
How to Reset Your Sleep Schedule, Seriously - b14ck
http://projectb14ck.org/how-to-reset-your-sleep-schedule-seriously
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Tyrannosaurs
One thing which I think would help many programmers reset their sleep schedule
is to remove routine use of caffeine.

For me it was only giving up caffeine that made me realise how powerful a
stimulant it actually is. If you're in a daily routine in which you're
routinely and regularly drinking caffeine throughout the day then it's almost
certain that it is impacting your sleep cycle. If you're drinking caffeine in
the evening and still sleeping at night you're probably exhausted or at least
over tired.

I'd recommend to anyone cutting it out for 2 - 3 weeks just to understand it
and allow you to better work out how you want to use that effect. For me that
means first thing in the morning and as needed (I have a 15 month old daughter
- that can be fairly often) but never in the evening and rarely in the
afternoon.

Certainly if you wanted to reboot your sleep schedule I think stopping it
would be significant. If nothing else then for a heavy coffee drinker the
added tiredness caused by removing the additional stimulation would help you
sleep earlier.

More on the impact of caffeine on sleep and sleep in general in Counting Sheep
by Paul Martin ([http://www.amazon.com/Counting-Sheep-Science-Pleasures-
Dream...](http://www.amazon.com/Counting-Sheep-Science-Pleasures-
Dreams/dp/0312327447/ref=tmm_pap_title_0)). It's a bit long and in places but
it's worth reading despite that if you're interesting in understanding sleep.

~~~
spaceman77
"first thing in the morning as needed I have a 15 month old daughter"

I UNDERSTAND

I have a 24 month old daughter and she is attacking me as I typo these wor
.';;= =-p3r=0oi, m \weprkg!!!!!!!

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kashif
I conducted an experiment. I slept as much as I wanted and whenever I wanted.
Sometimes I slept for 10 minutes and at other time for as much as 14 hours. I
just let my body sleep without limitations whenever I felt sleepy - no
exceptions.

After about 3 to 4 days of doing this my sleep schedule settled on its own
accord. On most days, I now sleep at around midnight and sometimes perhaps in
the afternoon for a bit. Some days I don't sleep at all because I don't feel
sleepy but that corrects in a few days to become normal again.

For me this is remarkable, I used to be an extreme example of a night owl.

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johnfn
It is certainly true that going camping will reset your sleeping schedule.
Last year, my sleep schedule was to start sleeping at 8AM, and wake at 4PM;
after a few days of camping, it had shifted all the way to sleeping at 8PM
(sunrise).

The only problem with this is that camping isn't something that you can just
go out and do, especially if you have any sort of obligation (work, school).

I recently "reset" my sleep schedule from sleeping at 4am to sleeping at 12am.
It wasn't really that hard, and I didn't use anything tricky or uncomfortable,
like starving myself beforehand. All you really have to do is climb into bed
two hours before you went sleeping the previous night, and start reading. I
find that reading puts you in a much more relaxed state, and after an hour or
so, I don't drift off to sleep so much as it hits me like a train. :) You can
knock back your sleep schedule almost an hour a day through this strategy.

The other advantage of this is that you get to do a lot of reading.

~~~
Tyrannosaurs
Wouldn't sleeping with the curtains open achieve much the same thing?

From the article there doesn't seem to be much special about camping other
than it removes much of the artificial control we exert over our environment
(light, noise and so on). Just willingly stopping those things would be a big
step in moving back into a rhythm which was more in step with the natural day
/ night cycle.

~~~
VBprogrammer
I would sleep with my curtains open more often but I generally find the sodium
street lights to be an annoyance when my eyes adjust to the almost darkness.
At which point they get closed.

I regularly go camping and have to agree with everything the author says. The
physical exertion (setting up camp, building a fire, walking around etc) lack
of environmental controls and natural light certainly correct any day / night
in balance immediately.

Though, since I finished University I have found that just having to get to
work for 9am each morning takes care of most problems. Other than the
occasional nights bad sleep, usually caused by being fascinated by some
programming problem or even a real life issue!

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ianferrel
I notice that the author used to be sleeping 6-7 hours (going to bed at 3 or 4
am and waking up at 10), but after camping, is sleeping 9 hours (going to bed
at 11pm and waking up at 8).

That seems like a bigger deal than shifting the schedule. I imagine it's much
easier to feel rested in the morning if you're getting 2+ hours of sleep more
than you used to.

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tfh
I think what helped him reset his sleep schedule is :

\- Exercise

\- The lack of artificial light

You don't have to go camping to have that.

~~~
scott_s
You're correct. But it's easier to enforce those things at a campsite than at
home.

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groaner
Try sleeping in a room above an open-air street market. The roosters will
raise a ruckus starting at 4am during the summer -- an alarm clock that you
_can't turn off_.

~~~
rdtsc
If you do turn it off, you might end up with a nice pot of soup though ;-)

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thingsilearned
I've camped in my back yard at times for this exact reason. Yes people find
that odd, but there's no better alarm clock than the sun baking you in your
tent.

When camping in good weather I always feel refreshed upon waking up.

~~~
tomjen3
If you are camping in your back yard, why not just skip the tent and enjoy
sleeping under the stars?

~~~
traskjd
I would assume occasionally the weather changes between going to sleep and
waking up. Might be able to sleep through rain on the tent (it may even
enhance the sleep by being white noise).

