Siesta, rest in 20 minutes

There are “owls” and “larks” among us, six hours of sleep is enough for some, and ten is not enough for some: the amount of sleep we need is determined by heredity. But the tendency to daytime sleep is an individual trait that occurs in men and women, in southerners and northerners.

It turns out that not only the inhabitants of the Mediterranean and some countries of the East need a siesta, and the hot climate is not at all the reason for this. When the sun is at its zenith, many feel the need to rest. Experts believe that if it is satisfied, it will help improve attention, memory and increase creativity.

Benefits of a day break

Siesta (Latin sexta – the sixth hour of the day) is the time of rest after a daily meal. In southern countries, it has become such a tradition that banks, shops and even most cafes are closed in the afternoon. The streets are deserted, and a rare passerby, hurrying about his business at such an hour, is bewildering. In fact, the custom of an afternoon rest also existed in Russia, and in all strata of society: among aristocrats, merchants, and peasants. Until the industrial revolution, when the hyperactive lifestyle of the metropolis turned daytime relaxation into an unattainable dream.

However, siesta brings certain bonuses to the body, and scientists are seriously interested in this. Psychologist Bill Anthony, director of the Center for Psychiatric Rehabilitation at Harvard University (USA), has been studying the positive effects of this “anti-stress pause” in the middle of the day for more than a decade. It was found that a day’s rest allows you to “reboot” the brain and then absorb new information much better.

Other studies show that this 20-minute rest boosts intellectual productivity by about 20%. Researchers suggest that the first phase of sleep (when we do not yet dream) is very important for remembering various information – and so that later it can be easily retrieved from memory. However, if we move into the next phase of sleep, accompanied by dreams, then the effect of “easy memory” is erased. Scientists have not yet fully understood the mechanisms of this phenomenon, although they can already explain the reasons for our afternoon sleepiness.

circadian rhythms

According to neurologist Michel Thiberge from the Sleep Center in Toulouse (France), “humans are genetically programmed to fall asleep around 14-15 pm.” During this period, attention decreases, eyes stick together, the head leans on the chest. Some frankly nod off, others just can not concentrate on work.

“A person is arranged in such a way that the “gates of sleep” open to him for one or two minutes every one and a half to two hours. This archaic rhythm goes back to primitive times,” explains Michel Tiberge. In order not to become the prey of predators, prehistoric man slept not for long, but often.

“This state depends on our biological clock, tuned to the daily rhythm, but is not associated with any physiological processes like those that are noted before going to bed in the evening (decrease in body temperature, etc.), says French biologist Anne-Marie Malabr. By the way, this is the time of the peak of traffic accidents. Doctors say that this diurnal slump is a leftover from polyphasic infantile sleep.”

The fact is that in infants, day and night, the phases of sleep and wakefulness alternate. Over time, the phases of daytime sleep are reduced, but the need for an afternoon rest for most of us disappears last, between the ages of four and six. For us adults, only a slight decrease in activity remains from it, which is felt differently by different people and depends on many factors: the season, the ambient temperature, the amount and calorie content of the food eaten.

Many creative people have intuitively felt that a midday rest has a positive effect on the ability to create. For example, Leonardo da Vinci developed his own version of polyphasic sleep: he believed that it was useful to sleep for 15 minutes every two hours.

When is the best time to sleep?

So, the afternoon decline in activity is natural. Resist nature, fight sleepiness, pushing yourself with coffee? It turns out that a siesta does not necessarily mean sleep, the main thing is to be able to restore strength. And everyone can develop their own version of the “anti-stress pause”: put your head on your desk or stretch out in the park on the grass, close the curtains or soak up the sun on a bench.

For those who are full-time, you can try to organize such a break for yourself at lunchtime. If you follow a scientific approach, it is ideal to give yourself 20-30 minutes of rest around 14-15 pm. By exceeding this duration (corresponding to the first two “light” phases of non-REM sleep), we trigger a 90-minute sleep cycle and jeopardize the ability to recover properly at night.

Falling asleep at about 17 p.m. is also unsafe: you can make it difficult for yourself to go to bed in the evening. For the same reason, daytime sleep is not recommended for those who suffer from insomnia – it is better for them to be tired during the day in order to sleep well at night.

If we do not immediately come to our senses upon awakening, this means that we have managed to enter the phase of deep sleep. This gives the feeling of a “heavy head”. We do not need such a prolonged siesta, except for cases of sleepless nights, time differences, in a word, compensation for “lack of sleep”. However, the abuse of a siesta may indicate a psychological regression reaction: a person hides his fears in a pillow in order to silence them.