Animisha First of all, alas I cannot nap. Also, I don't really see the point in ten minutes resting before practising. However, I should have more micro-breaks during practising.
Animisha This is SO interesting. Let us not forget, Molly's schedule was created from her own experimenting using the insights gained by neuroscience. There is no one-schedule-fits-all.
Animisha, two comments.
(1) I've been sleep deprived for the vast majority of the past 39 years. I've found recently that even if I can't nap (b/c I can't fall asleep), simply being horizontal and closing my eyes for 10-30 min seems to help me function better the rest of the day. I don't feel better immediately afterwards, but it's clear that there's a significant effect later on. Of course, YMMV. I just mention this b/c I used to feel the same as you; I didn't see the point in "resting", as opposed to napping. I was just so desperate that I starting attempting to nap, and found that the combo of "horizontal" and "eyes closed" ended up being helpful later in the day, no matter how wildly my thoughts spun while I was "resting". (Often I felt like I wasn't resting, and sometimes I worried that it was even counterproductive. Now I wonder if it's akin to someone who is trying to learn to meditate - their thoughts are swirling and they haven't learned to let the thoughts come and go, so they just sit cross-legged thinking that they're doing it all wrong, when in fact it's all part of the process. The difference for me is that I really seem to need to be lying down.)
(2) For me, the effectiveness of any schedule (frequency/spacing of repeated attempts to learn anything, length of breaks, etc.) depends very much on how receptive my mind is, which is also dependent on how well-rested I've been. So not only is there no one-schedule-fits-all, I've found that there's no one-schedule-fits-me-always. I need to be attuned to when my mind is "ready" for another round, and I need to have/develop a sense of when I need a longer or shorter extended break.
I think the real value in Gebrian's work isn't any particular implementation of a schedule, but rather in her codifying the general structure of how to learn. The sloppy way that I've thought about it in the past is that I need frequent enough high-intensity focus to gather the basic facts and develop a general overview of the problem (so for piano, basic awareness of the notes, structure, rhythm, phrasing, jumps, how each section should "feel"), and then I need some "off" time to let my mind stew on the problem in the background (how to link passages; how to execute everything together into a cohesive musical whole?). Gebrian explains the "why" behind these ideas via neuroscience and offers concrete models as a starting point for people to begin thinking about what might work for them, but AFAIK her models aren't meant to be prescriptive.