SojiwaJournaling · Breathing & Relaxation
How to stop overthinking at night when you're trying to sleep
A five-minute, specific to-do list before bed helped people fall asleep faster in a sleep lab study. How to write one, and what to do if you're still awake.
Written by the Sojiwa editorial team with AI assistance. Not medical advice.
Short answer: Spend five minutes before bed writing a specific to-do list for the next few days. In a sleep lab study, young adults who did this fell asleep faster than those who wrote about tasks they had already finished, and the more specific the list, the faster they fell asleep. If you are still awake after about 20 minutes, the NHS suggests getting up until you feel sleepy.
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The most useful thing to do with a racing mind at bedtime is to give it the list it keeps rehearsing. Spend five minutes before you lie down writing exactly what you need to do in the next few days, as specifically as you can. It sounds like it would wind you up. In a sleep lab, it did the opposite.
The study that tested it
Researchers led by Michael Scullin brought 57 healthy young adults, aged 18 to 30, into a sleep laboratory, where their sleep was measured with sensors rather than self-report. Before lights out, each person spent five minutes writing. Half wrote a to-do list for the coming days. The other half wrote about tasks they had already completed in the past few days.
The to-do group fell asleep significantly faster. And within that group, the people who wrote more specific lists fell asleep fastest. The group writing about finished tasks showed the opposite trend.
The study was published in the Journal of Experimental Psychology: General in 2018. It was one night, in a lab, with young and healthy volunteers, so it can't tell you how well it works for someone older, a parent up with a baby, or a person with ongoing insomnia. It does give a clear direction to try.
Why looking ahead works better than looking back
Writing about what you already finished might seem calmer, since it is all done. But it does nothing about the thing keeping you up, which is usually what is still undone.
A to-do list moves those open items out of your head and onto something that will still be there in the morning. Once a task has a place to wait, your mind has less reason to keep circling back to it at night.
Specific matters because a vague note does not close the loop. "Sort out work stuff" leaves you lying there working out what that means. "Email the supplier about the delivery date before 10am" is something your brain can set down.
The NHS gives the same advice for people who often worry in bed: before sleeping, make a list of what you need to do the next day, because writing things down can clear your mind.
Not every thought at night is a task. If it is a conversation you keep replaying or a worry with no action attached, turn it into the nearest thing to a task: "Decide on Saturday whether to raise this with my sister" is something you can put on the list. You are not solving it tonight, only giving it a time and a place.
That also gives you an answer when the thought comes back an hour later. It already has a slot, and you can tell yourself so.
When you are still awake anyway
Some nights the list will not be enough. The NHS advice is not to force it. If you are still awake after about 20 minutes, get up, sit somewhere comfortable, and do something quiet like reading or listening to calm music. Go back to bed when you feel sleepy.
This keeps your bed from becoming the place where you lie awake thinking. A thought that arrives after you have made your list can go straight onto the list, which takes a few seconds rather than half an hour.
If you have trouble sleeping most nights for weeks, or it is affecting how you get through the day, see a doctor. Ongoing sleeplessness is treatable, and it is worth more than a writing trick.
Try this today
Tonight, set aside five minutes before bed and write:
What do I need to do in the next three days, and for each one, what is the very first step and when will I do it?
Keep the paper or notes on your phone out of reach of the bed. The first step and the time are what make the list specific, and specific was what mattered most in the study. If the list runs long, that is fine. The limit is the five minutes, not the number of items, and anything you miss can go on tomorrow night's list.
Write it down in Sojiwa
A free journal with prompts to help when you're not sure what to write.
If you would rather breathe than write once the list is done, Sojiwa's free Sleep Breath exercise guides you through in four, hold four, out six, pause two, with optional background music that stays off until you turn it on.
