It’s actually like the title asks; What does everyone here do when you can’t sleep and are wide awake besides being on phone?

So let’s say it’s in the middle of the night and you are unable to sleep. You have to keep things soundless due to family or partner.

Trying to get the phone usage significantly lower when being in bed but it feels like nothing can replace the ‘easiness of mindlessly scrolling’.

  • Fondots@lemmy.world
    8·
    16 hours ago

    I very rarely have trouble sleeping, but when I do, this is what I’ve always done since childhood and it hasn’t failed me yet.

    I lay there, with my eyes closed, resist any temptation to look at my phone or do anything else, make myself as comfortable as possible wrapped up in blankets and pillows and whatever

    And I just kind of direct my mind towards something pointless and let it wander down that rabbit hole

    Maybe I’ll imagine sort of a bunch of swirling lights and colors and just kind of watch them, look for patterns, etc.

    Or I’ll make up stories. I’m no author, but I’ll imagine myself as maybe a super hero, or an astronaut, or a wizard, or any of those sort of stock characters, and I imagine myself saving the world, or fighting a dragon, or boldly going where no man has gone before. These stories I’m making up aren’t deep, they’re a crappy universe full of plot holes and the kinds of characters an elementary schooler playing make-believe would come up with, because of course the superhero I’m imagining myself as can fly and has heat vision and wolverine claws and can turn invisible and has super strength and…

    Or I just kind of think about simple things I enjoy. Places I could go hiking with my dog, date nights with my wife, meals I’d like to cook for friends, etc.

    Whatever it is, I just kind of let my mind wander down that road, it takes my mind off of whatever was keeping me awake, and after I while my focus begins to falter and I just sort of slip into sleep from there.

    I’m pretty sure this kind of falls under the category of some kind of meditation. My work once did a mandatory “wellness retreat” as a “training” thing I had to go to. One of the things we did was a guided meditation session, and that felt like the same sort of thing (but for people who are boring and lack the imagination to think of a scenario to meditate on by themselves, imagining myself flying an x-wing through an asteroid field beats the pants off of imagining I’m walking through a meadow to the beach or whatever that lady was having us imagine)

    Sometimes a little background noise is helpful. I’m not personally too picky about what it is, I like trip hop music for this purpose, or forest sounds, or just random YouTube videos (not even necessarily anything relaxing, I’ve fallen asleep to some machinist YouTubers plenty of times and the sound of a mill, lathe, band saw, grinder, etc. isn’t exactly what I’d call soothing.

    And when all else fails, I rub one out