Tsundoku is a beautiful Japanese word for acquiring and piling up books without reading them.

It is constructed from two words that loosely mean "piling up" and "reading."

It's easy to fall prey to tsundoku. Immediately upon entering a bookstore, I'm filled with the promise of knowledge and entertainment that exudes from the books. Each book calls out to share its wisdom and the draw of quiet hours spent reading it.

Given that it takes hours to read most books and only moments to buy them, practising tsundoku is a common pastime.

The sketch is loosely based on my parents’ bedroom while I grew up, both of whom are experienced and talented tsundoku-ers/tsundokists.

This sketch and many other word-related sketches appear in my book Big Ideas Little Pictures. I won't be offended if the book makes it into a beautiful pile—just please pop it at the top.

3,500 Lifetime Reads—the number of books you might read in a lifetime

Tsundoku

One of the best virtuous circles. One of my more surprising recent reads has been Novak Djokovic’s Serve to Win about diet, discipline, going gluten-free and physical and mental excellence. The guy certainly knows about excellence and it was neat to learn his philosophy on eating — the book contains recipes — and taking care of yourself including some serious respect for sleep. This sketchplanation is just one of the reason’s why. Since reading it I’ve put an alarm on every night to remind me to respect sleep. Night!

The virtuous cycle of exercise and sleep

Update: More recent research has brought into question the captivating notion of ego depletion with difficulties reproducing some key experiments and suggesting other factors may be at work.

In his book You are now less dumb, David McCraney explains an concept called ego depletion with the basic idea that our brains require fuel, particularly the decision-making and glucose hungry pre-frontal cortex. Every time you have to make decisions or deal with difficult situations it tires you such that we have a sort of finite amount of will power. If you spent the morning battling to get the kids dressed and out the door, then jostling your way through a crowded commute, by the time you get to work you’re more likely to say ‘whatever’ to any decisions that come your way. Making decisions is hard work.

McCraney brings up a remarkable, and slightly disturbing, study by Shai Danziger which followed eight Israeli judges as they decided on over 1,000 parole applications. The findings show that prisoners were most likely to be granted parole first thing in the morning, after a snack break, and right after lunch. If you were unlucky enough to be up for parole just before lunch, bad luck.

If you want the most control over your own mind so that you can alter your responses to the world instead of giving in and doing what comes naturally, stay fresh. Take breaks. Get some sleep. And until we understand what ego depletion really is, don’t make important decisions on an empty stomach.

Here’s a nice summary of Shai Danziger’s parole study in the Economist including a remarkable chart.

Don’t make important decisions on an empty stomach

This may have been obvious from day one, but despite the basic geometry of our necks it took me many years to figure out that back sleepers generally need just the one pillow and side sleepers are better off with two. Still think the pillow industry could do with a shake up though to solve basic problems like not falling into the gap between pillows, pillows made for two or pillows that more flexibly adjust as you turn over.

Back sleepers, side sleepers

Turns out a bunch of substances have the power to make you sleepy - tryptophan, vitamin B6, calcium, glycine, lactucarium and carbohydrates are some of the major ones. Some even interact with each other for maximum sleepiness. A few common foods with these compounds in good measure include:

turkey, walnuts - tryptophan
tuna, pistachios - vitamin B6
dairy - calcium
chamomile - glycine
lettuce - lactucarium

So an evening turkey or tuna, walnut, cheese and lettuce sandwich with a glass of milk and a side of pistachios or walnuts and you’ll be set for a good night.

Sleepy foods

We sleep for around one third of our lives. If you live until you're 90 years old you will have slept for a remarkable 32 years.

If you live ‘til you’re 90 you will have slept for 32 years

Via The Wall Street Journal: The Perfect Nap and @jessmnhey.

How long to nap

Have a hard time remembering your dreams after waking up from sleep?

Here's a little technique to try and remember a little more from your dreams: Will, Still and Fill.

Remember your dreams

It’s the general sage backcountry camping advice - don’t camp right on the edge of water, but so often people are tempted to camp right on the edge. But there are excellent reasons not to: there are more bugs, it gets much colder and damper overnight, and you’re likely to disturb animals coming for a drink which is not good for your sleep, your camp, or good for them. Instead, camp 50 yards, or more, away, and go watch the sunset by the edge of the lake - preferably with a dip.

Why camp 50 yards from water

My technique, for when you really have to get somewhere and are starting to feel tired: Pull over, neck coffee, 15 min shut-eye, cruise on. I have read that this is called a nappuccino.

There’s some science behind this: the half-life of caffeine.

Sleep sketches