10 Minutes of This Feels Like 8 Hours of Sleep (Andrew Huberman)
Summary
TLDRThe script discusses the benefits of Yoga Nidra, an ancient relaxation technique akin to sleep, which can boost dopamine levels and enhance mental and physical energy. The speaker shares their personal experience with the practice and introduces a simplified version called Non-Sleep Deep Rest (NSDR). This protocol involves lying still, focusing on breath, and body sensations to achieve restorative effects similar to sleep, potentially aiding those with sleep difficulties.
Takeaways
- π§ Yoga Nidra is a protocol that promotes mental and physical rejuvenation by lying down and trying to stay awake while remaining completely still.
- π The practice involves long exhale breathing to slow the heart rate, which is beneficial for stress mitigation and can offset sleep loss.
- π§ Research indicates that Yoga Nidra can lead to a 60% increase in dopamine in the striatum, a key brain area involved in movement and reward pathways.
- π The speaker shifted focus from animal studies to human studies to explore the effects of Yoga Nidra and stress mitigation techniques.
- π Non-Sleep Deep Rest (NSDR) was developed as a simplified version of Yoga Nidra, aiming to provide the same restorative benefits without the mysticism.
- π± NSDR can be practiced for 10 to 30 minutes and involves body scanning and staying awake, but falling asleep is not a problem.
- π NSDR has been observed to decrease sympathetic autonomic arousal, leading to a state of rest that is different from regular sleep or meditation.
- π€ The speaker collaborated with Dr. Matthew Walker to explore the neural level effects of NSDR, particularly its potential to mimic sleep.
- π NSDR is different from meditation as it focuses on relaxation and sensory experiences rather than concentration.
- π€ People who struggle with falling asleep can benefit from NSDR at any time of the day or night to help them self-direct their relaxation.
Q & A
What is Yoga Nidra?
-Yoga Nidra, meaning 'yoga sleep', is a thousand-year-old protocol where you lie down and try to stay awake while remaining completely still. It involves long exhale breathing to slow the heart rate and is traditionally used to offset sleep loss and create states of mental and physical rejuvenation.
How does Yoga Nidra affect dopamine levels?
-A study from a medical hospital in Denmark showed that people who performed the Yoga Nidra protocol for an hour experienced a 60% increase in dopamine in the striatum, a key area of the brain involved in movement, reward, and motivation pathways.
What is the difference between Yoga Nidra and non-sleep deep rest (NSDR)?
-NSDR is a protocol developed to strip away the mysticism and intentions associated with Yoga Nidra, focusing on the physical act of lying down, doing long exhale breathing, and body scanning to relax. It is designed to be a more accessible and scientifically clear alternative.
How long should one practice NSDR for optimal benefits?
-The script suggests that NSDR can be practiced for 10 to 30 minutes, or even an hour, with the aim of finding the minimal effective dose that provides restorative benefits similar to sleep.
What are the benefits of practicing NSDR?
-Practicing NSDR can lead to increased dopamine levels, improved cognitive performance, and a subjective feeling of having slept for several hours, which can be beneficial for those with sleep difficulties.
How does NSDR differ from meditation?
-Meditation is a focusing exercise that often involves directing attention to a specific point or thought, whereas NSDR is about relaxation and being in a sensory state, focusing on bodily sensations without drifting into past or future thoughts.
Can NSDR help with sleep difficulties?
-Yes, NSDR can be particularly beneficial for those who have challenges falling asleep, as it teaches self-directed relaxation and can be practiced at any time of the day or night.
What is the relationship between NSDR and the brain's reward and motivation pathways?
-The increase in dopamine levels observed after NSDR suggests a potential impact on the brain's reward and motivation pathways, which could contribute to the reported feelings of rejuvenation and mental clarity.
Is there any scientific collaboration planned to study NSDR?
-Yes, there is a collaboration brewing between the speaker and Dr. Matthew Walker, a renowned sleep researcher, to explore the neural level effects of NSDR using brain imaging techniques.
