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Sleep duration is associated with brain structure and cognitive performance

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Re: Sleep duration is associated with brain structure and cognitive performance

#231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm a creative person by nature, blessed with being allowed to figure out how things work by taking them apart when I was a child. I didn't hear "No" very often. Eventually, I found myself working on software maintenance at a bank, a job I become attached to because I thought I wasn't worth much without a degree. I worked there for 5 years. In corporate, my three role models have been Wally, Costanza, and Gibbons, so…

thanks for sharing, had a quick couple of follow up questions, how do you unsubscribe from paying monthly rent ? also did you get married and have kids ? if yes how did they factor in to your life ?

I have not dared have children until I'm certain I can take care of them, and I think I'm getting close. I don't believe in marriage, but I'm in a relationship. My partners accept me and support me.

I am low-maintenance, so it is not a burden on them. My rider is clean water, unprocessed food, Web hosting, a 104-key, a computer, and an Internet connection.

I unsubscribed from rent by not renewing my lease and moving out. I rented a storage space for the things I was still attached to at the time, but for much less. After all those boxes went unopened for months and I didn't miss them, I felt comfortable getting rid of them too.

I read that Elon Musk was big on couch-surfing, so I thought, if he could do it, why not me? I was blessed with friends and family who would put me up for various amounts of time, and the grace and patience to get along with them.

Generally speaking, if you want to accomplish something great, you should study those who have already done it. Read their biographies. Read articles and comments about them online. Ignore the noise of common advice you could've gotten from any other schmuck, and look for what they did differently from everyone else.

Elon Musk couch-surfs. Steve Jobs "dropped out" of college on paper and kept attending classes he was interested in. Kurt Cobain wore layers. Jimi Hendrix took speed and spent endless hours practicing guitar. Jesus abandoned physical possessions and embraced all-encompassing love of our Universe. If they could do it, why not you? Probably not any smarter or more capable thank you. All it takes is determination.

Perfect your actions. Every little thing that you do, make it impeccable. If you can't do the small things well, how can you hope to do the big things any better?

Connect with the other dimensions. Ignore the nay-sayers and concretists. 150 years ago, something like telephone would be considered impossible. 50 years ago, videochat was just barely non-fiction. We've been alive for millions of years, adapting to all the possibilities our existence provides.

In my quest, I visited Urbana-Champaign. I went to the old Netscape office and sat in the parking garage and meditated and slept and dreamed. I traveled to Redmond and Mountain View and all over Silicon Valley, and I listened to the space.

I think what's really carried me through all these changes is my relationship with higher power. I believe in intelligent Universe which helps me, provides for me, and never gives me more than I can handle.

I've heard a saying via my family, and later via others: Gd gives you a day, and Gd gives you food to eat. I live by that, I believe that Gd always loves me, is always there for me, is always watching me, rooting for me, supporting me, and will never give me more than I can handle.

I cannot overstate the comfort I feel from knowing this in every situation. It's like being an ant or a beetle, but knowing that there's a giant mountain of a human somewhere up there who's watching out for me, and won't let me come to any harm.

Of course, my ability to take care of an ant is infintesimal compared to the one who is sysadmin, operator, and developer of my very existence. And an ant has a much greater chance of comprehending a human than I have of comprehending this existence. So I just run along and hope that I'll find some sweets in my path, and that I am amusing or interesting or good enough to still be taken care of tomorrow. Kind of like that car battery in Rick & Morty.

You can model this any way you want in your mind, but the key is that this spirit of goodness permeates everything in our existence, and it's always looking for a way to make things a little bit better, a little bit nicer, a little bit kinder. It's infinitely more powerful than all the money in the world put together. It's infinitely smarter than all the world's computers and humans together. It can literally control every aspect of our existence, modify past present and future faster than you can type sudo. And it's here, right now, watching you read this from inside your very mind, opening it up to receive its gift.

Re: Sleep duration is associated with brain structure and cognitive performance

#232

I'd like to share my sleeping practice which I've developed after several years of focusing on it and trying to recreate the pre-industrial (and possibly pre-farming) sleep patterns my ancestors had for millions of years before the last few thousand. Whenever I feel tired, I lay down to rest. Whenever I am sleeping, I allow myself to sleep until I am "fully slept", meaning I can lay there for a while, still physicall…

This is similar to my "drink when you're thirsty" method for remaining hydrated. There's a whole industry built on the premise that we're unable to regulate our own water intake without the help of apps and special water bottles. I've not found that to be the case myself.

The thirst mechanism becomes less reliable with age, so older people may find those products beneficial. But yes, for most healthy young to middle aged people, "drink when you're thirsty" is generally fine. Maybe with the added subpoint that if your urine is often colored, try to drink a little more.

Re: Sleep duration is associated with brain structure and cognitive performance

#233
post #230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah... I think it's laughable, preposterous to call focus and flow a "disorder." Whoever wants to call me being able to focus on a task at hand a disorder can stuff it up their butt.

I think you are trivializing problems that many people struggle with. From my understanding hyperfocus is not at all "being able to focus on a task at hand" but rather being unable to focus on anything other than a specific task. Often this task is often NOT what should be worked on during the allotted time.

From what I've seen, people in hyperfocus often seem to effectively lose their sense of hearing, too. Which is sort-of useful in a noisy office, but can be dangerous when going about your daily life.

Re: Sleep duration is associated with brain structure and cognitive performance

#234

Main thing for me has been quitting caffeine after lunchtime. For most of my life I just drank caffeine as if it were synomynous with hydration - coffee in the morning, diet sodas in the afternoon, teas in the evenings. And for years, I wondered why I couldn't sleep... Withdrawal was surprising. On the first day, I fell asleep at 6pm until the next morning. The next day, 8pm until morning. Felt ill for a week. Ached…

I recently went on a break from caffeine, and while the withdrawals weren't bad (I was only ever a one coffee in the morning person), I have since noticed how INCREDIBLY sensitive I am to caffeine. Now that I have no tolerance, having one coffee at any point during the day will completely ruin my sleep for that night (from ~7h down to ~4h with lots of awake time).

