Avoid light at night, especially blue light. Light inhibits natural melatonin production, which interferes with your circadian rhythms.
If you can’t darken your room completely, you can use a sleep mask instead. Get the kind with cups (like opaque swim goggles) instead of the kind that puts pressure on your eyes.
Use f.lux on your personal devices to reduce blue light after sunset or use one of the similar built-in features of your OS. Windows 10 has the new “Night Light” setting, macOS and iOS have “night shift” mode. Newer Samsung phones have a “blue light filter” setting. These options vary in quality and may have configurable intensity. More intense is more effective and it’s surprising how much you get used to it.
Falling asleep is a common failure mode of certain types of meditation practice. You can use this to your advantage when suffering from insomnia in bed. Even beginners fail to meditate this way accidentally, so it’s not particularly difficult to do on purpose. Focus your attention on the sensation of breathing or on the ringing in your ears. When you notice you are lost in thought, refocus your attention. But when you notice the dreaming arise without directed effort, dive in and let them take you. It works for me anyway. If not, at least you got your meditation in today.
Take naps. Even 20 minutes dramatically improves performance when sleep deprived.
Try the sleep mask when napping.
Try the meditation techniques for naps too.
Track your sleep quality.
You can get smartphone apps that purport to do this using the phone’s sensors. Some fitness trackers or smartwatches also have this function built in or available as an app. Accuracy varies.
You may have sleep apnea. Talk to your doctor about doing a sleep study to diagnose possible issues and treatments. Some people do much better on a CPAP, but there are many other treatment options.
Avoid eating late at night. This can cause indigestion, which can keep you awake.
if you suffer from heartburn, sleep on your left side to contain it better, because your esophagus attaches to your stomach on the right side (unless you’re one of those rare people with backwards internal organs).
Exercise regularly. I’m not sure why this helps, but it seems to. Perhaps mental fatigue doesn’t always line up with physical fatigue unless you actually make some effort physically during the day.
The answer above is not a direct response to the question as asked, but it is still a very good list of interventions for improved sleep.
I’d add a few points. That the sleep literature is very big on maintaining a good circadian rhythm (entrainment) and a few interventions follow from that.
Go to sleep and wake up a the same time each day.
Don’t sleep too late in the day.
I try to avoid napping after 5pm no matter how tired I am.
Expose yourself to good amount of blue light in the morning for at least fifteen minutes, but ideally 30-60 min good. This is the opposite of the no blue light in the evenings.
A bright outdoors is best.
A luminator is good too.
I have Seqinetic light therapy glasses which shine bright blue light into your peripheral vision. I often put them as soon as I wake up while still lying in bed, and they noticeable push away lingering tiredness and sleep inertia. Unfortunately, I think they’re out of business. I wonder if anyone else is making an alternative version.
Routine helps too. The brain is very contextual and a consistent routine is part of that..
A set routine, e.g. brushing teeth and washing face, can induce your brain to think it’s sleep time.
Not using your bed/bedroom for anything other sleep or sex also stems from the “brain is contextual” principle, hence wanting to make bed/bedroom distinctly a context for sleep.
Also extremely key is temperature. Sleep is triggered by dark and cool.
You can note that sleep is generally worse in summer months because of the heat.
I believe I experienced a large improvement in my sleep quality when I began running an air conditioner to keep my room at ~17C (~63F) together and purchased a ChilliPad. The later makes a big difference since my current foam mattress is far more insulating than the coil mattresses I’ve used most of my life.
I echo the endorsements here of sleep tracking. I use a Fitbit Ionic whose data I use to generated an automated email report. The custom report is worth it since a) it lets me focus specifically on the inputs I control, i.e. when I go to sleep, and b) it lets me visualize trends and comparison over time better than the default Fitbit report. I describe my tracking strategy in greater detail in another comment.
Get more sleep at night.
Take melatonin at the appropriate time and dose. It’s cheap and legal in the U.S., but most products have way too much. https://slatestarcodex.com/2018/07/10/melatonin-much-more-than-you-wanted-to-know/ most insomnia drugs are not much more effective than this.