What is the primary goal of practicing NSDR?
-The primary goal of NSDR is to restore mental and physical vigor through relaxation techniques that are distinct from meditation, hypnosis, or pharmacology, and to potentially recover from sleep loss.
How does the speaker personally utilize NSDR?
-The speaker practices NSDR about once a day, at any time that suits their needs, to feel rejuvenated and to simulate the effects of a full night's sleep, even if they have only slept for a few hours.
Outlines
π§ββοΈ Yoga Nidra and Non-Sleep Deep Rest
The speaker introduces Yoga Nidra, an ancient practice that involves lying still while awake to induce relaxation and replenish mental and physical energy. They share their personal experience with the practice, noting its restorative effects and how it made them feel as if they had slept for eight hours. The speaker then discusses their research into stress mitigation and trauma, leading them to explore Yoga Nidra's effects on the brain. They mention a study from Denmark that showed a 60% increase in dopamine levels in the brain after practicing Yoga Nidra, which is associated with improved cognitive performance. The speaker also introduces the concept of Non-Sleep Deep Rest (NSDR), a protocol they developed to simplify Yoga Nidra for scientific study, focusing on the physiological effects rather than the spiritual or mystical aspects.
π Exploring Non-Sleep Deep Rest for Sleep Recovery
The speaker delves into the differences between Non-Sleep Deep Rest (NSDR) and other relaxation techniques like meditation and hypnosis. They explain that NSDR is distinct from meditation, which is a focus exercise, and hypnosis, which is designed to solve specific problems. NSDR aims to restore mental and physical vigor and teach self-relaxation. The speaker shares anecdotal evidence that people who struggle with sleep find NSDR beneficial at any time of day or night. They also discuss the potential for NSDR to mimic sleep recovery, although more research is needed to confirm this. The speaker concludes by emphasizing the importance of NSDR as a tool for enhancing well-being and the preliminary findings suggesting its effectiveness in increasing dopamine levels in the brain, which could contribute to improved cognitive function.
Mindmap
Keywords
π‘Yoga Nidra
π‘Dopamine
π‘Non-Sleep Deep Rest (NSDR)
π‘Stress Mitigation
π‘Trauma Treatment Center
π‘Respiratory Sinus Arrhythmia
π‘Sympathetic Autonomic Arousal
π‘Positron Emission Tomography (PET)
π‘Cognitive Tasks
π‘Neuroimaging
π‘Matthew Walker
Highlights
Yoga Nidra is a protocol that can help explore the importance of sleep and its effects on mental and physical vigor.
Yoga Nidra involves lying down and trying to stay awake while remaining completely still for 10 to 20 minutes.
People who practice Yoga Nidra experience a 60% increase in dopamine in key brain areas.
Yoga Nidra has been used to offset sleep loss and create states of replenished mental and physical vigor.
The speaker shifted their lab focus from animal studies to human studies to explore stress mitigation and trauma.
Non-sleep deep rest (NSDR) was developed as a simplified version of Yoga Nidra, focusing on the physical rest aspect.
NSDR involves long exhale breathing to slow the heart rate and calm the body.
The speaker found NSDR to be incredibly restorative, especially when not sleeping well.
NSDR creates dramatic decreases in sympathetic autonomic arousal, similar to a shallow state of sleep.
A study from Denmark showed a significant increase in dopamine in the striatum after practicing Yoga Nidra.
Post-Yoga Nidra performance on memory and cognitive tasks is improved.
The speaker is collaborating with Dr. Matthew Walker to explore the neural level during non-sleep deep rest.
NSDR is different from meditation as it focuses on relaxation rather than focus.
NSDR can be practiced at any time of the day or night to help with sleep difficulties.
Yoga Nidra and NSDR are protocols for restoring mental and physical vigor that are safe and have no cost.
The speaker finds NSDR to be a potent tool for personal use, providing a significant increase in dopamine and mental clarity.
