If you want a great night’s sleep, all you need to do is PLaN!
PLaN is an acronym for Prepare, adjust Lighting, and control the Noise in your bedroom.
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Preparation
Preparation for sleep is one of the most important things you can do to improve the duration and quality of your sleep. First, stop taking stimulants by 2:00pm in the afternoon. Caffeine is so common in drinks today, that you may be ingesting more than you are even aware of. Stop drinking coffee, caffeinated teas and other drinks at least 8 hours before bedtime to give your body plenty of time to metabolize the stimulants that will otherwise keep you awake or interfere with your ability to get the deep sleep you need.
Another thing to consider is exercise. If you do exercise in the evening, stop at least 2-3 hours before bed to give your system plenty of time to slow back down before you lie down to sleep.
Heavy mental exercises, including video games especially, as well as many other mentally exerting activities, can get you so pumped up you cannot easily go to sleep. Give your mind at least an hour long calming break before you hit the sack. Reading, listening to laid back music, meditating, taking a slow walk around the neighborhood are all good strategies for winding down and getting ready to fall asleep.
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Light
Way back before we developed a means for lighting up the dark, man developed an adaptation that let him maximize his awake time which he needed in order to be able to gather or successfully hunt enough food to survive. That adaptation is light sensitivity. When the sun comes up, we naturally wake up, not due to some internal clock, but rather from the stimulating effects of light. Even with your eyelids closed, you can still easily perceive the presence of light, and it will interfere with your sleep. You can see how sensitive you are to light even through your eyelids. Close your eyes, then place your hand over your closed eyes and notice how much darker it gets. When you are trying to sleep in a room where a streetlight shines in the window, or in which you have a computer monitor on or even a bright nightlight, your nature keeps telling your mind, “Wake up! It’s morning already!”
The solutions are simple and obvious: shut the blinds, turn off the monitor or the nightlight. Can’t do that for some reason? Try wearing a sleep mask. As a bonus you get to feel like a movie star.
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Noise
We hear from lots of people about the irritating effects of noise, most commonly of the snoring spouse variety, but also from adjacent apartment dwellers and traffic noises. Another human adaption is sensitivity to unusual, infrequent or loud noises. Conversely, ongoing noises usually just get tuned out once you get used to them. So, if you suffer loss of sleep due to the former, and you cannot change where you sleep to a quieter venue, then ear plugs are a great solution. Find a really nice and soft ear plug that you can lie on comfortably, and regain the quiet you need for a good night’s sleep.
Alternatively, you can use the second adaptation, tuning out the sound, to help you sleep. Just get a white noise machine that will produce a nice calming masking sound. This sound will cover up most of the irritating noises you are now hearing, and because your mind will simply tune it out, the background white noise will not mess with your slumber. To see if a white noise machine might be the solution you have been seeking, test the theory by turning on a fan to see if it helps you get a better night’s rest. If it does, you can always upgrade to a white noise machine which will be considerably less expensive to operate, and which will not create a draft like a fan will, which is especially important in the winter.
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So, now you know how to PLaN to reliably get a great night’s sleep. Sweet dreams.
Until next time, be safe and do the right thing.
--Tom Bergman, Vice President
Ear Plug Superstore
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