Introduction to Sleep Hacks
The term “sleep hacks” has gained traction across several platforms in the last few years. This is a catch-all phrase for what seems to be an endless cornucopia of methods purported to enhance sleep. Sleep experts have mixed feelings about the term. Skeptics suggest sleep hacks are untested techniques and that the use of the word hack implies a degree of technological know-how that in some ways seems to undermine the importance of having a regular sleep schedule. More positive takes on the term see it as a sign of the growing awareness that sleep is one of the most useful health tools we have.
Sleep is not simply a time of repose; it is a vital biological process that impinges mightily on physical health, thinking, and feeling. A mounting body of evidence has shown that lack of sleep in sufficient amounts can lead directly to a host of awful health outcomes: you can become obese, or suffer heart and blood vessel disease, or be more anxious or lose your marbles altogether (November 3, 2016), or fail to regenerate the immune cells that keep you healthy.
This blog post aims to explore ten of the most popular sleep hacks. Some of these hacks are common knowledge in the public domain, while others are less well-known. Within this exploration, we evaluate the effectiveness of each technique, drawing on personal experience and scientific research. The handful of restorative sleep hacks we stumble upon over the course of this post appear to be practical strategies for most people to implement. The not-so-helpful hacks we encounter along the way serve as a cautionary tale about putting too much stock into sleep advice that lacks scientific backing.
Hack #1: The Power of Aromatherapy
Aromatherapy has gained acknowledgment as a widely accepted manner for encouraging relaxation and enhancing the quality of sleep. By harnessing the calming attributes of essential oils, one can generate an atmosphere ripe for restful slumber. Of the many essential oils that exist, lavender and chamomile are two that possess—indeed, even flaunt—their well-known tranquilizing effects. Studies have shown that these oils, when properly utilized, may work wonders in supplementing the force of sleep and extending its grip.
While I was investigating this sleep hack, I used lavender essential oil in my bedtime routine. I began by mixing a few drops of the oil into a diffuser about an hour before I planned to sleep. That evening, I “lifted it up” with my hands and rubbed it on my most fragrant parts—my neck and chest. I then did the same freshening up with the sachet of dried lavender flowers, which I placed right beneath my pillow. One evening pretty soon after adding these acts of lavender to my routine, I noted significant changes in the manner in which I was sleeping.
Another potent essential oil, chamomile, also played a significant role in my aromatherapy experiment. Known for its calming properties, I used chamomile essential oil in a similar manner as the previously mentioned oils, blending it with a carrier oil for topical application. I massaged it onto pulse points, which allowed me to enjoy the aroma directly. This method further enhanced my nighttime wind-down routine, though I can hardly call it a routine when it has differed quite a bit from night to night. Still, it has been a regular presence in my evenings. And because this presence has served as a vehicle for experiences that I can stretch into what some might call a “lulling” narrative, or even a meditation undertaken to achieve the near-trancelike state that some people, myself included, associate with real sleep, I feel compelled to share some of the details. They vary slightly from night to night, but the essence of what happens has been remarkably consistent.
Hack #2: The 4-7-8 Breathing Technique
The breathing technique of 4-7-8, which was developed by Dr. Andrew Weil, is meant to instill a sense of relaxation and calmness in people, enabling them to make the transition to sleep. It uses controlled breathing to stimulate the nervous system in a way that might help individual to calm down in a natural, drug-free manner. To do this technique, find a comfortable position, preferably sitting or lying down. Completely exhale through your mouth, making a whoosh sound. Close your mouth and inhale quietly through your nose to a count of four. (This is a 4 count for inhalation.) Hold your breath for a 7 count. Exhale completely through your mouth, making a whoosh sound again, for a count of 8. (This is an 8 count for exhalation.) Repeat the whole sequence for a total of 4 breaths.
The 4-7-8 breathing exercise has the potential to transform not only how long it takes an individual to fall asleep, but also how often they achieve that deeply restorative state we call sleep. The participants in this trial were each given a slightly different methodology for how best to perform the exercise (breathe for 4 seconds, hold for 7, let it out for 8) and were told to do it every evening before they retired for the night. They kept a log and noted whether or not they had easily achieved sleep within 60 minutes of getting into bed.
