MindEnhance (Mirror)

Sorry for the lack of updates! I’ve been playing Starcraft 2 with my free time. It’s far too addictive. I’ve finished it though! I’m going to give it another run-through in the future on hard mode.

Anyway, I’ve started the SPAMAYL schedule! I’m trying to keep it as close to Uberman as possible for the most part, and adding naps when I go into zombie mode.

So far, it’s been 2 days since I’ve made the switch. As for why, I was prone to oversleeping on Uberman because of social activities. If I went to a party, it was virtually guaranteed that I would oversleep when I came back. Now, with SPAMAYL, I could take a few naps right before the party and then a few naps after.

SPAMAYL also has a better rate of adaptation, from what I’ve seen. Rasmus, SteelSovereignity, and Luke have all adapted in a relatively short span of time. In comparison, there have been only a few confirmed Ubermen (and women) over a span of about 5 years (Puredoxyk, Aya, Steve…etc., being the high-profile ones)

It’s been a little over half a week since my refresh of the Uberman schedule. I have only had one major oversleep (5 hours, yesterday). I slept through my main alarm, and my backup super-loud alarm was set to PM instead of AM. I have had a couple of minor oversleeps (less than 30 minutes over), largely due to schedule irregularities. As I said earlier, if I have over 3 major oversleeps, I will switch to SPAMAYL.

Otherwise, I’ve been sticking to the schedule! I still have zombie mode in the mornings, but that is starting to go away. I bought the Orange Box to aid in my quest for staying awake during zombie mode. I am also planning to get Starcraft II soon, hopefully at a reduced price.

Here’s another quick update. I apologize, as lately I haven’t been very motivated to write the long posts I usually do.

Day 7 was a pretty good day. I had my first nap where I both had a vivid dream, and I woke up before my alarm! I was really happy about it. Seems like I’m starting to get the REM sleep I need.

Day 8 started out great, until I missed my noon nap. I had a lecture to attend, and I didn’t want to fall asleep in the middle of it. I tried to take some catnaps, and probably only entered light sleep for 5-10 minutes. When I got back home at 5, I overslept by 6 hours.

I’ve become quite frustrated lately. I have been oversleeping nearly every other day since I started the experiment. I thought it was because of my lack of loud alarms, but that doesn’t seem to be it, because I bought a loud alarm. I feel like I may be turning off the alarms without knowing it, but I keep my backup alarm far away, forcing me to get up, and I have a “alertness captcha” on my main alarm. The other explanation is that I am simply sleeping through it. This would be so much easier if I had a friend doing Uberman at the same time.

I feel that all these oversleeps have been taking a toll on my confidence. I have not been posting consistently, and have stopped data recording all together. Thus, I am going to attempt to refresh my experiment.

Don’t worry, I am not going to abandon polyphasic sleeping just yet. Starting today, I am going to take a day of rest, where I just let myself sleep as long as I want, kind of like the recovery day in Claudio Stampi’s experiment. I’m going to regain any SWS and REM sleep I missed. Tomorrow, I will resume the Uberman sleep schedule.

I have decided to put a definite end point to my experiment if things don’t pan out. I will definitely do the Uberman schedule until July 30. If at July 30, I have had over 3 oversleeps of over 1 hour, I will stop doing Uberman and take a recovery break of approximately 3 days, where I just sleep as long as I want. Sleep deprivation isn’t good. Then, after this break, I will try SPAMAYL. This is only if I have over 3 oversleeps over 1 hour (say this sentence again ), though.

If I don’t have over 3 oversleeps over 1 hour, I will continue with Uberman and see where that leads me.

P.S. I have made an interesting observation. It feels as though my fingernails are growing slower. It may just be due to sleep deprivation, though, as I have not fully adapted yet.

I have bad news, but also really good news. In fact, I’m so excited that I am posting early!

• I overslept by nearly 6 hours today. It had horrible effects on my ability to stay alert. Ironic that 20 minutes of sleep turns me into the energizer bunny while 6 hours makes me trip over my feet in drowsiness. I fell asleep at the chair at work, and everyone noticed. My PI even offered me coffee, which I took.
• I may be canceling my experiment a little bit early. I have had numerous problems recently, and I only have myself to blame. I have been inconsistent with record keeping, cognitive tests, and blogging. In addition, I became addicted to watching Dexter, running through 2 seasons in less than 3 days.

Before my oversleep, I felt closer to full adaptation than I ever had. I was falling asleep quickly for each of my naps, and waking up refreshed after each one. I even dreamed during some naps.

