What I’ve Learnt About How to Sleep
Sleeping too much can tire me out as much as sleeping too little.
Waking up in a sleep cycle, about 1 and a 1⁄2 hours, is tiring.
Switching off digital devices an hour before bed helps me sleep.
My body has an internal clock and I can just decide when to wake up by setting an intention to do so before you go to bed.
The costs of missed sleep often show up not the next day, but the day after that.
Earplugs work, but I have to roll them thin before inserting them, otherwise they won’t seal themselves in your ear.
Blocking out light works. Pro-tip: use tin-foil. It’s good for more than just blocking out telepaths.
Melatonin isn’t meant for putting you to sleep immediately. You take it several hours before your intended bed time, to shift your sleep schedule.
I regularly get migraines if I stay awake >2-3 hours past my normal bed time.
I can quickly fix my sleeping schedule if I want to.
Shifting your sleep schedule too quickly can lead to poor sleep.
Consistency matters a lot for good sleep.
After I fix my sleep schedule, it’s glaringly obvious when I feel tired. You want to go to sleep on time.
I can just decide to go to sleep. Yes, even if I’m doom scrolling on twitter late at night.
Consciously weighing the value of going to sleep vs. continuing what I’m doing right now helps me realize I want to go to sleep. Is sacrificing tomorrow worth what you’re doing today?
I start reading OOD things when I’m awake too late: this includes things I’ve always wanted to read, but never got around to. Like textbooks, blog posts, papers etc.
I can cough so much that I can’t fall asleep for more than an hour for weeks.
I become funnier when I’m severely sleep-deprived.
Absent corrective efforts, my sleep schedule drifts forwards each night.
When I sleep late, the next day I feel constrained by my sleep schedule, as I have fewer hours to stay awake. So I decide to sleep later to “have more time”.
Magnesium gives me crazy dreams. Like, spelunking caverns whilst hiding from the dragon god in Demon Souls, fighting zombies for chocolate in supermarkets, and finding a space-warping trash stream that accelerates till its velocity hits a singularity. Yes, that was a single dream.
I can just change clothes at night if I’m too hot/cold in bed.
Caffeine doesn’t make me more awake, but does stave off tiredness for several hours.
When I get mentally exhausted, I can take a 10-minute nap to get a second wind.
Going to the gym at night doesn’t make me that tired.
Eating before bed makes it harder to sleep.
There are probably other things I’m missing, but I can’t really think of what at the moment. So ends my attempt at a listicle. Man, this 500 word requirement is a bit tedious. Ah well, such requirements are useful and we had to set the limit somewhere.
If I consider getting off the bed in the morning, but I feel tired, is there an easy way to figure out whether I have slept too little or too much?
Taking a nap when I return home from work is like magic: it resets my brain so that the evening feels like getting an extra piece of weekend.
Waking up at the same time every day is as important, if not more important, than the quantity slept (up to a point).
For example, if I go to bed 1-2 hours later than usual, I will still choose to wake up at the same time the next day to maintain my normal circadian rhythm. But if I stay up 3+ hours later than usual, then sleeping in makes me feel better.
I’d do some research online to confirm this for yourself, as well :)
Honestly, I’d just suggest moving your sleeping schedule forwards/backwards in ~30 minute chunks until you find something more restful and then do binary search. Just takes a few days.
Also, you may want to get blood work done and get a Whoop sleep tracker to gather some data bearing on what’s stopping you from sleeping well.
I do this too to block out light.
Are you guys talking about tin foil for small lights that some appliances emit? For windows I don’t understand why not just use a curtain.
Yeah, I’m talking about covering appliances’ small indicator lights, because gaff tape alone allows light to shine through.
Curtains don’t cover every inch of the windows.