~~~
philwelch
If you're ever building or reroofing a house, look into a corrugated steel
roof. Sure, it has all the visual appeal of corrugated steel, but it's cost-
effective and the sound of rain on a steel roof is very beautiful. My parents
had their house reroofed with steel a couple years after I left for college
and I've always loved the sound of rain on it.

~~~
ido
Wouldn't it trap heat like crazy in summer?

~~~
philwelch
The house isn't in a particularly hot place so I'm not sure, but I suspect
there are ways of defeating that.

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armandososa
I stopped reading when he says "go camping" and "it's fun" because I frikin
hate camping. Does that make me a weirdo?

~~~
pdelgallego
"If you find yourself trapped in the middle of the woods without electricity,
running water, or a car you would likely describe that situation as a
“nightmare” or “a worse case scenario like after plane crash or something.”
White people refer to it as “camping.” " -- Stuff White People Like

<http://stuffwhitepeoplelike.com/2009/08/14/128-camping/>

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gcheong
With respect to sunlight hours, wouldn't this technique depend a lot on timing
(e.g. winter vs. summer) and latitude? I mean, it wouldn't seem to be of much
use in say northern Alaska during the summer where daylight nears 24 hours or
in winter where you're in the dark much of the time.

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nivertech
No hack will help in the long-term:

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delayed_sleep_phase_syndrome>

Look on the positive side: by sleeping from 4-5am to 9-10am, you have both day
and night! While "normal" people have only day and evening.

~~~
ciupicri
That's exactly what I've thought when I read:

 _Thirdly, after you come back from your short camping trip, you’ll not easily
fall back into your old schedule._

I've reset my schedule a couple of times and I can say that falling back to
the old schedule was a piece of cake.

~~~
wanderr
Same here. I've found the only way I can stick to a morning schedule for any
length of time is if I push my schedule later and later until late is early;
my body tries to push my schedule backwards for a couple of weeks before it
starts slipping forward again.

I don't recommend my sleep hack for everyone though, it's probably only easy
if you have a really easy time staying up 4 hours later than usual but find it
almost impossible to get up even one hour earlier.

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rudin
Please, for the sake of non-Americans (non-Californians?) use the following
regular expression on your titles.

s/", Seriously"//

~~~
nandemo
Indeed it took me a few seconds to understand the meaning (or rather lack
thereof) of "seriously" in the title.

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trjordan
I actually just did this!

I just got back from a long weekend camping. We hiked 8+ miles Saturday and
Sunday, and I was so tired last night I went to bed at 8PM (no joke). Thursday
night, I went to bed at 1AM.

More generally, I've found that exercise helps a lot with moving my schedule
earlier, just because I'm tired. If you're out camping, you tend to be active
all day (there aren't many non-active activities in the woods), which helps a
lot.

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petercooper
My sleep schedule usually becomes "normal" on vacation. I'm not much of a
hiker but being outside 80% of the day seems to do the trick for sure. But I
don't go to that from getting up at merely 10AM (which I'd consider normal
myself) I just got up at 6PM ;-)

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JacobAldridge
Interesting. I recall a good discuss here a little while ago that involved,
primarily, a morning walk as being invaluable for shifting from night to day.
Similarly, it espoused the importance of sunlight on your body's natural sleep
rhythm.

~~~
b14ck
I originally didn't think it would make much of a difference. I just figured
that sunlight and nature would have very little (if any) effect. However,
after actually doing it, and seeing such a huge shift in schedule, I realized
the importance of sunlight a LOT more.

I didn't see the article you're referring to (can't seem to find it), but I'll
try taking a morning walk as well. Sounds like a peaceful way to start the
day.

~~~
zalzally
Simply taking a few 10-15 minutes walks during the day -- one in the morning,
one after lunch, and maybe even one before bed -- is a good habit to get into
if you're indoors and/or in front of a computer all day. Fresh air, sun, and
movement are all awesome things.

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rtomayko
I have a great way of dealing with this that's simple, fun, and requires very
little lead time: get drunk.

I head out around 10PM and drink beer or whisky repeatedly until I'm
completely intoxicated. By 2AM or so all I want to do is go to sleep.

~~~
eru
Alcohol may make you sleepy. But it doesn't make for better sleep. See e.g.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcohol_use_and_sleep>

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benologist
The hardest part of resetting my sleep schedule is actually _sticking_ to it
... I almost always end up staying up later and later and before I know it
it's a total mess again.

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zbanks
What if I want to reset my schedule to something unnatural?

~~~
philwelch
Stay indoors. Seal out all natural light. Replace all your lights with
theraputic Seasonal Affective Disorder lamps to simulate the natural light
spectrum of the sun. Work out an automated schedule of turning the lights on
and off--or varying their brightness, if you find ones with dimmers--to trick
your body into thinking it's daytime when you want it to be daytime, and
nighttime when you want it to be nighttime. This might actually work, but I've
never tried it.

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tomjen3
That doesn't really work in winter though.

Or it might just be me who object to sleeping outside in subzero weather.

~~~
arethuza
I find camping in subzero temperatures a lot more pleasant than camping in
cold & wet temperatures - it's fairly easy to stay dry and staying warm really
isn't a problem if you have the right equipment.

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nix
This works even better if you don't build a campfire.

