Lack of sleep is one of the biggest issues of our time. Not because you are doing anything useful, or because you don’t have time to sleep.
This article is about taming your tiredness so you can sleep.
This is one thing no one is talking about… you are too tired to go to bed, you are too tired to go to sleep.
Most of my life I lived a life like this: I would work, intensely, 12-18 hours a day. Then I would be too tired to go to sleep.
I may even get to my bedroom, and sit on the edge of the bed, preening, or just thinking, or jumping up and racing back to my desk to finish just one more task.
My mind was both tired and busy. It would take me hours to get from the edge of the bed to turning off the light.
Now, you probably aren’t spending your time working till it’s time to go to bed. But being too tired to go to bed, turn off the light and go to sleep is a lot of people’s problem.
I have found two strategies that worked for me:
- Bring down my tiredness level to normal… go from exhausted, spent to just tired and ready to go to bed.
The totally counter intuitive solution I used is drink half a cup of cup of coffee, just as I was going to bed.
Coffee perks you up, normally, but when you are too tired, it makes you just the right tired to go to bed.
The small amount of caffeine creates an unexpected effect: it perks you up just enough to do what you need to do: lie down and turn off the light.
It is also, in my experience, the best way to shut the chattering mind up… so you can drift off to sleep.Of course, if you weren’t exhausted enough: this method is not for you.
If you are just plain tired from watching videos, or some other non-essential stuff, then I also have the other method.
- Beware: this may need the Foresight capacity to be activated, or you will poo-poo it, discount it, and won’t do it.
Getting Ready for Bed Before You Are Ready for Bed
Nowadays I don’t work as hard as I used to. I have noticed that all the important, must do things didn’t make a difference.
But I still have nights that I would not be able to meet my goal of being in bed by 9 pm, if I didn’t do this move… so here you go.
I made a list of all the things I normally do to get ready for bed, brushing my teeth, taking my vitamins, filling a glass with water and set it on the night table, turning the heat lower, checking my emails, preparing what to wear the next day, setting up the breakfast tasks so all I need to do is flip a switch in the morning.
I told you it needs foresight…
So I have my list, and I start doing the steps hours before it is my bedtime. I brush my teeth after my evening meal… This serves a double purpose: I haven’t been snacking… I don’t want to brush my teeth again! My body will thank me for it.
By the time it is time to go to bed, all the preparation is done, all I need to do is pee, undress and slip under the cover.
The idea came from this quote:
I used to find that I was so tired that I didn’t want to go to bed because it seemed like too much trouble to get ready, take out my contacts, wash my face, and brush my teeth. Now I try to get ready earlier so that there’s very little I need to do when it’s actually time for bed.
Brush your teeth right after dinner so you have one less thing to do later. Set tomorrow’s alarm early in the day, take out your contacts and use your glasses as soon as you get home from work, and wash your face right after dinner when you brush your teeth. The more bedtime prep you can do early on, the easier it will be to crash whenever sleep starts to call. You won’t have to stall anymore because slipping away into dreamland will be the only thing left on your list
The part about the contacts was the straw that pushed me over.
I remember trying to remove my contacts in a hurry, when I was tired, and it was a struggle. One time I even hurt my eyes and had to be taken to the emergency room. They put vitamin C in my eyes… Can you imagine how it stung?
What is the piece that grabs you and tells you: I should do this!
Please share.
