The 5-minute bedtime habit can help you fall asleep faster

What a nightmare!

You’ve had a glass of warm milk, read a book and counted sheep – but the Sandman isn’t coming. Many Americans need half an hour to fall asleep, although it shouldn’t take that long to drift off.

A five-minute trick can save you precious time – and sheep. Before you hit the grass, try writing a list of tasks you need to tackle the next day.

“When I started making nightly to-do lists, I had no idea it would help me sleep—I just wanted a way to better track my day-to-day priorities and productivity,” wrote CNET managing editor Adam Benjamin. . last week.

“So every night before bed, I wrote down three things I wanted to do the next day,” Benjamin continued. “I would also note one good thing that happened during the day, no matter how small.”

There is science to back up the sleep suggestion. A 2017 study found that participants who wrote a to-do list before bed instead of journaling about their accomplishments fell asleep “significantly faster.”

Nine minutes, to be exact, which Baylor University researchers confirmed with a diagnostic test.

“The more specifically participants wrote down their to-do list, the faster they subsequently fell asleep, while the opposite trend was observed when participants wrote down completed activities,” the study authors wrote in the Journal of Experimental Psychology.

They speculated that writing down tasks allows you to push your worries away, so you don’t have to think about them while you’re trying to sleep.

The concept is called “cognitive download”. It reduces the mental effort required to complete a task, which can ultimately lead to better performance.

Examples include writing a grocery list, setting a reminder on your phone for an upcoming meeting, and leaving an item in a designated place to remember later.

The importance of “cognitive download” was demonstrated in a 2014 study of German IT workers. Employees who didn’t complete tasks by the end of the week had worse sleep over the weekend because they spent more time worrying about unfinished business.

Sleep experts who spoke to CNN recommended setting aside “worry time” outside of the bedroom to explore worries that might be keeping you up at night and emailing yourself your to-do list.

“It gives you satisfaction and knowing that it’s night and you can’t do anything with your list, but you can get it tomorrow,” Dr. Vsevolod Polotsky, a doctor of sleep medicine.