To wake up refreshed and full of energy, use the sleep calculator. Simply going to bed early is not enough because you need to work out what time your brain enters light sleep. Do it with our calculator, thanks to it you will find the best time to fall asleep.

Whether we wake up refreshed or tired in the morning is not only determined by the length of sleep. It happens that we go to bed early in the evening, and in the morning we feel sleepy anyway. This state of affairs can be influenced by many factors (e.g. eating too late, excessive stress, alcohol), but the most common is waking up in the wrong phase of sleep.

Paradoxically, waking up in the REM phase (light sleep), we can get up refreshed and full of energy after 6 hours of sleep. On the other hand, even 10 hours in bed does not guarantee an easier waking up if the alarm clock wakes us up during the deep NREM phase.

Find out what determines your sleep quality and how to create your own sleep calculator .

Sleep phases

During sleep, the brain goes through 2 main phases: NREM and REM, which alternate between them. During NREM, the brain gradually goes into a state of relaxation and begins to work more slowly until it enters a state of very deep relaxation.

It is at this time that the regenerative processes in the body are most intense. For most people, NREM lasts an average of 90 minutes before the brain enters REM sleep. During its duration, the activity of the brain increases again, the pulse increases and dreams appear.

It lasts about 15 minutes and if you do not wake up during it, you re-enter the NREM phase and the cycle starts all over again (repeats 4-5 times during the night).

Phases of sleep and getting up - what is the best time to wake up?

Since NREM is the time when the brain gradually "shuts down" and goes into a state of deepest relaxation, waking up from sleep in this phase is the most difficult and unpleasant. Usually, it requires a very strong stimulus, e.g. a shake or a loud noise.

When we wake up, we are distracted and it takes a long time to recover. We are also accompanied by a feeling of tiredness and we do not want to get out of bed, even if we have slept all night.

Wake up in the REM phase is much faster. As the brain works at high speed during this time, it increasesalertness and acceleration of the pulse, even a soft sound or a slight nudge can interrupt sleep. After waking up, we feel refreshed, refreshed and immediately ready for action. Therefore, the best time to wake up is the REM phase, which comes after about 1.5 hours of deep sleep.

Sleep calculator - how to calculate sleep duration?

Using averaged data, we can create our own sleep calculator and calculate how long a night's rest should lastso that we get out of bed in the morning without any problems. The NREM phase takes an average of 90 minutes, so your total sleep time should be a multiple of 1.5 hours in order not to wake up during it.

For example, a person who gets up for work at 7.00 am should fall asleep at 11.30 pm. To this, you should add 15 minutes needed to fall asleep, so at 11.15 she should be in bed to be refreshed in the morning. This variant assumes 7.5 hours of sleep, which is the most optimal dose that allows you to work effectively during the day.

However, if the same person has to go to bed later, he should choose between 1:00 am or 2:30 am. If she falls asleep at a different time, waking up will take her out of the NREM phase and will have a hard time getting out of bed in the morning.

It is worth noting that, according to scientific research, NREM can last from 80 to even 120 minutes in different people. 1.5 hours is just an average value and will work for most people, but not all. Therefore, if it happens that after sleeping 6, 7.5 or 9 hours we still have problems with getting up, we should take a closer look at the stages of our sleep.

It is best to do it on a free weekend, when we have the opportunity to sleep without restrictions. The experiment is to fall asleep as soon as you feel sleepy. You should remember the time of going to bed and warn the household members not to wake us up in the morning.

After we wake up naturally, after which we should feel refreshed, we count our total sleep time. Then we convert it into minutes and divide it into 5 cycles - e.g. a person sleeping 8.5 hours divides 510 minutes into 5, which gives the result of 102. Her sleep should therefore be a multiple of about 100 minutes.

You can also use the trial and error method - wake up one day, e.g. after 7 hours of sleep, another after 8.5 hours and observe in which case we were more sleepy in the morning.

Worth knowing

Does taking a nap help you sleep better?

We often feel that if we are tired after waking up, an extra 15 minutes of nap will allow us to rest better. Nothing could be more wrong! After each waking up, be it REM or NREM, the entire sleep cycle starts all over again.

It means falling asleepfor 15 minutes we break the deep sleep phase again, which results in the feeling of even greater tiredness and lack of sleep.

There is also a special type of sleep, which consists of several phases, i.e.polyphasic sleepconsisting of a combination of naps and basic sleep.

Sleep calculator - does this always work?

Theoretically, every dream that lasts a multiple of the NREM phase gives you rest and makes you get up easily in the morning. Therefore, after sleeping for 6 hours at a time, we will feel more refreshed than after 10 hours of sleep.

But the key word here is "once" - if we allow ourselves to sleep so briefly once a week, it will not affect our activity during the day. However, for most people, sleeping 6 hours a day sooner or later will result in sleep debt, which is the number of hours of sleep to catch up on.

People with poor sleep most often compensate for this lifestyle by sleeping until noon on weekends. This way, the body cannot make up for the deficiencies caused by chronic sleep deprivation. To maintain a high level of concentration during the day, you need to sleep regularly for at least 7 and no more than 9 hours.

Otherwise, we risk a number of ailments: mood disorders, decreased attention, slower reaction, memory problems.

Wondering what your dream means? Use our dream book - thanks to it you will learn how to interpret your dreams.

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Category:

Psychology