Is it possible to have midday power nap and still be productive?
Have you ever gotten to the point, about halfway through your day where you just can’t keep your eyes open? Struggling to keep your focus on one simple task?
And what is it with those onslaughts of yawns, relentlessly coming one right after the other?
You widen your eyes, shake your face and stretch to try and rid your body from this unwanted sleep attack. Seconds later, you find yourself back into battle with your eyelids.
Oh, the struggle.
I am going to tell you how to beat this afternoon drowsiness right now…
For me, I’ll usually give up on the sleep attack and search out a quiet area, out of the way of the mainstream of people to shut my eyes for a very needed energy reboot. A.K.A power nap.
I figure I could either sit here and struggle for the remainder of the day fighting the sleep, getting absolutely nothing done. Or, I can take a quick 10-minute power nap and finish the day off on a good note.
Though no matter how good I feel after my power nap, I still get the nagging feeling of guilt, and that I had just done something wrong. I will usually start beating myself up, thinking about how much work I could have gotten done during that time, and tell myself that I need to stop being so lazy.
It’s a foul and ugly cycle that I find myself doing about 2 or 3 times a week, especially after those long and late nights that I work.
My Power Nap Research
After doing a little research, I found an article in The Telegraph, a UK based blog about a study performed by Dr. Tomohide Yamada on the benefits of power napping and waking before the deep slow-wave sleep.
Dr. Tomohide Yamada explained, when limiting your nap to 10 – 30 minutes, and waking up before the onset of deep slow-wave sleep, seems to offer a beneficial increase of awareness and motor skills.
My Power Nap Equal Productivity
As I think about it, I am much more productive during the afternoons after my power naps. Even though in the back of my mind I am nagging myself how lazy I feel for needing a power nap. I genuinely feel physically much better and eager to follow through with what I started that morning.
Not only is my energy up, but I seem to be more thorough with my work. Resulting in finding fewer mistakes the next morning when I go through my work from the day before.
Like I was saying before, I like to keep my power naps between 10 or 15 minutes at the most. Some of the articles that I read defined a power nap as 60 to 90 minutes long. 60 minutes seems a little excessive and a bit time consuming for my busy day. Plus, it always puts me in a worse condition than when I started.
Over napping is no bueno for me.
It seems the consensus on most of the articles that I read about power naps is that taking midday naps also helped with memory, focus, and creativity as well as to help lower stress.
So if you suffer from the power nap guilts or simply don’t take naps because you think it’s a lazy person habit.
Stop.
Power Naps Are Good For You
Taking midday power naps can be just as beneficial and needed as what you eat for lunch. Anytime you find yourself more productive, efficient and effective at work is positive. Isn’t this something that we all strive for?
Take 10 or 15 minutes and find somewhere that is quick, and get a little shut eye. If you are the type that can’t sleep like this, that’s ok. Just take the time and relax, breathe, meditate or even read a book. Take the time for yourself and re-energize.
thanks alot of information