Why Polyphasic Sleep?



Most newbies in the sleep hacking community as well as skeptics outside the sleep hacking community, never question as to why the core sleep is split into smaller naps when it comes to polyphasic sleeping.


Folks who are unacquainted with the concept of sleep and sleep hacking believe that anything and everything concerning splitting your core sleep into shorter naps is stupid and/or dangerous.


However there are also quite a few who are acquainted with the concept of polyphasic sleeping but assume that, the more naps in a schedule, themore awesome the schedule is. Which is not true.


Along the same lines, is another question as to why you should even go polyphasic in the first place and split your core sleep into smaller naps when instead you can keep decreasing your sleep monophasically.


To sum it up, the above paragraphs can be listed in a couple of questions below:
1. Why polyphasic sleeping at all?
2. Why polyphasic sleeping is better?
3.  Why can’t I decrease my total sleep time without polyphasic sleeping?


Below is a short excerpt from page 74 of ‘The Manual’ provided in theEasy Sleep Hacking guide which answers all the three questions asked above.


1. Why can’t I continue sleeping monophasically and keep decreasing the total sleep duration down to 2 hours?

Ans. The onset of the REM stage of sleep is immediate only when you sleep short polyphasic naps. Hence, when you are on the Uberman or the Dymaxion sleep schedule, the onset of the REM stage of sleep occurs within minutes of the start of the nap. However, if you sleep monophasically and decrease the total sleep time down to 2 hours, you should remember that the entire sleep will not consist only of REM sleep because the REM stage of sleep lasts for short bursts of 30 minutes to 1 hour and it will be either preceded or followed by the N-REM stages of sleep. Hence, if you hack your sleep down to a single 2 hour nap, you will be deprived of REM sleep.


Not only will you be deprived of REM sleep but, on top of being in state of sleep deprivation, the amount of time between two naps goes up to 22 hours. This is prolonged sleep deprivation will affect your state of body and mind. On Dymaxion sleep schedule however, the onset of REM stage of sleep is immediate and the time gap between two naps is only 5.5 hours. This means not only are you not being deprived of REM sleep but also, you will be getting your REM sleep at short intervals of 5.5 hours.


Science. Anecdotal Evidence. Dymaxion Sleep.





I get an email every once in a while from a reader who happens to be well versed with the concept of sleep hacking as well as possesses the basic knowledge about the functioning of sleep itself. The email usually starts with quoting some statement I made on the blog or in the guides, followed by the reader citing some piece of information or study or anecdotal evidence which contradicts my initial statement and finally ending the email with a long explanation stating why I am wrong.


The weird aspect of this situation is that both, me as well as the guy opposing my work on here, both have a decent argument to back up our claims.  Here’s the funny thing though, neither of us are wrong and neither of us have 100% surety that we are right.


Scientists, philosophers, psychologists and the likes have been trying to figure out the whys and whats of sleep since a few centuries now and despite the advance in technology and the numerous studies conducted over the years, all the great minds put together don’t have a definite answer as to why we sleep, yet. They do have ‘theories’ however and then they have theories to contradict the previous theories and on goes the loop.


No one knows why we sleep or every single intricate functioning of the mind and body during sleep. I have myself presented an elaborate explanation of the internal functioning of the mind and body during sleep in the guides but that is just a droplet in the ocean of knowledge.


We have been advised to not sleep a minute less than 8 hours of sleep a day but at the same time, we have quite a few odd folks who haven’t slept for years but seem to be doing alright. Then we have us, the sleep hackers, who lie somewhere in between by trying to decrease our sleep as much as possible without damaging our body, mind and brain.


Science. Anecdotal Evidence. Dymaxion Sleep.


Here are a couple of questions that are frequently asked when it comes to Dymaxion sleeping and I will try answering them below using science and anecdotal evidence. Obviously there is a contradictory piece of information out there to every single word I say below. But I still choose to present evidence in support of dymaxion sleep to show you guys that dymaxion sleeping or polyphasic sleeping as a whole is not puffery.


1. Will I suffer from __________ if I transition to the dymaxion sleep cycle?


No. According to the Evolutionary theory of sleep and hormesis, you will adapt to the changes you make in your sleep schedule and long as they are progressive in nature. Even giant animals like giraffe and elephants have adapted themselves to sleep on 2 hours of sleep a day and they seem to be functioning perfectly.


