Results matching “Bird”

Biphasic sleep : Day 13 - Test articles

Biphasic sleep : Day 13Whether it's a way to address world hunger, or I'm simply planning my day; I'm usually pondering something when I first open my eyes. Like dreams, these thoughts feel as though they've been going for hours (although a few minutes is far more likely). Today I was thinking about one of the few downsides of biphasic sleeping.

Regular monophasic sleep (the typical 'eight hours a night') is generally associated with two periods of greatly reduced productivity. Most people don't do much (at least not anything productive) in the last few minutes before bedtime, or the first few minutes after waking. This period varies from person to person, but about 15-20 minutes is fairly common.

Biphasic sleep has four such periods. I am reluctant to start anything major just before a nap, or just after, or just before the main sleep, or just after I wake from it. What can be done to reduce this 'lost time'?

There are a few small changes I have made over the past week, and there'll undoubtedly be several more. Here's a summary :

Reducing the 15-20

A few days ago I read Steve Pavlina's excellent article 'How to become an early riser'. My aim was not to become an early riser per se - I was simply curious as to how it was done. In that article was one crucial point that I'd never considered by itself: go to bed when you're tired, and wake up with the alarm. Modifying this slightly, I now hold the nap back a bit until I feel that I could fall asleep quickly; rather than having it at a set time each night. This works well, and certainly helps to shave the 15-20 minutes down a little.

Using the 15-20

Realistically I'm not going to solve the problem of world hunger by pondering it for 15 minutes. However, 15 minutes spent fleshing out plans for the day are well spent. A calendar, reminders and various to-do lists tell me what needs doing; the 15 minutes is great for establishing how I'll get things done. Very useful.

This is also the period of time in which dream recall - if any - is possible. Once the day begins in earnest there is almost no chance of remembering the subtleties of last night's dreams (I'm not talking about recurring nightmares here, which I've been fortunate enough to avoid). Although there isn't always an obvious meaning to them, a few notes should provide an interesting look mid-term (say, over a few months) of what kinds of things were going through my head. I suspect patterns may start to gradually emerge.

I'm sure there are many other ways of improving productivity during these periods, or at least reducing their duration. If you've got any ideas, let me know.

Following nap

That wasn't quite the result I was after. Waking naturally after 4.5 hours it took a while to work out what had happened - for some reason the alarm didn't go off (dead battery I suspect). What's the best way to correct this and get back on schedule? Probably to swap the nap/main sleep for tonight (napping around 05:30 - 07:00). Not to mention checking the alarm battery.

As for the productivity improvements, I've been noting down just how much time I've been spending on each task today (in order to see how productive I am during the bulk of the day) and there's probably quite a bit of tweaking I can do there. Improving the low productivity periods around sleep is just a bonus.

Using MS Office for Family Trees - History

My Family TreeAmit Agarwal has an interesting article on the use of MS Office in making a pedigree chart. Very simple.

Using MS Office for Family Trees - Test Area

My Family TreeAmit Agarwal has an interesting article on the use of MS Office in making a pedigree chart. Very simple.

Marty GallagherIn this week's Aggressive Strength Magazine Mike Mahler has an interesting chat to powerlifting coach Marty Gallagher.

With around 40 years of strength training under his belt, and numerous books and articles to his name, Gallagher is an extremely knowledgeable guy.

Biphasic sleep : Day 12 - Test articles

Biphasic sleep : Day 12The extra 1.5 hours was certainly well received. It took a little longer to wake up than usual as I was on my way to a 3.5 hour drive less than half an hour after waking. Still, it was perfect weather for being on the road.

Following nap

That's the first time I've overslept a nap (following the pattern of switching off the alarm when it sounds, rolling over and going back to sleep). Walking around in the heat today seems to have taken a greater toll than I realised at the time. Still, dream recall was great - I can still clearly remember the various events and characters - and I woke naturally after a further 90 minutes.

A 3 hour sleep coming up in a couple of hours.

Goals and Toilet Seats - Test articles

Gutsy displayIf the title suggests to you that this might be an article about squatting, well, you'd be wrong. Surprisingly, Dan John writes about goal setting. And toilet seats.

There are a couple of pieces of wisdom that jump out from this article, the most critical one - to me at least - is a quote from the One Minute Manager :

Look at your goals.
Look at your behaviors.
Does your behavior match your goals?

Definite food for thought. Speaking of food, if the Velocity Diet stuff got you intrigued, you might like to go back to Chris Shugart's original article. It's interesting stuff.

Biphasic sleep : Day 11 - Test articles

Biphasic sleep : Day 11That wasn't bad, but I awoke feeling more than ready for the luxury of another 1.5 hours. As today's a workout day, that's precisely what tonight will bring.

Following nap

Up until now I've been allowing anything up to 30 minutes to fall asleep. This will be tested tonight as a planned trip tomorrow (with an early departure) pushes the main sleep back a little closer to the nap - leaving a space of only 1 hour between them. I suspect a bit of reshuffling and an earlier nap today would've helped.

As for the nap itself, I suspect it took a lot more than the allocated 25 minutes to fall asleep. I feel as though I've been woken mid-cycle, and the usual feelings associated with that are present; I feel tired, grumpy and irritable. The extra 1.5 hours later is definitely well timed.

RamboTony Gentilcore discusses how soft tissue work - and not just the foam roller - is not only 'more painful than watching a David Hasselhoff music video' but also essential work for many who spend time in the gym.

He also discusses First Blood, The Usual Suspects and why the humble tennis ball is your friend. A great read.

PigeonI wasn't quite sure how the biphasic sleeping thing would impact workouts - at least during the adaptation phase - so I kept to the 'frequent, short workouts' philosophy. This seemed to work out well, and the change in sleeping habits didn't have any noticeable negative impacts.

In fact, two of the things that have become clear so far (with regard to the biphasic sleeping):

I eat a lot more. Previously there was a solid block of time (as much as 8 hours) without eating (apart from the occasional nocturnal shake), plus an hour or so at each end of this with little or no food. With the longest period of sleep now 4.5 (occasionally 6) hours, this limitation seems to have vanished; breakfast is now earlier, a late supper is now later, and there are more meals inbetween.

Late afternoons / early evenings are now possible workout times. Apart from the fact that it's really starting to warm up here now, scheduling a deadlift session just before a dose of carbs and a nap just feels right.

As for muscle recovery, general feelings of being alert/sleepy, focus during workouts - the biphasic sleeping doesn't seem to have changed things at all. Definitely a good thing.

Thursday
Light bodyweight work.

Friday
Hanging knee raise 40@bw
Zercher squat 2×20@40/88, 2×8@60/132

Saturday
Pull-up 5@bw
Bent row 10@60/132

Sunday
Bodyweight work.
Triceps raise 2×20@20, 2×10@25

Monday
Reverse shrug 2×10@bw
Rack pull (5 holes, dbl o'hand grip) 2×20@60/132, 2×10@80/176, 10@60/132, 2×10@100/225, 2×5@120/264, 10@60/132, 5@140/308, 2@160/352

Tuesday
Chin-up/pull-up superset 5,5,5,5
Total Gym work

Wednesday
Floor press 10×6@20/44, 4×6@30/66, 4×6@40/88, 2×6@50/110
Chin-up 10,10 @bw
Pull-up 10@bw
Bent row 4×10@50/110

Operation Hulkout - Test articles

The Incredible HulkSticking with the hunger theme, take a look at Operation Hulkout ('You wouldn't like me when I'm hungry'), the powerlifting training log of the enigmatic 'O'. Looking at the earlier weights, that's definitely a year of solid progress.

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