A while ago, we conducted a Sleep Survey that asked various questions. Today, we are looking at the results of a Sleep Survey we conducted a while ago. One of the questions, “What do you do to drift off to sleep?” gave us a good insight into our best methods for helping us drift off into a blissful slumber.
We’ve looked through the results of the Sleep Survey and picked out the best and most bizarre answers you gave us!
Supermarket sweep
The newly revamped ITV show is an unlikely source for inspiration - but Helen finds it effective enough.
“I picture pushing a trolley around a supermarket. I think up a shopping list, plan out where I’m going to go first, what I’m going to pick up just before reaching the checkout, wonder how many snacks I’d let myself grab… even though I never get any further than the fruit and veg counter!”
As far as visualising goes, a supermarket is a pretty good location; it’s somewhere familiar enough to conjure up images without thinking too hard, yet is often overflowing with all sorts of goodies that can captivate your fancy.
Are you playing your word games with me?
Another good way to start catching z’s is to tire your brain out, just as Alex and Sam suggest:
“I play a little word game, seeing how many I can rhyme together. For example, I’ll start with ‘ant’ and go through ‘rant’, ‘pant’, ‘plant’ and so on until I can’t think of anymore.
“I work my way through the alphabet, naming animals like armadillos, badgers, cats… Funnily enough, by the time I get to ‘s’ and think of ‘sheep’, I’m normally more or less asleep!”
It seems that no matter what the subject is, practising your vocabulary or working through 26 items is enough to make your mind twist and turn until it’s all tuckered out. Whether you’re trying to find something that rhymes with ‘orange’ or rolling through all the animals in the zoo, mental gymnastics often act as a pretty good way to knock yourself out.
Everybody wants to win the lottery
Though this fantasy isn’t exclusive to the night, as it’s something we’ve surely all done during a tough day at work, imagining a huge amount of money falling into your lap is always fun.
It’s this latter point that’s so alluring to Melvyn:
“I imagine how I would spend a million pounds, or better yet, a lottery win! Depending on how big the jackpot is, I can get to sleep before getting past ‘pay all the bills’.”
There’s no place like home (unless it’s a beach resort)
Everybody has a happy place, and it seems unlikely that you’d have anything akin to insomnia while being there, so said happy place would naturally be a relaxing spot to doze off at, right? That’s the thought process of Tanya, as she imagines a spot that invites guests to blissfully nap:
“I pretend I’m somewhere warm and beautiful! Azure water lapping over golden sands, large palm trees swaying in the breeze and a delicious cocktail in hand; it’s almost like telling my brain what to dream about!”
Despite how comfortable a bed can be, it’s hard to argue with the idyllic beach in the picture that Tanya’s painting! Unless it’s an idyllic beach with a bed, it’s hard to determine whether that’d be more or less comfortable than a hammock.
A total yawn fest
If all else fails, why not take a page from the scripts of sitcoms? Characters have been known to be so bored while doing something so mundane that their eyelids have gotten heavy, their attention has waned, and they’ve finally succumbed to slumber.
Rebecca’s got the right idea when it comes to making television tropes a reality:
“Doing mundane quizzes on Buzzfeed since nothing else makes me sleepier than determining what kind of dog I am based on my favourite junk food, my attitude towards jazz and what my mother’s maiden name is.”
Most of us often spend our last moments in bed doing something on our phone, but this specific approach might be considerably more effective than the likes of searching for videos of puppies. Trust us; that gives you cute aggression and again kicks off the whole lottery-winning thoughts to justify adopting every dog possible!