What actually is fatal however is complete sleep deprivation. Complete sleep deprivation is when you go without sleep for days or couple of weeks on end. This can also lead to death in extreme cases.


On the Dymaxion/Uberman/Everyman sleep cycle, you are giving the body the essential REM phase of sleep that it needs. Hence, you can function perfectly and need not worry about any harmful effects which are actually caused by complete sleep deprivation.


2. Is SWS phase of sleep not essential?


To answer this, allow me to talk about the two theories of sleep hacking first.


Sleep Hacking Theory #1: Polyphasic sleeping makes the onset of REM phase of sleep immediate and eliminates the seemingly wasteful NREM phases of sleep. It is said that you require 1.5 to 2 hours of REM phase of sleep and hence when you sleep on the Dymaxion/Uberman sleep cycle, your REM onset is immediate and hence you can function perfectly on as little as two hours of sleep a day.


Sleep Hacking Theory #2: On polyphasic sleep schedules, your entire sleep cycles are compressed. Your naps become the miniature versions of your normal 8 hour sleep and since you get all the essential phases of sleep you require, you can sleep for as little as 2 hours a day.


Now here is my answer: No, the SWS phase of sleep is not essential. Here is the reason why, the second theory of sleep hacking fails. If your nap was the miniature version of your monophasic sleep then there would be no need to split your sleep into 3, 4 or 6 naps! One single nap would have been sufficient.


Plus it has been seen via EEGs and Zeos that the mind goes through chunks of REM and NREM sleep in an irregular pattern during the course of the sleep. Hence, it is impossible that the entire monophasic sleep can exist in a miniature version in your nap.


However, various sleep hackers over time like Steve Pavlina, Puredoxyk, over a dozen Youtube vloggers and forum commenters and myself   have documented that it is very much possible to function perfectly on two hours of sleep a day while not even taking into account the great intellectuals in the past like Leonardo Da Vince, Buckminster Fuller, Edison, Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin.


Hence, it makes sense that the Uberman/Dymaxion cycle would be possible only if the onset of REM was immediate because if it wasn’t then the 20/30 minute nap would consist of only N-REM phases of sleep. And if your sleep consisted of only NREM phases of sleep and no REM phases then most polyphasic sleepers on the advanced sleep schedules would be dead by now.


3. Why do you prefer Dymaxion sleep schedule over Everyman/Uberman sleep schedule?


I prefer the Dymaxion sleep schedule over Everyman sleep schedule because the Everyman sleep schedule gets your sleep down to only 4-5 hours a day. If I am dedicating so much effort and mental energy to polyphasic sleeping, than 4-5 hour of sleep a day does not feel worth the effort. The Dymaxion sleep however, not only is it equidistant and easier to keep track of but also lets me get my sleep down to 2 hours a day.


And I have already written in detail about why I prefer the Dymaxion sleep cycle over the Uberman sleep cycle.


In conclusion, it is said that, “The plural of anecdote is not data” but since sleep is such a complex and essential part of human life but still hasn’t been figured out and before we have all the scientific evidence in support of polyphasic sleeping, we have to go with the little scientific and anecdotal evidence available in our hands and live up to our true potential.


There is an another saying which goes as, “The mind sees what it wants to see” and currently my mind knows and can see that us humans can function perfectly on the 2 hour sleep life so that is what I choose to see and stick to, despite all the contradictory theories out there.


Time Magazine's Article in 1943 On Dymaxion Sleep And Buckmister Fuller







Time Magazine: Monday, Oct. 11, 1943 


Sleep is just a bad habit. So said Socrates and Samuel Johnson, and so for years has thought grey-haired Richard Buckminster Fuller, futurific inventor of the Dymaxion* house (TIME, Aug. 22, 1932), the Dymaxion car and the Dymaxion globe. Fuller made a deliberate attempt to break the sleep habit, with excellent results. Last week he announced his Dymaxion system of sleeping. Two hours of sleep a day, he said firmly, is plenty.


Fuller reasoned that man has a primary store of energy, quickly replenished, and a secondary reserve (second wind) that takes longer to restore. Therefore, he thought, a man should be able to cut his rest periods shorter by relaxing as soon as he has used up his primary energy. Fuller trained himself to take a nap at the first sign of fatigue (Le., when his attention to his work began to wander). These intervals came about every six hours; after a half-hour’s nap he was completely refreshed.