NSDR is a protocol that can help people explore the restoration of mental and physical vigor outside of traditional sleep.
Transcripts
if ever there was a protocol that is
useful for people to explore given that
sleep is so important and mental and
physical Vigor are so important it's a
10 to 20 minute or I've continued to do
it about once a day and I personally
just feel as if I've slept 8 hours feel
amazing people who did this experienced
a 60% increase in dopamine in these key
brain areas this is wild this is a big
effect what is
this I first thought about and learned
about something called Yoga Nidra Yoga
Nidra means yoga sleep there's a
thousand-year-old or more protocol where
you lie down and you try to stay awake
while remaining completely still it
involves some long exhale breathing
which we know slows the heart rate
through respiratory sinus arhythmia
which is a good thing it slows the heart
rate and it had long been used as a way
to offset sleep loss as well as to just
create states of replenished mental and
physical Vigor even if you slept well
and there are a bunch of theories and
some actually interesting writings about
yoga Nedra potentially allowing people
to um tap into intentions and things
like that okay great I learned about
this process by the way somewhere around
2015 2016 and I decided to shift a
significant portion of my lab from
animal studies to human studies and I
was very interested in stress mitigation
and Trauma so I went visit a trauma
Treatment Center in Florida where they
were doing Yoga Nidra with people every
morning for an hour they would wake up
they would do this yoga NRA for an hour
I decided to participate once or twice
and I found it to be incredibly
restorative because I wasn't sleeping
well on that trip and I would come out
of it thinking like I just felt like I
slept eight hours I only slept four or
five broken hours I do this one hour of
Yoga Nidra and whoa feel amazing like
this is wild this is a big effect what
is this go back to my laboratory we're
studying stress stress mitigation
techniques and for whatever reason you
know I decided okay we could talk about
Yoga Nidra but it's a little bit like
talking about meditation and then you
have these name which is you know a
little complicated for the scientific
literature because it's not clear
exactly what it is and I want to be very
clear I'm not trying to take anything
away from Yoga Nidra or those practices
I have tremendous respect for them but I
came up with this thing called non-sleep
deep rest or nsdr for short which a
gives people some sense of what they're
doing and B strips away the intentions
and any kind of mysticism whatsoever and
it really just involves lying down for
anywhere from 10 to 30 minutes or an
hour I suppose and people are doing long
exhale breathing to slow their heart
rate and calm down doing a sort of body
scan of paying attention to different
parts of their body trying to stay awake
but if they fall asleep it's okay we
observe that it creates very dramatic
decreases in sympathetic autonomic
arousal AKA alertness and places the
brain into and body into kind of a of a
a shallow state of sleep not surprising
but a state that is unusual and at least
to my knowledge not observed in other
meditative States at least you know to
my knowledge but to be fair we didn't do
neuroimaging of this so we didn't have a
lot of insight into it I started digging
around in the literature and turns out
there's a study out of a medical
hospital in Denmark that had people
doing Yoga Nidra for an hour so a very
similar protocol but an hour using
what's called pet positron amiss
tomography measuring the amount of
dopamine in the reserve pool in a
certain key area of the brain called the
striatum which is involved in the
generation of movement it's also part of
the reward and motivation pathway
although you know there a bunch of
different Pathways for dopamine so I
want to be clear about that we talked
about that earlier so what they observed
was really interesting they observed at
least by Patron amission
tomography that people who did this
1hour yoganidra protocol experienced a
60% above Baseline increase in dopamine
in these key brain areas just from this
hour of lying there completely still
trying to stay awake listening to this
script relaxation I think like this is
wild and then there's some other studies
showing that post Yoga Nidra performance
on memory tasks or other cognitive tasks
is improved I got very excited about
this and started whittling down the
non-sleep Deep breast protocol to what
we hope is the minimal effective dose
which is about 10 minutes of non-sleep
deep rest um we've done some exploration
of that in my lab currently there is a
collaboration Brewing between myself and
Dr Matthew Walker