Avoid light at night, especially blue light. Light inhibits natural melatonin production, which interferes with your circadian rhythms.
If you can’t darken your room completely, you can use a sleep mask instead. Get the kind with cups (like opaque swim goggles) instead of the kind that puts pressure on your eyes.
Use f.lux on your personal devices to reduce blue light after sunset or use one of the similar built-in features of your OS. Windows 10 has the new “Night Light” setting, macOS and iOS have “night shift” mode. Newer Samsung phones have a “blue light filter” setting. These options vary in quality and may have configurable intensity. More intense is more effective and it’s surprising how much you get used to it.
Falling asleep is a common failure mode of certain types of meditation practice. You can use this to your advantage when suffering from insomnia in bed. Even beginners fail to meditate this way accidentally, so it’s not particularly difficult to do on purpose. Focus your attention on the sensation of breathing or on the ringing in your ears. When you notice you are lost in thought, refocus your attention. But when you notice the dreaming arise without directed effort, dive in and let them take you. It works for me anyway. If not, at least you got your meditation in today.
Take naps. Even 20 minutes dramatically improves performance when sleep deprived.
Try the sleep mask when napping.
Try the meditation techniques for naps too.
Track your sleep quality.
You can get smartphone apps that purport to do this using the phone’s sensors. Some fitness trackers or smartwatches also have this function built in or available as an app. Accuracy varies.
You may have sleep apnea. Talk to your doctor about doing a sleep study to diagnose possible issues and treatments. Some people do much better on a CPAP, but there are many other treatment options.
Avoid eating late at night. This can cause indigestion, which can keep you awake.
if you suffer from heartburn, sleep on your left side to contain it better, because your esophagus attaches to your stomach on the right side (unless you’re one of those rare people with backwards internal organs).
Exercise regularly. I’m not sure why this helps, but it seems to. Perhaps mental fatigue doesn’t always line up with physical fatigue unless you actually make some effort physically during the day.
The answer above is not a direct response to the question as asked, but it is still a very good list of interventions for improved sleep.
I’d add a few points. That the sleep literature is very big on maintaining a good circadian rhythm (entrainment) and a few interventions follow from that.
Go to sleep and wake up a the same time each day.
Don’t sleep too late in the day.
I try to avoid napping after 5pm no matter how tired I am.
Expose yourself to good amount of blue light in the morning for at least fifteen minutes, but ideally 30-60 min good. This is the opposite of the no blue light in the evenings.
A bright outdoors is best.
A luminator is good too.
I have Seqinetic light therapy glasses which shine bright blue light into your peripheral vision. I often put them as soon as I wake up while still lying in bed, and they noticeable push away lingering tiredness and sleep inertia. Unfortunately, I think they’re out of business. I wonder if anyone else is making an alternative version.
Routine helps too. The brain is very contextual and a consistent routine is part of that..
A set routine, e.g. brushing teeth and washing face, can induce your brain to think it’s sleep time.
Not using your bed/bedroom for anything other sleep or sex also stems from the “brain is contextual” principle, hence wanting to make bed/bedroom distinctly a context for sleep.
Also extremely key is temperature. Sleep is triggered by dark and cool.
You can note that sleep is generally worse in summer months because of the heat.
I believe I experienced a large improvement in my sleep quality when I began running an air conditioner to keep my room at ~17C (~63F) together and purchased a ChilliPad. The later makes a big difference since my current foam mattress is far more insulating than the coil mattresses I’ve used most of my life.
I echo the endorsements here of sleep tracking. I use a Fitbit Ionic whose data I use to generated an automated email report. The custom report is worth it since a) it lets me focus specifically on the inputs I control, i.e. when I go to sleep, and b) it lets me visualize trends and comparison over time better than the default Fitbit report. I describe my tracking strategy in greater detail in another comment.
https://humancharger.com/ would be another light therapy device for the mornings.