In general, the 4-7-8 breathing method is one of the best sleep hacks. “It’s simple, accessible, and can easily be incorporated into a nightly routine,” said Dr. R. Aditi Nerurkar, an integrative medicine physician at Brigham and Women’s Hospital. For people with sleep problems—especially those whose symptoms may be tied to anxiety—the breathing exercise might effectively restore some semblance of balance to their mental and physical state before bed.
Hack #3: Limiting Screen Time Before Bed
In the current online era, it’s become the norm for people to invest a great deal of time in front of screens even in the hour or so just preceding bedtime. It’s become increasingly conventional wisdom to suggest that we set aside anything with a screen at least an hour before we plan to sleep, but recent research has offered up some serious backing for this as a public health recommendation. I’m going to tell you a bit about this research, what it suggests, and why it matters.
Current research indicates that being subjected to blue light in the evening can cause problems with both the onset of sleep and the overall pattern of sleep. When I started using this sleep hack, it really hit home how much blue light I had been “enjoying” in the hours right before bed. My room wasn’t blue. But my mind felt as though it was bathed in the calming light of an ocean or maybe a nice tropical swimming pool, and I was just lying there enjoying the peace. I was just consumed by warm thoughts.
But I wasn’t thinking anything coherent or useful, and I certainly wasn’t in any kind of meditative state. So I didn’t get to sleep easily. And when I did sleep, I fretted that I wasn’t going to have another good stretch of feeling rested any time soon.
Manage technology use in the evening by establishing a digital curfew. This may involve putting devices away in a designated area, which could allow for a sleep-conducive environment. If you’re still awake, consider engaging in some alternative calming activities: read a book, meditate, or do some gentle stretches. If you feel you can’t do without your device, using a “night mode” feature can help reduce blue light exposure (this is the light that supposedly messes most with our melatonin production). Still, the best way to use these features is to not be using the device at all. Your sleep is the single best thing you can improve for your overall health.
Hack #4: The Sleep Environment
Achieving sleep is about much more than just meeting a physiological need. It is an act requiring a person’s volition and conducive conditions to be satisfied. These conditions comprise several factors, most notably the amount of light a person is exposed to in the evening. The body, in response to an environmental signal of decreasing light, acts like a dimmer switch, turning on the production of sleep hormones like melatonin. Any increase in artificial light at this hour will not only impair the quality of the act of sleeping but also whole-salely affect the quantity of sleep a person feels satisfied with.
Following that, regulating temperature emerged as another key element that ensures a pleasant sleeping atmosphere. The optimal sleep temperature falls between 60 and 67 degrees Fahrenheit, though individual preferences can bump that range up or down a few degrees. Playing with the thermostat showed that the cooler the temperature, the more favorable it was for sleep latency—the time it takes to fall asleep. On warm nights, a fan or a cooling pad amped up the comfort factor, maintaining a seemingly undisturbed body temperature that reduced the number of times I flipped from my back to my stomach and vice versa.
When one is trying to sleep, it is essential that disturbances from outside remain at a minimum. External disturbances can arise from a number of common sources, including traffic, construction work, or even loud neighbors. For some people, the use of a white noise machine or even earplugs can help to dampen the impact of these disruptive sounds. In urban settings where the noise level is at a premium, the aforementioned are probably nightly must-haves for a good number of people.
Still, in trying to assess whether one prefers silence or some kind of sound to help fall and stay asleep, my sister conducted a mini-experiment where she alternately made use of her app that features different nature soundscapes (the sounds of which are versatile and pretty much monotonous) and the just plain sounds of nature that her neighbors make at night (for which there is no shortage of actual wildlife, as well as anything but guano bats,123 which my sister is a fan of).
Hack #5: Sleep Schedule Consistency
For optimal sleep and consequent well-being, it is crucial to keep a consistent sleep schedule. This means setting the same times for going to bed and getting up in the morning to help the body’s internal clock keep time, and the clock is an important part of the system that truly helps one sleep well.
When I set out to implement this sleep hack, I discovered that the internal clock is quite a bit more stubborn than any watch or alarm used to regulate wake and sleep times. A struggle ensues, however, because the modern lifestyle is replete with activities that lead to lots of missed opportunities for sleep.