I attracted a lot of attention falling asleep at work. One of the grad students in the lab mentioned that he had experimented with abnormal sleep schedules before. He managed to obtain an actiwatch from a professor during his first year as a grad student:

This awesome little gadget continuously records movement data from the wrist (and perhaps other data as well). The grad student showed me his records – he had recorded his sleep-wake activity for about a month. This could save me all the time I spend logging my own sleep patterns while being far more accurate!

Unfortunately, the actiwatch is extremely expensive (at least, for a college student), with the cheapest ones costing upwards of $1000. Luckily, the professor the grad student borrowed his from is going to be my professor next semester! I have already sent an email to him asking about it.

Perhaps, if all goes well, the professor may even help me out with my experiment! As I said before, my current experiment is far from rigorous – it is only semi-scientific. I hope that with his help, I can do higher-quality work. Even if he refuses (quite likely, actually, due to ethical and liability issues), I can get to know him better. Perhaps I can even do some animal research.

On a side note, did you know that most mammals are naturally polyphasic sleepers? In fact, one possibility is that humans are fundamentally polyphasic sleepers, but have become monophasic because of lifestyles associated with civilization (Tobler, 1995). Of course, the caveat is that one, this is just speculation, and two, with Uberman, you are reducing total sleep time drastically. Perhaps SPAMAYL taps into this possible “fundamental” sleeping pattern more closely.

The grad student has also rekindled my interest in programming. One of my original career choices was to become a computer scientist, but I was horrible at programming. Perhaps now, with stronger attention capacity and more willpower than my high school self, I can learn it properly.

I have learned a lot thus far, thanks to this experiment on myself. First, data analysis is a bitch. It’s arguably the most tedious and hardest part of an experiment. I’ve been procrastinating on analyzing my initial data. Second, for self-experiments, being consistent is difficult, but not impossible. Just don’t get addicted to a TV show, 60 hour long video game, or some massive book series. Finally, I learned that I have an uncanny ability to turn off alarms without remembering that I have done so.

I will continue on with my experiment, despite my inconsistent record-keeping. Even if the experiment is a complete failure, I can learn from my mistakes and design a better second experiment. For now, wish me luck!

Paper Cited -
Tobler, I. Is sleep fundamentally different between mammalian species? Behavioural Brain Research 69, 35-41, 1995.

Sorry for the lack of updates! I stumbled upon a TV show, Dexter, and got addicted to it. As such I have become a bit lazy in my blogging and testing (but not sleeping!). Here is a quick update.

On Day 4, I was extremely sleepy in the morning and nodding off during work. Otherwise, I kept to my schedule.

I overslept on Day 5! However, this was intentional. I needed to be up for about 8 hours straight, since I went to Six Flags. Therefore, I slept for 4 hours in the morning, from 5-9. Afterwards, I resumed my normal polyphasic sleeping.

Day 6 was essentially Dexter marathoning. In general, I adhered to my schedule pretty well.

Everything seemed to be going along fine after my 12:30 AM nap. I was only a little tired when it came to my 4:30 AM nap. Unfortunately, my schedule fell apart when…

 …I overslept by 3.5 hours. Fail. I later figured out that I had my phone’s volume set to low, so I simply ignored the alarm. What’s even worse is that I woke up at 9:00 AM racked in pain. I had exercised my biceps too intensely the day before. Seriously, this was more torturous than the sleep deprivation from days before. Throughout the rest of the day, I could not extend my arms fully. I had to keep the angle between my forearm and biceps at less than about 135 degrees, or suffer more pain. However, I highly doubt this pain has any relation with my sleep schedule. I had simply overextended myself the day before at the gym. Even now my arms are still extremely sore. I am doing some stretching, though, and it seems to help.

One good side effect of my oversleep is that I felt fairly awake the whole day. My ratings for alertness were at a consistent 8 (1-Braaiiiinnnnnssss; 10-Who needs Red Bull?).

Unfortunately, I did not gather much data today from my tests. On the other hand, I got Brain Workshop to work properly! I will finally be able to get some dual n-back data.

This episode of oversleep has been a learning experience for me. For one, I realized that I do not have enough backup alarms. Currently I am only using my phone, and while it generally works great, what would happen if I turn down the volume and forget again? Thus, after my 5:30 PM nap, I hopped on the train and went shopping for another alarm clock.

