The Elusive Uberman Sleep Schedule (Day 0)

This is it.  I’m going for it.  I’ve started the quest to discover the fabled “Uberman Sleep Schedule“.

This highly sought sleep cycle is a polyphasic sleep schedule that consists of a 20 minute nap every 4 hours.  The idea behind this rather absurd sleep schedule is that once your body becomes acclimated, you immediately enter REM (deep) sleep as soon as you close your eyes.  Thus, you get the same 2 hours of REM sleep that a person that sleeps 8 hours would.

Admittedly, this is somewhat absurd.  There have been a number of people who claimed to have achieved this sleep cycle that have blogged about it. They claim that after the first 2 weeks, they felt more rested than ever and got to enjoy 22 hour days.  Of course, the difficulty is the acclimation phase.

Now, of course, I don’t just assume these accounts to be true.  So I have to wonder, is there any reason to think this is possible?  Well, I do know that the 8 hour, monophasic sleep schedule is something we’ve imposed upon ourselves.  I also know that the human body is adaptive.  Our natural behaviors aren’t meant for performance.  Our behaviors come from the need for efficiency and conservation.  But, what are we capable of when we test our limits?

Way back, before someone came up with the concept of business hours and the human need for 8 hours of sleep, I wonder how our ancestors slept?  While the farmers were back in the village living according to the sun, I imagine that the hunters were out tracking woolly mammoths and making use of a very different sleep cycle to keep up with their game.  And if I were to guess, I’d say I’m more of a hunter than a farmer.

Personally, I’m tired of the frustrating process of getting to sleep.  It’s never felt natural to me, nor worked very well.  So I’m going for it. My friends have put me at not being able to get past Day 3.  We’ll see.  I’ll track my progress on the blog.

The human condition is a vast frontier.  More than anything, I have to know if this really exists.

-Kevin
11.17.2009