the author of why we sleep the great
sleep researcher the great Matt Walker
to explore what is happening at a neural
level using brain Imaging during
non-sleep deep rest Matt has some my
understanding is some insight or
hypotheses I don't know you know what
exactly um is based on so I want to be
very clear this is all very very
preliminary that certain pockets of the
brain might be able to go under go
sleep-like States in things like nsdr
Yoga Nidra that is not whole brain
sleeping um but it might be pockets of
brain areas um going to sleep like
States H but the whole purpose of doing
these experiments going forward this
collaboration is to figure out exactly
what's happening at a neural level
during non-sleep deep rest and how
closely it mimics sleep can you recover
sleep that you lost we don't know here's
what we do know subjectively and again
this is anic data if you will these are
people who have challenges falling
asleep often benefit from doing
non-sleep deep rest a 10-minute or
20-minute protocol at any time of day or
night because it's teaching you to
self-direct your own
relaxation it's different than
meditation because meditation involves
focusing meditation is really a focusing
perceptual exercise think about your
third eye center focus on your breath
redirect your focus every time it drifts
meditation is a focus exercise and work
from Wendy Suzuki's Lab at NYU has shown
that it can improve performance in
different cognitive tasks but the
traditional forms of meditation
sometimes can disrupt people's ability
to sleep well why well you're increasing
Focus capacity to fall asleep you need
to kind of defocus and let go of your
thoughts it's kind of interesting at the
beginning of all yoga needra scripts at
least the ones I've heard you hear um
you're going to move from thinking and
doing to being and feeling very new Agy
language but let's explore that thinking
and doing is about anticipation it's
about memory to feeling and being you're
going into as much as possible a purely
sensory state right you're focusing on
just how things feel you're not thinking
into the Future Past you're just
thinking future or past you're just
feeling sensation in your body very
interesting and we so different than
than meditation different than hypnosis
hypnosis is a sort of meditation
designed to solve a specific problem
quit smoking relax less pain okay
meditation more of a focus exercise
non-sleep deep rest is used to restore
mental and physical Vigor and to teach
you to relax yourself so it can be done
in the middle of the night if you're
having trouble sleeping it can be done
in the morning this is when I typically
like to do it I did morning I woke up at
5:00 that's a little early for me I she
had a phone call uh for about an hour
and then I realized oh goodness I got to
get up soon I'm going to take 30 minutes
and do a 30 minute non-sleep deep rest
or in this case it was yoga Nitra I come
out of that and I recall fa being in a
pseudo sleep State and I personally just
feel as if I've slept 8 hours and many
people report the similar sensation and
again it's subjective but I think if
ever there was a protocol that is useful
for people to explore given that it's
safe at zero cost and that sleep is so
important and mental and physical Vigor
are so important and the data on
dopamine it's a 10 to 20 minute Yoga
Nidra or nsdr script to me it's one of
the more interesting aspects of
protocols meaning you know we have
exercise protocols we have nutrition
protocols we got deliberate heat
exposure deliberate cold exposure
protocols what about protocols for
restoring mental and physical Vigor that
aren't meditation that aren't hypnosis
that aren't pharmacology and what does
that look like it's taking the brain out
of that anticipatory mode so if we
speculate go okay move from thinking and
doing to being in Feeling Again very new
Agy but what are we doing we're
deliberately shifting our thinking away
from the very types of thought and
action that deplete the dopamine Reserve
pool right and should we be surprised
that there's this significant increase
in dopamine in the striatum post Yoga
Nidra or nsdr probably not because
you're not tapping into that neural
circuitry for a period of time it also
underscores the extent to which in our
Waking Life we are constantly in Gold
directed Behavior even when we don't
realize it and so um I find nsdr to be
among the most potent and important
tools or protocols that I've used in my
own life I've continued to do it about
once a day um any time of day or night
sometimes based on need to get more
sleep sometimes just as a practice and
even 10 minutes of nsdr for me I emerge
from that feeling completely completely
different and always better
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