At first, I struggled to maintain my assigned sleep hours, especially on weekends. The calls of “stay up late!” and “sleep in!” on days off can be hard to resist. But I found that my attempts at weekend rebellion did not help me recharge for another week of work. Instead, they handed me a form of “social jet lag” that made it hard to get up and at ’em again on Monday morning. After a few months, I gained some good sleep hygiene habits. Better light management, better time management, and a few other tweaks helped my mood, my mind, and my weekdays all feel better.
Being sleep disciplined also benefited my evening habits. I got into the good habit of winding down a couple of hours before bedtime, which, in turn, allowed better relaxation before falling asleep. This sleep discipline reduced the engagement in stimulating activities or exposure to screens almost right up to the time of sleep. Ultimately, the effort put into establishing a routine of consistency really paid off. Not only did the overall sleep quality improve, but it also became evident that much of the mood stability and productivity throughout the day enjoyed a significant positive boost enforceable by just this sleep hack.
Hack #6: Bedtime Snacks for Better Sleep
The concept of eating certain snacks before bed to improve sleep has gained quite a bit of popularity among sleep aficionados. Supporters of this particular sleep hack argue that certain edibles can elicit relaxation, make a person feel drowsy, or otherwise enhance the quality of sleep one might enjoy after partaking in a pre-sleep nosh.
If you are going to try this, it is particularly important to make sure that the snack you choose is something that can legitimately aid with sleep. Some nutritionists suggest it might be best to reach for some foods that are rich in good old-fashioned sleep hormone melatonin.
For instance, a lot of people often point to turkey and yogurt for their high tryptophan levels, which can boost serotonin and melatonin levels in the body. Not exactly the things I’d typically want to eat before bed, but to each his own! What I am on board with, however, are nighttime snacks like nut butter on a slice of whole grain toast, which also supply you with the sort of complex carbohydrates that can keep your blood sugar steady while you sleep. Nuts like almonds and walnuts also deserve a mention here; they’re packed with magnesium, which is known to help with relaxation and winding down.
My experiences with bedtime snacks have made me more aware of my diet. I eat a small cup of yogurt and a few nuts every night, and I fall asleep much faster and stay in a deeper sleep longer than I did before. Still, portion size is key; too much of any food close to lights-out will almost guarantee a disrupted sleep. The effectiveness of bedtime snacks, in general, is quite subjective, with different people experiencing different results.
To sum up, although nocturnal nibbles hold promise for possibly improving slumber, the effectiveness is not guaranteed. Everyone experiences different results. If you want to try the concept—which is essentially just eating a light snack before bed—do it mindfully. Consider what you’re eating, when you’re eating it, and how it makes you feel after you eat it. You might also want to keep a food and mood journal.
Hack #7: Meditation and Mindfulness Practices
In the last few years, meditation and mindfulness have garnered substantial interest as techniques that can improve the quality of sleep. The practices themselves focus on being in the present, which can likely counteract the stress and anxiety that often get in the way of falling asleep. I experimented with a few different ways of meditating or practicing mindfulness and paid attention to how they may or may not have improved my experience of sleeping.
An insightful method that I found to yield good results was guided meditation. I would listen to audio sessions meant to facilitate sleep, and I would find it much easier to chill my mind and body. The instructor’s voice was such that it would carry me to an enjoyable state of relaxation, and with the added element of barely audible background music, I found that I was in a tranquil space that was much more conducive to falling asleep. These sessions also tended to feature an element that is also quite useful for sleep—progressive muscle relaxation.
Mindfulness, a currently ubiquitous concept and practice in the field of psychology, has largely been adopted from Eastern meditative traditions, particularly those of Buddhism. Mindfulness, or being aware and fully present in the moment, without judgment, has been shown to have a multitude of physical and mental health benefits. Deep breathing exercises, a popular mindfulness technique, also offered remarkable benefits. By concentrating on my breath and practicing the 4-7-8 method, I individualized my tension-reducing sleep regimen. This simple act of inhaling and exhaling in a specific pattern shifted my mental state from one of alertness to a low, tranquil, precession to sleep.
