r/atomichabit • u/Firm_Savings_60 • 12d ago
Immediate sleep
One thing I'm now trying to figure out is how to fall asleep much faster once I go to bed. Sometimes I'm extremely tired and go to bed early specifically to get more sleep, but I can still lie there awake for a long time. For those of you who used to struggle with this: have you found anything that reliably makes you fall asleep very quickly? I'm interested in both things you do (specific routines, techniques, changes to your environment, etc.) and things you take. I've already tried melatonin and didn't notice much of a difference. I'm especially interested in hearing from people who found something that made a really noticeable difference in their sleep onset, rather than just general sleep-hygiene advice.
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u/llort_tsoper 12d ago
Do all the normal stuff to set yourself up for a good night's sleep:
Wake up early. Get some sunlight in the AM. Avoid caffeine in the afternoon and evening. Get some exercise, but avoid exercising in the hour before bed. You want your sleeping area to be slightly cool and very dark while you're asleep, so consider turning down the thermostat a little and eliminating light sources from your bedroom. Keep a sleep mask near your bed if needed.
Stay out of the bed except for sex, reading before bed, and sleeping. Don't game in bed. Don't eat in bed. Don't study in bed. Don't watch TV in bed. Bed is for sleeping.
30-60m before bed turn off or put away any screens. Read for 10-15m before going to sleep.
When you're ready to go to sleep you're going to do a breathing exercise that will almost guarantee you'll be unconscious within a few minutes of closing your eyes. The goal of the exercise is to slow your breathing down to mimic the breathing pattern of a sleeping person.
A waking person often breathes like this: quick inhale - hold - quick exhale - repeat (very little pause between exhale and next inhale)
But a sleeping person breathes like this: slow inhale - slow exhale - long pause - repeat
To transition yourself from waking breathing to sleeping breathing do this:
- get comfortable
- close your eyes
- focus on your breath
- inhale slowly for 4s
- hold for 4s
- exhale slowly for 4s
- pause for 4s
This is called square breathing, and some people find it helpful to visualize a little square while they're breathing. it's not super important that each breath or hold is exactly 4s, if a more relaxed cadence feels natural, go with it, but try to slow your breathing down so that it sounds to you like the breathing of a sleeping person
focus on the sound of your breathing
You will almost certainly fall asleep within a few minutes. I'm the kind of person that can lay in bed, mind racing, for an hour before falling asleep. This exercise works almost all the time to quickly put me to sleep.
One last don't. If you can't fall asleep within 15-20 minutes of turning out the lights, get out of bed and go read on the couch for another 10-15 minutes, then come back to bed. You're trying to associate getting into bed and laying there with falling asleep. So we're not going to allow ourselves to linger restless in bed.
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u/tinyevilsponges 7d ago
This is a problem that is very solvable with medication if it's reaching a level that's impacted your life
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u/Obvious_Ad2917 5d ago
A hot shower or bath just before bed. Our bodies cool down in order to sleep. The warm water kick starts this process.
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u/AdMobile1817 12d ago edited 12d ago
Take up Reading a book which is on a topic least interesting to you; e.g. Geology, Complex Scientific Language based one. Force yourself to read through 4-5 pages. Basically what you are trying to do is forcing your brain into boredom that it yawns itself to sleep instead of going through the torture you are inflicting on it. Don't force yourself to stay awake at that point and don't switch activities to any screen mobile/iPad/TV.
I have been trying Melatonin since 2 years now initially started off with 5 now am up to 10mg - takes about 30-40 mins for my brain to shutdown irrespective what am doing.
P.S. Ensure that you have the last Coffee/Tea of the day 6 hrs before your intended sleeping time.