Or maybe you're a werewolf. Just a thought.
- Laying around with your eyes open staring blankly at the wall hoping to fall asleep? Wrong! Close your eyes regardless of anything, even if your bedroom sparks on fire, it'll help you fall asleep faster.
- Avoid stimulants. Don't drink coffee or caffeinated soda, and sugar in general. Avoid sinus and diet pills that speed up metabolism, it'll keep you up longer after taking them.
- Exercise. But not right before you go to bed. Your increased heart rate might keep you awake. Personally, I like to exercise right before going to bed, and I use the natural "calm down after exercise" to relax and fall asleep.
- Don't eat 2-3 hours before going to bed. Put that turkey dinner back in the fridge, it's time to go to bed! If you eat a big meal at night, or eat food 2-3 hours before going to bed, you'll have problems going to bed while your body tries to digest the food while you lay down.
- Don't nap during the day. If you nap a lot during the day, your body will get adjusted to short burst of sleep to oppose to a full 8 hour sleeping period. Also, if you nap long enough, you simply "won't need to sleep", so while you'll wide awake at night, and asleep in the morning, it'll be hard to adjust to normal life in this society in this manner.
- Turn off that TV/computer. I know you stay up way past your bed time watching youtube videos and playing games. Turn the TV/computer off 30-15 minutes before you go to bed. Go brush your teeth, read a book, listen to some relaxing music.
- Don't concentrate. What? Are you working on a math problem? No? Then stop concentrating, allow random thoughts to appear and thrive in your mind, let each thought lead to another thought and let those thoughts growing out of other thoughts to drift you off to sleep.
If you continue to have problems with sleeping, contact a medical professional. (No, that doesn't mean your twice removed great uncle Tim. Go to a REAL doctor.)