I found an “Extra Loud” alarm clock. I am worried that the sound will disturb my suitemates, since our dorm walls are so thin. Also, I made the mistake of buying an analog kitchen timer. I cannot sleep with all the ticking going on. Fortunately, it was only $3, so it’s not a huge loss. I could probably find some use for it cooking.

In addition to backup alarms, I found out that my phone alarm app gives the option of a little test to turn off the alarm. I set this on the toughest level possible. Hopefully, all of these safeguards prevent any future oversleeps. If all else fails, I will try sleeping on the couch instead of the bed.

I am modifying my schedule. I know it is frowned upon, but I feel that these changes are definitely for the better. I had an epiphany, and realized I was thinking about the Uberman sleep schedule incorrectly. Now I present my changes and my new theory:

I will be taking 20-minute naps rather than 30-minute naps. My original rationale for taking 30-minute naps is that I would need extra time to fall asleep. Now I realize that 30-minute naps simply increase the risk of falling into deep sleep when I don’t want to. I find that for many of my naps, I never fall fully asleep. During adaptation, this is to be expected. My brain still wants to compress all my sleep into one block, so I remain somewhat conscious during my daytime naps. When I do fall fully asleep in the morning, I oversleep. My brain is stuck in monophasic “block mode.”

One of the goals of adaptation is to cut this giant block into little blocks. This is why it is essential to prevent oversleeps. Oversleeps keep the brain in monophasic mode. In fact, sleep deprivation actually helps in the adaptation, because in the next nap, you may be sleepy enough to actually fall asleep. Gradually, your brain gets the message and starts actually falling asleep at naptimes. In theory, you will soon adapt!

My new schedule is as follows:

• 1:30 AM-1:50 AM
• 5:00 AM-5:20 AM
• 8:30 AM-8:50 AM
• 12:30 PM-12:50 PM
• 5:30 PM-5:50 PM
• 9:30 PM-9:50 PM 

• One large bowl of cereal 
• Taco salad 
• 2 bowls of salad (Thousand Island Dressing, Iceberg Lettuce, Carrots, Bell Peppers, Tortilla Strips) 
• Two servings of Trader Joe’s Crispy Crunchy Oatmeal Raisin Cookies

One small sidenote about food. I heard somewhere (I think the google groups) that someone was hungry, but had no appetite. I think I have been experiencing the same thing. I feel physically full even if I didn’t eat anything, but psychologically hungry.

This was a long post, but for all you lazy folks…

• Failure! Overslept by 3.5 hours. 
• Also, extreme muscle pain from workout yesterday; probably unrelated to sleep schedule
• As a result, revamped my schedule and my personal theory
• 20 minute naps; schedule better accomodates summer job
• Theory explaining why you don’t need to add extra time for falling asleep, why sleep deprivation is necessary in adaptation, and why oversleeps are so detrimental.
• Bought a new extra loud alarm clock.
• Also stupidly bought an analog kitchen timer. Ticking makes it impossible to use.

After my 12:30 AM nap, I took a walk around campus. Normally, during the school year, there would still be activity at 2 AM. Not so in the summer. It was a complete ghost town. I tested what buildings my key cards could get me into. I was hoping to get into one of the dorms, so I could study in the middle of the night (it is very difficult for me to study at home). Even better would be the dorms with pianos in the soundproof rooms, so I could practice without disturbing anyone. Turns out I was only successful in getting into the mail room. Also, there were maintenance workers in some of the buildings who gave me funny looks, probably because no one ever goes for a stroll at 2 in the morning in the summer.

I have once again confirmed that I am not a morning person. After my 4:30 AM nap, I experienced for the first time a nearly uncontrollable zombie state. At the computer, I was constantly nodding off, and my memory for what happened between 5 and 7 AM is vague at best. At 7, I had a sudden burst of energy. This actually worried me because the microsleeps may have been the cause. If so, they could interfere with my adaptation.

After I got to work, I again experienced microsleeps, lasting from 9 to 10. Again, I got a strange burst of energy later, at 11. So are the microsleeps good or bad? I am not sure. However, now that I know my times of weakness (5-10 AM), I can combat it. I plan to play videogames or watch TV to keep me awake between 5 and 8:30. Unfortunately, I can’t do anything about work. I’ll just have to soldier on between 9 and 10.