For two years Fuller thus averaged two hours of sleep in 24. Result: “The most vigorous and alert condition I have ever enjoyed.” Life-insurance doctors who examined him found him sound as a nut. Eventually he had to quit because his schedule conflicted with that of his business associates, who insisted on sleeping like other men. Now working for the Foreign Economic Administration, Buckminster Fuller finds Dymaxion working and sleeping out of the question. But he wishes the nation’s “key thinkers” could adopt his schedule; he is convinced it would shorten the war.


Intermittent sleeping was not originated by Fuller, has respectable scientific backing. Last week the Industrial Bulletin of Arthur D. Little, Inc., famed Cambridge, Mass, research firm, which published Fuller’s sleeping plan, noted a strong point in its favor: most sleep investigators agree that the first hours of sleep are the soundest. Some pro-Fuller evidence:


-Photographs and electric devices to record movements show that the average sleeper, who changes position at least 40 times during an eight-hour stretch, is quietest in the first two hours, then grows progressively more restless.

-At Colgate University sleep investigator Donald A. Laird found that people awakened after four hours’ sleep were just as alert, well-coordinated physically and resistant to fatigue as those who slept eight hours (but they did lose in accuracy and concentration).


* A Fuller word representing “dynamic” and “maximum service.”


Hormesis And Sleep Hacking




What Is Hormesis?

Hormesis is a biological phenomenon whereby a beneficial effect results from exposure to low doses of an agent that is otherwise toxic or lethal when given at higher doses.


You certainly did not have a moment of epiphany from reading that small definition up there but I can guarantee you that the next 5-10 minutes that you spend on understanding what hormesis is and how it applies to your life will pay back positive results 10 times or even 100 times to the amount of little energy and time you spend on reading these two articles below.


To get a thorough understanding of what hormesis is and why I hold it in such high regards, I urge you to read these two posts on hormesis first: This and this.


If you could really comprehend, what hormesis is from those articles and how amazing it is as a concept for life, your mind should be full of questions like ‘does hormesis apply to every single thing in life? Why is hormesis not more famous and mainstream? Is XYZ caused/possible by hormesis? Are there any exceptions to hormesis?’ and so on…


If the articles didn’t captivate you enough to make you ask such questions to yourself, I assume you either already knew what hormesis is or really haven’t understood how deep it’s application is, and in the latter case, trust me, you will have your moment of epiphany someday soon.



Hormesis and Sleep Hacking

If you are wondering about what the connection is between hormesis and sleep hacking, let’s take a look at few of the examples of hormesis discussed in the above articles and you will notice how a similar pattern applies to sleep hacking too.


1. Exercise/ Physical stress





2. Sunlight





I am going to restrain myself to only two simple illustrations, which also happen to be fairly relatable to everyday life, up there because hormesis has been verified to be true for around 5600 dose-response relationships till date and I believe you have a fair idea of what hormesis is by now.


So does the concept of hormesis apply to sleep hacking too and how? Yes! It surely does and here’s how.


3. Sleep Hacking/Polyphasic sleeping





A sudden transition from the usual 9 hour sleep schedule to the Uberman or the Everyman sleep schedule or a total deprivation from sleep completely for a period of over a few days results in a high dose of stress which your body cannot adapt to and has harmful effects such as adverse effects on mental health or even death in some cases.


However, just like other stress agents, sleep deprivation is highly beneficial when applied in lower doses and will actually make your mind and body stronger and more efficient.


The Easy Sleep Hacking guide uses the same principle of hormesis and talks about the benefits of sleep hacking in depth when applied in a small dose using a progressively decreasing transition, while at the same time giving the body enough time to adapt to the changes in sleep schedules.


Your body is Better than you think it is

Most people are extremely worried about placing even the tiniest discomforts and stresses on their mind and body thinking that if they happen to do so, their minds and bodies would just breakdown.


They forget that the body has a progressively adaptative mechanism for literally every sort of stress as long as the stress is not extremely heavy in nature. Way too much emphasis is placed on eliminating the tiniest discomforts while forgetting the fact that the human body has adapted itself to survive different kind of stresses which even the dinosaurs and other fierce beasts couldn’t survive. We as a human race would have never made it this far had we not been able to adapt to the stress our surrounding presents us with.


Maybe Friedrich Nietzsche’s adage “That which does not kill us makes us stronger” is too general as a statement. But at the moment, I can hardly come up with even one single agent (sunlight, physical stress, etc) that is lethal in higher doses but NOT beneficial in lower doses. Can you?