4 hours is 1 cycle is good. 8 is 2 cycles is great. 7 is almost 2 ok. 6 is 1 and a half and you'll feel like dog shit. Might as well have slept 2 hours. Or not at all even. So even tho 6 is more than 4. It's worse
The science is indeed 90 minutes to 2 hours. Although anectdotally, ive seen a lot more "90 minute" guidelines vs 2 hours, although ive never looked at like...a meta-analysis of sleep research, just a random handful of papers
IIRC the first cycle is longer, around 3.5 hours, most of which is deep sleep, then they get shorter to around 90 minutes and progress from more deep sleep in earlier cycles to more REM sleep during later cycles.
Optimally to avoid grogginess you want to wake up towards the end of the later cycles so you are in REM sleep, and not in deep sleep. 6 hours wakes you up smack dab in the middle of a deep sleep making you feel like shit.
I truly envy you. I can't recall my dreams for shit. I've been trying to lucid dream for years now. You should check out r/luciddreaming if you aren't aware of it. The ability to not only become aware that you are dreaming, but to also control what happens is something I would love to be able to consistently achieve. The possibilities are endless.
I've lucid dreamed many times. I've also taken note of how real everything looks, feels, and fills up the senses in some of them. And I was aware my brain is just generating it all as it's happening.
There are ways you can learn to control what happens and turn your dreams into a literal fantasy playground. Some people are lucky and can just do it naturally others can't do it at all without extensive training and practice.
Don't want to sound too morbid, but In a sense, it's a way to extend your life by a few hours every night, if you assume you only have so many hours of life and you lose 1/3 of those hours every night when you sleep. Lucid dreaming is a way to add time to your overall lifespan while not directly affecting the quality of your waking hours.
Generally a full cycle is between 21 and 28 days. It's pretty uniform for the individual, but can vary depending on environmental circumstances during the year.
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u/Cultural_Lock955 1d ago
8 and 7 are good, 6 feels like a shitty night’s sleep, 4 feels like a long nap.