• 2:00-2:30 AM
• 5:00-5:30 AM
• 8:30-9:00 AM
• 12:30-1:00 PM
• 5:30-6:00 PM
• 9:30-10:00 PM  

I started sleeping polyphasically this morning/midnight at 12:30 AM. Here’s my intended napping schedule

• 12:30 – 1:00 AM
• 4:30 – 5:00 AM
• 8:30 – 9:00 AM
• 12:30 – 1:00 PM 
• 4:30-5:00 PM 
• 8:30 – 9:00 PM  

Naturally, I ran into some snags. Here’s what really happened:

I couldn’t fall asleep at all for my 12:30-1:00 AM nap, probably because I was not sleepy at all. At 4:30, I was sleepy, and managed to fall asleep for some time. In the period between 5:00 and 8:30 AM, I was too sleepy to do much. I tried to do some physics and read some language books, but at 7, I gave up and reverted to playing games.

After my 8:30 AM nap, I felt even worse, and my statistics seem to reflect that (371.6 ms visual reaction time, compared with around 250 ms average, 68wpm on typing tests, as compared to around 80 average). At work, I was nodding off. The ergonomic chair was far too comfortable, and the temperature perfect for sleeping. As such, I took off my jacket and resorted to walking around to stay awake.

Strangely, I had a burst of energy at 11:00 AM. I had a wonderful nap after lunch in that same ergonomic chair, and I woke up refreshed. Productivity during the following few hours was the best I had all day. Then, I hit my first major snag.

My next nap was scheduled for 4:30. However, I didn’t want to nap any more during working hours, so I stayed awake. I went home promptly at 5. My nap was 50 minutes late, at 5:20. When I woke up, I found that a whole hour had passed. Oversleep on the first day! That’s not a good sign. What’s interesting is that I had absolutely no recollection of turning off the alarm. I must have turned it off and kept sleeping.

What’s even more interesting is that I felt totally awake after that nap, and had vivid dreams throughout. I felt amazing, like I had just slept a full 8 hours. Unfortunately, all was not rosy. For my next nap, at 8:30 PM, I couldn’t fall asleep. I stayed in a semi-awake state the whole time. The same thing happened for my 12:30 AM nap. In addition, my 5 year old laptop overheated and crashed, causing me to lose my cognitive test data from 9 PM.

Now, I am still quite awake. Let’s see how long this lasts

I’ll be keeping track of what I eat everyday here. In addition, I will upload my statistics weekly and take my weight weekly. Note that I do not have a specific goal for my weight. Rather, I am focused on losing fat and gaining muscle.

Weight (approx. 6 hours after dinner) – 150lbs

Food:

• Three bowls of cereal, no milk (Honey Bunches of Oats Peach; cereal is now my snack food xD)
•  Sweet and Sour Chicken w/Fried Rice
• 1 bowl Strawberry salad (Spinach, strawberries, almonds, raspberry hazelnut vinaigrette)
• Lots of strawberries 
• 8 small Schnucks chocolate chip cookies (fresh from the oven!) 

How should I define days? Polyphasers tend to find that the lines between days blur. For my blog entry’s purposes, my “first nap of the day” will be my 12:30 AM one. So any food I eat past 12:30 will be listed on the next day’s blog entry.

• Incredibly sleepy in the morning – I am a night owl 
• Work interferes slightly with schedule 
• Overslept by 30 minutes on the first day
• However, felt amazingly awake afterwards

P.S. I’m still working on that data analysis! Hopefully it’ll be up by tomorrow

Hi everyone! This blog is going to be a mirror for mindenhance.blogspot.com. Well, not a full mirror. I’m just going to mirror posts concerning polyphasic sleeping. I’ll just copy and paste posts from there to here.

I’m collecting lots of data – logging my sleeping patterns, alertness ratings, typing speed, and cognitive test statistics. And I am making all the data available. I have finished a 2-week period of testing to establish a baseline. In the future, I will be comparing new data with this baseline.

Without further ado, here is my first mirrored post, from yesterday:

I am still conducting the analysis, but for anyone interested, I now have the raw data up!

Download here: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/2071936/Blog/Polyphasic/Cognitive%20Tests.xlsx (these are the test data)
and here:
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/2071936/Blog/Polyphasic/Log.xlsx (My sleep log)

I had technical issues with the Corsi Block Task and the Dual n-Back task. Brain workshop was freezing/causing cpu slowdowns often, and the Corsi Block Task couldn’t go past 12. I decided to drop the musical interval task, as it didn’t seem to provide anything too important.

I feel that the dual n-back task is a very important measure, so I will try to get data on it more often during my polyphasic period.

Welcome to Try Polyphasic Blogs. This is your first post. Edit or delete it, then start blogging!