Sleeping is Hard – The Halfway Point

Posted on February 17, 2012 by The Young Urban Unprofessional

Today marks the halfway point for this life experiment. So far it has been a fun experiment to record my dreams after each night of sleeping. As I normally do, I’ve been dreaming every night. The only difference is that I’ve been waking up at the 8 hour mark and then waking up 15 minutes later after my 2^nd alarm goes off. Before this month, my typical “well rested” state was at around 7 hours, with 6 hours being common and 5 hours not being out of the question for a Thursday night (or Tuesday night if I’m in a Social Boston Sports league).

Due partly to the active lifestyle I lead and partly to my extroversion, I’m always on the go, either physically or mentally or both. I work 40 hours/week, rock climb 1-2 nights/week (running, biking or lifting after work if I’m not climbing), adventure on the weekends, keep up with my blog, hang out with my girlfriend, hang out with my friends, go to parties, play guitar, and I’m always working on one or two side projects like outdoor gear or professional networking events in Boston. Also, I find time to feed myself somewhere in there. With an average of only 4.5 hours available to me after work to live life, it’s hard to slow down to go to bed at 10:30, I don’t see how people do it.

I enjoy the intensity and I’m fortunate to always have something to do, I thrive on it and it gives me energy. I’m not sure I remember the last night I spent at home watching tv or doing nothing at all, it just doesn’t really appeal to me. So it’s been extremely hard to cut my night short, go home, brush my teeth, and get in bed ready to sleep by 10:30. For example, I was at a friend’s house at 8pm having a meeting with my climbing buddies about the future. It didn’t end up starting until close to 8:30 and I knew I’d end up having to leave early for bed time (read: lame). It was a great conversation and we were all in a deep discussion about life, climbing, and the meaning of both. However, it was a 45 trip from my apartment after factoring in walking on either end, waiting for the train, switching train lines, and the train ride itself (still better than driving and finding/paying for parking). So I had to leave at 9:30pm in order to be home by 10:15 and in bed ready to sleep by 10:30. When I announced I had to go they all asked why, and I had to shamefully explain that I had to go to sleep. Weak. I managed to actually get into bed around 11:00pm which meant that I had to sleep until 7:00am, which also means no shower, running to the train, and eating breakfast at work’s cafeteria (gross). However, I made a commitment to this sleeping/dreaming experiment that I intend to keep. Even at the expense of fun and friends. There’s always some excuse to keep me up late but this month I decided that I’d see what it was like to make sleep a priority. I’m still not convinced that 8 is the magic number but I’m willing to give change my behaviors for 30 days in order to see if it’s beneficial.

February 2011 – Dream Journal and 8 Hours of Sleep per Day

Posted on February 2, 2012 by The Young Urban Unprofessional

Each of my month-long experiments have challenged something about my day to day life as a young urban professional. August challenged my environmental habits, September challenged my commute to work, October challenged my 5-9 after work life, November challenged my consumption habits, December challenged my meat eating habits, and January challenged my avoidance of others habits. Combined, they span my life from when I wake up in the morning until I go to bed at night. This month I’ve decided to challenge myself while asleep in an attempt to improve my sleeping life.

This is the goal: good, consistent sleep and increased dream activity.

This experiment is two-fold. I’ll be mandating an 8 hour-minimum sleep schedule each night and I’ll also be keeping a dream journal throughout the process. Getting 8 hours per day of sleep might not seem like much of a challenge but working full-time, commuting to and from work, having an active lifestyle, and trying to feed yourself leaves little time for sleep. I’m not sure I can remember the last time I got more than 8 hours of sleep. Most people catch up on their sleep on the weekends, but my weekends generally involve waking up at 5 or 6am to go hiking after a night of camaraderie ending around midnight. Finding the ability, motivation and will power to put myself to bed on time for an 8 hour night is damn near impossible. So this month I’ll be seeing what life is like well-rested. I’m sure it won’t be easy.

The other aspect of this month’s experiment is to write down my dreams each morning after I wake up. I did this for two years in high school but five years of engineering school later, the habit was beaten out of me. I still have crazily detailed dreams but they’re nothing like the ones I had while I was keeping a dream journal. I don’t particularly care about what the dreams mean, I’m not into analyzing them to find some deeper understanding of my subconscious. I’m more interested in increasing their vividness, their potential lucidity, and my ability to remember them.

This month will force me to change the behavior of my life from eyes closed at night until eyes closed in the morning. All aspects of life are important so that’s why I’m particularly excited about this one. How often does one actively try to improve their sleeping life. Typically you spend your time focusing on bettering your career, your relationships, your friends, etc. I would argue that very few people are interested in active increase the quality of their life while unconscious. If you have any suggestions, tips, tricks, or just general support, please feel free to comment on my blog or use the social media buttons below every post to like it, share it, or tweet it.

Tuesday October 18th – Half Day at Work, Sleeping, Laundry, and More Sleeping

Posted on October 19, 2011 by The Young Urban Unprofessional

It turns out that I was right. I was indeed coming down with a cold. I’ve spent many nights in a row getting 5 hours of sleep, many weekends in a row hiking through cold streams, all my coworkers are sick, both my roommates are sick, AND I ride public transit every day. Therefore, I was a ticking time bomb just waiting to (explode) get sick. I went to work today despite feeling like crap but quickly realized that I was going to be pretty useless at work, not to mention I was infecting everything I touched so I decided to go home just before lunch and pass out. Luckily I got to stop by the farmer’s market downtown before heading back to my apartment. Got lots of fresh fruits/veggies/whoopie pies (yes multiple whoopie pies). Then I passed out for a few hours, did some laundry, and passed out again.

This is what I saw when my randomized alarm woke me up at 5:17, I was super pissed to get out of my bed but I knew I wouldn't be able to sleep tonight if I didn't get up then.

Cruisin my laptop at the laundromat. Clean clothing was getting to a dangerously low level so I figured being sick was a good excuse to do laundry. Is that wrong? Nah.

Still at the laundromat, party on my laptop and partly listening to the extraordinarily trashy talkshow on the television.

Learning about the levels of carbs in various breakfast, lunch, and dinner meals. A common misconception is that carbs are fattening, not true, excess calories are fattening, carbs are for energy and performance. It's apparently a very long and energy intensive process for carbs to turn into fat.

A view of my laundry (hockey) bag on the way back from the laundromat.

It was actually pretty cold in the apartment so I broke out my wolf sweatshirt "Leader of the Wolf Pack" that my older brother got me for xmas last year. Nice work older bro, good taste.

Walkin outside at night, not terribly interesting.

Creeping at the Tufts campus center.

Definitely felt like crap today, just lot’s of congestion and sinus pressure. I ended up going to bed around 9pm after a 3 hour nap from 2-5pm today. Sleep and fluids, it works for me every time. However, I also felt like crap the next day (my birthday) so I stayed home from work then as well. I just have to make sure that I can get better before my hike this weekend.