Practicing visualization was another step I took on the path toward better sleep. When I attempted to clear my mind of the day’s events or of the many thoughts crowding around the idea that I really needed to sleep, I used two different kinds of imagery. One was common to a variety of relaxation techniques: I imagined a peaceful scene, as one might do while meditating, somewhere halfway between a serene landscape (which I have seen enough of, in real life and in pictures, to know what that looks and feels like) and a much more open-ended, half-imagined, half-sensed peaceful scenario in which I could easily lose my waking mind and find a location where my sleeping mind could wake up refreshed.
Melding these meditation and mindfulness practices into my nightly return to consciousness has brought about some very impressive gains, both in the quality of my sleep and its length. And I have found, through further exploration of the techniques, that they have incredible potential for just about anyone wanting to improve their slumber situation. Meditation, and its cousin mindfulness, serve not just as relaxation tools but as long-term emotional and mental mental health boosters.
Hack #8: Exercise in the Daytime
Participating in consistent physical activity throughout the day has been broadly acknowledged as an effective method to boost sleep quality. Many research studies have been conducted on the hack and with good reason; the overwhelming evidence strongly supports that exercise affects sleep in a very positive way. In my ongoing attempts to figure out the best sleep routine for me, I have used different types of exercise at different times of the day to see how they affect my sleep.
From my personal experience, the amount and when you do it makes all the difference in the world. You have to understand something very clearly. I am not an expert. I am not a doctor. I am not even a exercise physiologist like my wife. I am just a dude talking about his experience. Someday soon, I will get into the why of all this, but for now, dump all your preconceived notions about exercise not making you feel good and why you shouldn’t do it at certain times. I think too many people have these notions embedded in their heads, and it really holds them back. So that’s my opening.
While I was undertaking even more intense workouts like weightlifting and high-intensity interval training (HIIT), I found that they were beneficial only when I had finished them at least three hours before I intended to go to bed. Otherwise, I was having the same issue with winding down and getting to sleep as I had been having with my yoga practice. HIIT will give you a good energy release; that is for certain.
In addition, stretching and yoga formed an effective duo that really helped my overall sleep efficiency. Doing them in the late afternoon set my body on a path toward relaxation, and somehow improved the mental clarity that I really needed to ease the temporary insanity I experience during the transition from waking to sleeping. Overall, it seems that exercise is a nonnegotiable part of the equation when it comes to either enhancing or decreasing sleep quality, revealing that the timing and intensity of workouts really matter.
The Verdict: Which Hacks Actually Worked?
After investigating ten well-known sleep hacks, the results turned out to be quite diverse. While experimenting with the various strategies, it became clear not all of them were sleep-promoting. In the end, three hacks really stood out, and we would definitely recommend them to our friends. Consistently going to bed and waking up at the same time, for instance, is a great habit if you want to improve your sleep quality (or if you just want to, you know, not feel like a zombie during the day). This hack adjusts your internal circadian rhythm and also gets you on a routine that’s somewhat necessary for most people, given that we don’t function well when we’re constantly flipping our sleep schedule upside down.
The second hack that showed a lot of effectiveness was optimizing the sleep environment. Making sure the sleep environment was dark, cool, and quiet substantially improved not only the ability to fall asleep but also to stay asleep and undisturbed through the night. Moreover, investing in much higher quality bedding and blackout curtains created a much more conducive atmosphere for sleep, and thus, sleep quality was proven to be largely impacted by environmental factors.
Finally, meditation and deep breathing before sleep were found to produce significant improvements. This was not a straightforward association. Meditation and deep breathing were in some way precursors to the improvement when they were directly evaluated. What was established is that these practices were effective in lowering the level of anxiety and stress that inhibits falling asleep. Individuals who integrated them into their routine were able to serve as signals to the body’s internal clock.
To conclude, among the different sleep hacks that were tested, three stood out as effective. Setting a consistent sleep schedule, optimizing the sleep environment, and using relaxation techniques were helpful not just for the author but for many others in obtaining quality sleep. They are safe, simple, low-cost, and accessible strategies that almost anyone can use. In fact, it is likely that many people already use at least one of these hacks without thinking of it in those terms.