10 Little-Known Ways to Fall Asleep Fast

If you have trouble getting to sleep, you’ve probably been looking for ways to fall asleep fast your whole life.

Some may have worked out, while others didn’t help.

But before you turn to sleeping pills, expensive gadgets, or else, you should take a look at some hacks and tricks that aren’t so popular.

We’ll be talking about short-term solutions here, which means that if you find the one that works best for you, you’ll have to repeat it whenever you can’t get to sleep. After some time, however, you’ll do it on autopilot and your mind will get used to it.

Here are 10 ways to fall asleep fast that you probably haven’t heard of:

10 Ways to Fall Asleep Fast

1. Use reverse psychology.

By now, you should have realized that trying to force yourself to sleep just doesn’t work.

Stop trying it and do the opposite instead.

When in bed and insomnia kicks in, force yourself to stay awake. Keep your eyes open and repeat to yourself that you shouldn’t fall sleep no matter what.

The results are amazing if you do it right.

Related: How to Cure Insomnia Naturally

2. Listen to an audiobook.

Most audiobooks are boring because the voice is too monotonous. If you choose a boring subject, it’s even better.

It’s okay to leave it on, just make sure it’s not too loud so that it doesn’t disturb your sleep.

3. Get a real book.

Put any device away from your bed, as they still make noises when near you which you can’t feel but it ruins your sleep.

Read instead. It’s the simplest and oldest trick to help you fall asleep fast and it always works.

Even if the topic is interesting, you learn new things and get excited about it, you’ll still fall asleep much faster than you usually do.

Related: What to Do When You Can’t Sleep

4. Take a warm bath.

That will work best if you don’t usually do it.

Take a soothing bath and relax your mind and body during it. Then, don’t do anything too exciting or intense between this and going to bed.

It’s one of the most natural ways to fall asleep fast.

5. Listen to soft music.

It’s a proven method to help you lower your blood pressure and heart rate. That means you reduce stress too, let go of anything that happened during the day and enter a special meditation state. From then on, falling asleep is a no-brainer.

6. Use hypnosis.

You can try hypnosis to get yourself to sleep.

But first, forget about your prejudices here. It’s nothing more than tricking your mind into falling asleep quickly and visualizing.

Get into a comfortable sleeping position, start breathing deeply and emptying your mind.

Random thoughts are not easy to avoid, but the breathing exercise helps a lot.

Imagine you’re at a peaceful place. Draw the picture in details in your mind, let your creativity flow. The goal, again, is for you to calm down and put your brain to sleep.

Keep breathing deeply, forget about the reality around you and dive into your vision.

You may be swimming in a beautiful lake, or being around Buddhist monks, or even flying. There are no limits here.

Just feel your body do what you’re doing in the vision, put a light smile on your face, relax every muscle of the body while doing it.

Soon, you’ll get better at that.

In time, it’s possible that you’ll be able to fall asleep the moment you start visualizing.

7. Get up and do something.

If you’re lying in and can’t go to sleep no matter what, get out of there and do something else for 15 minutes. But something that’s active and requires you to move your body or brain.

Preferably, something you don’t usually do.

Why not declutter a whole room, if you haven’t done it recently? Or write a few pages in a journal. You can do push-ups, squats and kicks too.

You may be surprised at how tired you’ll feel soon after that and will want to go back to bed. This time, however, you’ll go to sleep faster.

8. Fix your sleep problems with aromatherapy.

That’s probably something you’ve never thought of trying. But it’s worth seeing whether it works for you.

It includes using essential oils. You can massage your neck and shoulders (or let someone else do it), put a few drops onto a cotton pad and place it next to you while sleeping, or just add them to the soothing bath we mentioned.

All this promotes deeper sleep and relaxation.

If you’re wondering what oils to choose, you can’t go wrong with lavender, chamomile or ylang-ylang.

9. Progressive muscle relaxation.

It’s a natural sleep remedy that’s one of the little-known ways to fall asleep fast.

It has similarities to meditation and self-hypnosis but focused more on the body than the mind.

When in bed trying to make yourself get to sleep sooner, give this technique a try. Here’s what you need to do:

Start with one end of the body. Work on one muscle at a time. Tense it – consciously – then slowly relax it and leave it like that. Then, move onto the next muscle group that comes after it. Do it until you get to the other end of the body.

By then you should be fully relaxed physically and won’t feel any pressure in your body.

10. Try the “4-7-8” breathing technique.

The 4-7-8 method is proven to make people fall asleep in under a minute. But let’s see how it will work for you.

Here’s the short version:

Inhale using your nose for 4 seconds. Hold your breath for 7 seconds. Exhale completely through your mouth counting to 8.

Do this a few more times.

The battle with insomnia is a common problem. That’s why we need to get creative and find out new ways to fall asleep fast.

Give these a try over the next few weeks and see which one gives you actual results. Then, turn that into a habit.

Once you do, staying awake in bed for hours trying to get to sleep won’t be an issue anymore.

What about you? Do you struggle with insomnia? What other ways to fall asleep fast have you heard of?