced research on the subject, experts noted that space travelers showed a boost of up to 54% in vigilance and a 34% boost in cognitive performance post a 26-minute snooze (to be precise, this counted a six-minute long falling asleep phase). “I recommend setting a timer for 20-30 minutes – many individuals are asleep quickly,” says a specialist. “There’s a lot of guidance out there about the perfect length of minutes, but that tends to lead individuals to become more anxious than anything – and the most counterproductive thing you can do while aiming to get to sleep is to be anxious.”

Should you decide to sleep for longer, steer clear of the 45 to 60 minute range that induces that sluggish feeling, that spaced-out feeling when you awaken. “The science would say it is preferable to have a longer nap lasting 60-90 minutes than a medium-length one,” says the expert. “45 minutes is sufficient to plunge you into a deep sleep stage and you’re more likely to feel disoriented when you get up – while if you take it a bit longer to 60 or 90 minutes, it's likely you'll to finish of a sleep cycle and are likely to get up feeling more refreshed. But if you’re sleeping for an hour and a half, it can influence how you sleep later that night.”

Establishing an Ideal Nap Environment

When it comes to specific techniques, recommendations vary. Certain specialists suggest adopting similar routines you’d use to foster restful sleep: a quiet room, a supportive surface and minimal light as you can manage. Some advise that one could merely snooze on a couch in whatever light is present – both to discourage post-nap grogginess and to preserve your sleeping quarters as the space you associate with nighttime rest. “Sleep is notoriously difficult to command,” explains an expert. “If you don’t have any drowsiness, it becomes harder to get comfortable and essentially command yourself to go to sleep. There must be a natural inclination available to bring the sleep on in the first place. For me, it's possible to snooze in broad daylight and wake up naturally without an alarm, but what helps a lot of people is to anticipate an instance that they’re naturally somewhat sleepy and then simply relax into it.”

Experimentation is key, and if your choices are limited – such as, if you’re trying to squeeze in some shut-eye on a train or in a soundproof office pod – it is perfectly fine to employ sleep aids. “Coaching elite athletes, I advise that they avoid becoming accustomed to sleeping in their bed, because they’re going to have|they will