As an adult it would have been unthinkable to consider taking a mid-afternoon nap. It would be frowned upon, seen as soft, lazy, or worse, downright negligent. Today, this very eyebrow raising activity is making a resurgence as not only an accepted practice but a highly recommended activity to engage in. Mediterranean, Spanish, South Asian traditional siestas are being looked upon favorably. High tech nap pods are mushrooming in corporations, hospitals, universities and airports. It is the latest trend.
Modern sleep science has been studying how napping improves a person’s health. Neuroscience is making headway into proving how it enhances a person’s cognitive functioning and mood regulation.
Dr Sarah McKay, neuroscientist and author, writes in her blog The Neurobiology of an Afternoon Nap (2019) “naps facilitate executive functioning, memory formation, subsequent learning, and emotional regulation.” ‘Strategic naps’ that are of 15 – 20 min duration and occur once in the afternoon when we hit our low performance period are optimal for bouncing back from our mid-day slump. We enter NREM (non-rapid eye movement) sleep which increases memory, problem-solving ability, and enhances immunity. On a cautionary note, frequent napping is unhealthy with adverse physical and mental outcomes. Also, long naps (over 30 mins) cause us to drift into REM sleep which leaves us feeling groggy when we wake up, sliding us into sleep inertia. Frequency and length of naps matter.
“Afternoons are the Bermuda Triangles of our days” declares Daniel Pink, author, in his book When: The Scientific Secrets of Perfect Timing (2018). We tend to perform optimally in the mornings and nose-dive into a sluggish period in the afternoons that he calls a ‘trough’, jeopardizing sound decision-making and task performance. Studies around global regions reveal dangerous ‘trough’ events documented across several domains. In health care, diagnostic and treatment procedures are compromised. In the courts, legal judgments are blurred. On the road, traffic safety is diminished. In schools, test scores drop significantly. In offices, critical thinking on complex tasks is impaired gravely. Cognitive fatigue is real.
Pink recommends vigilance breaks as well as restorative breaks as essential for healthy, safe and ethical functioning in any domain. Naptime is one such proposed restorative break. Creating intentionality around naptime is important. A healthy reason to nap excludes escaping boredom, healing from an illness, or avoiding emotional turmoil. Watching TV or scrolling through social media do not count as naptime either. It is when you want to re-energize and regroup your senses that you lay down for the 20 minute ‘shut eye’. He calls it running a Zamboni over the ice rink of the brain smoothing out the cuts and scratches that have been left on our ‘mental ice’ during the hectic demands of the day. What a cooling metaphor.
You wake up refreshed. I know I sometimes sit up after a nap with an idea or a solution to something that was niggling at the back of the brain. It is truly magical. Give yourself the gift of a short nap today. You might soon claim it as your personal super power.