If you have trouble getting to sleep at night, you need to pay special attention to your sleeping habits. Many people struggle with falling asleep and staying asleep, and they become lethargic and feel run down during the day as a result. These tips to go to sleep will help you get the rest you need through revealing healthy sleep habits and identifying those things you should avoid.
Tips to Go to Sleep – Establish Healthy Sleep Habits
Healthy sleep habits, maybe surprisingly, start the minute you get up in the morning. The first thing you need to do is get up and stretch. While lying in bed, make
sure you stretch your body to become relaxed and comfortable before you start your day. You should also be drinking several glasses of water throughout the morning and afternoon. Drinking water before bedtime will keep you fresh and hydrated, which is critical for calming your mind and body so that you can fall asleep easier and sleep more soundly.
Before going to bed, stretch again. Stretch out every major muscle group to promote relaxation. To paraphrase the old Calgon commercial “Stretching, take me away!”, When you feel “right”, and only when you feel “right”, it is time to go to bed. Avoid eating anything at bedtime. If you have a snack before going to bed, that is okay, but avoid anything “heavy” or “spicy” as it will only cause you to be tired and irritable when you wake up.
Also, be sure to put your alarm on for the morning (or whatever your required wake-up hour). Avoid hitting the “snooze button” if you can. You may think you are prolonging your sleep time. What you’re really doing is conditioning your body to expect and crave those extra few minutes. Your body will begin to crave more and more causing those last hours and minutes of your sleep to be the most unsatisfactory of your whole night. Those are the EXACT minutes when you want to be at your most restful as they are going to be the moments your body and mind remember for the entire day.
Avoid TV and Consuming Caffeine
Avoid watching television or using the computer immediately before bedtime. This will give you less time to unwind and relax. It is very tempting to use these things at bedtime, so try to resist viewing them as much as you possibly can. Instead, focus your mind and effort on reading or meditating if you want to fall asleep more quickly.
Avoiding caffeine and sugary drinks is another one of the best bedtime tips to fall asleep. Caffeine is a stimulant and makes you feel less sleepy immediately and makes it more likely for you to have difficulty staying asleep. Sugary drinks tell your body not to shut down its engine until they are processed. You don’t want your body revving when it’s time for sleep.
See also: https://fitnessandhealthadvice.com/the-best-washable-weighted-blanket/
Tips to Go to Sleep – Learn to Deal with Stress
It’s easy to develop healthy sleep habits. Sleeping is a natural part of life and everyone needs it. Still, there are factors that can lead to problems in that area. One of the most common reasons people don’t sleep is stress. It’s easy to let your day-to-day life get in the way of a good night’s sleep. Worrying about work deadlines. Feeling harried in the kid’s carpool. Feeling your performance is inadequate when having… you know… with your spouse. All of these stressors can negatively impact your sleep.
The last thing you want to do is to struggle with falling asleep or staying awake for too long. The good news is there are a variety of remedies identified in this article that can help you defeat stress allowing you to fall asleep easier and stay asleep for a longer period.
Probably the best stress reliever is covered in the following section. That is, of course, getting good, regular exercise. But, if you don’t consider yourself the exercising type or you are physically unable to participate in your regular exercise routine, you might consider aromatherapy.
Aromatherapy involves the application and sometimes diffusion of what are known as essential oils. Over time, people have come to understand how different essential oils can affect mood, healing, and, appropriate for our consideration, stress. Look for a future article on essential oils and aromatherapy.
Get Regular Exercise
Besides it benefiting your overall fitness and health, getting regular exercise is one of the best tips to go to sleep. My preference is for some sort of aerobic exercise. Raising your heart rate to an appropriate level every day will allow it to “power down” when you want it to more efficiently.
Aerobic exercise is not necessarily the answer for everyone. Since getting to sleep requires calming all those thoughts and emotions running through your brain, meditative exercise can be a good solution. Direct meditation or physical activities like yoga which have a meditative element can make falling asleep a lot easier.
Tips to Go to Sleep – It Bears Emphasis – Avoid Late-Night Caffeine
We’ve already recommended you avoid caffeine as an important tip to go to sleep. This substance can disrupt your sleep pattern enormously. Caffeine generally has
the effect of making your heart race. Obviously, that’s not inductive to good sleep. While caffeine gets your motor running quickly, the effects of caffeine can wear off within a short amount of time making you more tired than you were when you first decided to hit your rack.
