A lot of people counter heavy eyes with a third afternoon coffee or another energy drink.
Sure, these can work in a pinch, but if those are your solutions to sleepiness, have you considered the elusive midday nap instead?
Naps aren’t just for toddlers. Well-timed power naps can boost your mood, memory, alertness, and energy, revitalizing you to finish the work day on a high note.
Plus, there’s zero commitment or schedule, and it’s completely free. According to the journal Sleep, just 10 minutes of shut-eye is all it takes to fuel a sleep-deprived body for two hours minimum.
Here are three ways to nap like a boss.
Calm, cool, collected, covered
The ideal setting for a nap would be a dark, cool, quiet sanctuary. If you can adjust your Thermostat between 60 to 70 degrees Fahrenheit, that’s optimal too. Cover up with blankets to taste, and you’re all set.
For an uber naptime, don’t be afraid to employ eye masks, ear plugs, or white noise to really settle into your sleep.
Shorter the better
The ideal nap time range is 10-30 minutes, the sweet spot that’ll have you feeling reinvigorated, but not groggy. Longer naps can make you less productive, cause sleep inertia, or the aforementioned period of grogginess that typically manifests after being awoken from a deep sleep.
If you can believe it, long naps can actually deteriorate your health, too. Naps over 40 minutes have been linked to higher risks of diseases like diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and obesity. So to avoid the negatives of naps, remember to set an alarm!
Related: Why napping too much is bad
Employ the pencil trick
For the sleep-deprived, Albert Einstein’s general theory of relativity is only second to his infamous Pencil Trick.
Unlike his theory of relativity, this is an easy thing to understand. Hold a pencil whenever you feel like you’re starting to drift off. When the pencil drops, it’s wake up time.
The legend goes that Einstein used this trick for his own power-napping, ensuring he’d wake up before he entered a deep, unproductive sleep.
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