I'm at a point now where I don't think coffee is for me - I love the taste and the effect but not at the expense of a good night's sleep!

Re: Sleep duration is associated with brain structure and cognitive performance

#235

I'm bipolar so I've gone through periods where I sleep 18 hours a day and periods where I sleep 2 hours a night if at all. Caffeine intake doesn't seem to matter. Medication and good mental hygiene helps a lot with this issue.

Lately my body seems to be waking me up after around 4.5 hours of sleep. I'm alert and well rested, but if I wake up I'll be tired in an hour or two. If I push myself to sleep more, I wake up around 7-8 hours feeling more tired, and I can easily sleep to 10 hours at that point. It's really frustrating, because there doesn't seem to be a perfect amount of sleep for me anymore. I'm 45, Bipolar type II. Ever since tryin…

How are you measuring your sleep? I have an Oura ring and while it's not the most accurate thing in the world it does a pretty good job of total sleep and phases for me. The readiness scores are also really useful as a yardstick and comparison against how rested you feel. I got one because I have mild sleep apnea and wanted to be able to track the efficacy of the solutions I was trying out.

Re: Sleep duration is associated with brain structure and cognitive performance

#236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm a creative person by nature, blessed with being allowed to figure out how things work by taking them apart when I was a child. I didn't hear "No" very often. Eventually, I found myself working on software maintenance at a bank, a job I become attached to because I thought I wasn't worth much without a degree. I worked there for 5 years. In corporate, my three role models have been Wally, Costanza, and Gibbons, so…

thanks for sharing, had a quick couple of follow up questions, how do you unsubscribe from paying monthly rent ? also did you get married and have kids ? if yes how did they factor in to your life ?

I am also curious. How does this person just decide to stop paying rent? I think we would all love to do same but paying for housing is really the only option if you want to remain in a city where you already have an established network of friends, family, etc. The only thing I can think of is a communal living situation in a rural area.

Edit: sibling comment posted as I was typing. Apparently its couch-surfing and religion.

Re: Sleep duration is associated with brain structure and cognitive performance

#237
post #203
post #131

Around the age of 17 I used to regularly go to bed late so I could socialise, but I often had to be up at 8-9am for college / university / work. This meant I developed a fairly unhealthy sleep pattern and would often only get 6 hours of sleep a night. 10 years on and although I don't stay up to socialise anymore, I still really struggling to get enough sleep. No matter how tired I am throughout the day my mind seems…

https://www.artofmanliness.com/articles/fall-asleep-fast/ That works wonders for me. You won't fall asleep in less than two minutes the first time you do it, but after doing it for two weeks, you will. Relaxing the muscles is very important to be able to fall asleep. Pay attention to the facial muscles and those of the eyes. To clear my mind of distracying thoughts I count from 120 to 0. These days I seldom reach 100…

I've been thinking about trying to find that method again. Thank you for sharing it so I don't have to search. :)

Another article I just read on that site was on "hypnagogic naps" basically napping for less than a second, by holding a heavy metal key or ball bearings between your thumb and forefinger, draped over an armrest, or hanging off your bed, and below it are plates or pans. When you fall asleep and your fingers let go of the object(s), they fall and clang against the plates/pans and wake you up.

According to the article, it has been used by many artists and scientists such as Poe, Edison, Dali, Poincare, and Robert Louis Stevenson to gain inspiration and insight into problems/find new ideas etc.

https://www.artofmanliness.com/articles/hypnagogic-nap/

Re: Sleep duration is associated with brain structure and cognitive performance

#238
post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What makes you think it’s not enough? Do you have mental or physiological symptoms?

Just tired. A lot more tired than I should be.

Consider getting an at-home sleep study, you may have sleep apnea. I did, and I did, and now I wear a device (not a CPAP machine!) that helps significantly. I don't sleep any longer but my sleep is less interrupted and I get more deep and REM sleep. I feel 1000 times better for it.

Re: Sleep duration is associated with brain structure and cognitive performance

#239
post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 24h sleep I advise anyone reading this and experiencing similar sleep pattern or fatigue to visit their doctor. This could be anything from diabetes, iron difeciency, Vitamin D difeciancy, and whole other things that could be wrong. Please don't use someone's else experience as the whole truth.

Edit: I want to preface this by saying that I'm not writing off modern medicine, nor post-modern medicine, nor saying that you should avoid doctors altogether. Just that it's a powerful and thus dangerous tool, and that you should ideally find a doctor you trust and then maintain contact with them, probably by visiting them regularly, now that I think about it, and maybe occasionally giving them a nice gift. :) I adv…

It might have something to do with incentives. In my country most people would complain that the doctor doesn’t do anything to them, and based on my experience living with doctors all my life (parents, sisters and now wife), I see they are actually bothered by people taking their time without reason and not being able to pay proper attention to the ones who do need it.

Re: Sleep duration is associated with brain structure and cognitive performance

#240

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is similar to my "drink when you're thirsty" method for remaining hydrated. There's a whole industry built on the premise that we're unable to regulate our own water intake without the help of apps and special water bottles. I've not found that to be the case myself.

The thirst mechanism becomes less reliable with age, so older people may find those products beneficial. But yes, for most healthy young to middle aged people, "drink when you're thirsty" is generally fine. Maybe with the added subpoint that if your urine is often colored, try to drink a little more.

Yes, it is important to pay attention to urine, and poop too.
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