There are alternatives to caffeinated beverages. The best we can recommend is plain old H2O or water. You may be tempted to consume something like fruit juice. However, that should be avoided as the sugar and acidic combination would serve to exacerbate restlessness. Rather than consuming large amounts of coffee and other forms of caffeine or a sugary beverage, consider taking herbal tea instead. The warmth has a calming effect and the contents won’t stimulate your digestive system to a great extent.
Tips to Go to Sleep – Avoid Reaching for the Smokes
People who smoke like to play that doing so helps them relax. This can be true to some extent. But, it’s more of a psychological calming than an actual physical 
calming. Nicotine is a central nervous system stimulant and can keep you awake at night. If you smoke, try to quit immediately. The effects of smoking are long-term, often devastating, and ultimately will not ease your sleep problem.
If you are a smoker and also experiencing problems getting to sleep, the first tip would be to avoid smoking at all costs. As noted, it’s a stimulant, so potentially the actual SOURCE of your inability to get to sleep. If you absolutely have to smoke to get that psychological calming, do so well before your planned sleep time and incorporate one of our other suggestions before you bed down for the night. That way you can get your psychological help before you get your physical help. The combination may just be what you need.
Don’t Sleep on These Tips
Once you have learned some simple tips to go to sleep, you will be well on your way to a more restful ending to your day. In addition to following the proper sleep patterns, you will also need to develop healthy sleep habits. Healthy sleep habits include getting enough rest, avoiding stimulants, exercising regularly, and eliminating things that can disrupt your sleep patterns such as watching too much television and smoking. If you can manage to do all of these things and stick to a regular schedule then you will find that you get a good night’s sleep and feel much better throughout your entire day.
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Struggling with insomnia is such a challenging thing! I have had to deal with this over the years and have tried many different options all with varying levels of success.
One thing that I have recently found to be helpful comes from the Calm app. I listen to a “sleep story” when I climb into bed and have a looping white noise / background track that plays through the rest of the night to encourage restful sleep. Not sure what the science behind that looks like but it has seemed to help me personally.
That’s a great suggestion and thanks for the comment. I would think the “science” behind it has something to do with the sounds triggering the release of chemicals into the brain which promote that sense of calm contributing to good sleep. The success of something like that is probably tuned to the individual. I’m glad you found something that works for you.
Hi William,
This is an excellent article and much needed for many people, there are many people who have trouble sleeping and the tips you have provided are simple and accessible without too much effort. I my self have problems getting a good nights sleep on many occasions.
I will personally start to stretch the major muscles before going to bed to aid my nights sleep as this is easy and simple to start doing straight away. The other tips are also great but I am personally ok with most of the those, I already exercise a number of times each week.
Great topic in a world where people are stressed and unable to relax, this post is much needed!
All the Best
Wince
These are all great tips to help you get to sleep quicker and to feel more rested after waking up. I’ve been doing my best to avoid drinking any kind of caffeine at least three to four hours before going to bed. The thing I struggle with the most is using my computer or my phone all the way up until I end up going to sleep.
Thanks for the comment. I have the same problem with using my computer right up until bedtime. Even though I know it’s not a good practice I just can’t help myself. My sleep suffers because of it.
Thank you for sharing this interesting article on falling asleep. It’s an area I sometimes struggle with. I especially liked that you stressed the importance of stretching and movement. That in itself makes a huge difference. Also, the importance of drinking water and staying hydrated is a very real thing. Many people don’t want to drink too much before bed because they think they will have to get up frequently during the night, but actually good hydration will help you sleep longer. Great article – thanks again!
Hi, I’ve just read your amazing post about tips to go to sleep quicker and feel more rested. To be honest, this article is a solution to my long-time sleepless night problem. Little did I know that stretching your boy plays such an important role. I always hate to drink water when going to bed to avoid nature calls but today I’ve learned how important it is to drink water before bedtime. Thus, I find this post very educative and informative. Thanks for sharing with us and I’ll also be sharing it too to spread the word.
this Blog is well put together separating the key factors which affects sleep and the ways to avoid it. I loved most the idea of letting ppl know that defusing armors helps contribute to a stress free and relaxing sleep. The importance of sleep needs to be known and you have done a good job putting it together.