I used to think, that if you wake up at the beginning/middle of REM, you go back to REM when you fall asleep. But I no longer think that's true.
I believe, that no matter when in your sleep cycle you wake up, you always start to fall asleep with NREM. The only difference is, how long this NREM is. At the beginning of your night/sleep, NREM can be as long as 80 min and REM only 10 min, so together they make an average 90 min sleep cycle.
But as you sleep, NREM gets shorter and REM longer. So after maybe 7-8 hours (not sure on this one), your sleep is almost only REM, (80 min REM and 10 min NREM), with a very short NREM. This is important for a WILD attempt, when you have to stay concious during NREM until you reach dream in REM. So obviously, the shorter the NREM, the easier is to make it through to REM.
REM in naps -
people do report having success with WILD (going straight to REM) even in the afternoon naps.
I did have maybe one or two WILDs in afternoon naps (4-5pm, with 8-10am waking time). But my best success was within 1-3 hours of waking up. I guess it could be individual.
But the basis is, that during a nap, our body knows that it's extra sleep, it doesn't have to do any deep sleep to regenerate and heal, so it does REM sleep. But if you nap close to your normal bed time, it could take it as normal sleep and it goes through sleep cycles with NREM and REM.
One of our members made a great post about this, maybe he'll stop by, because I can't find that post to link it. Anyway, this is how I see it, correct me, if I'm wrong.
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