Insomnia was a huge issue for me, so this will be a long post.
I tried a lot of things to fix it, and eventually cured it without drugs. I'll give a few suggestions here, in case it helps anyone:
1) Experiment with your diet. By this I mean - change one significant thing (cutting out a particular type of food, adjusting macro ratios, etc.), then give it a week or two to see if there's a notable change. I've found that sugar and excessive dairy have noticeable negative effects on my energy levels and how I feel, plus my energy levels are a little more stable throughout the day when I increased my fat intake. Changing those did improve my sleep also.
2) I workout in the evenings, maybe an 1-1.5 hours before I go to bed. It tires me out, which helps if I do the other things on this list.
3) I shower at night, then do some stretching afterward. It gets rid of a lot of subtle body tension that can keep me uncomfortable when I'm trying to sleep.
4) The last thing I do before I get in bed is meditation. I highly recommend a regular meditation practice for a lot of reasons, but it has definitely helped my sleep. There are lots of different techniques that fall under the umbrella of "meditation", but I'll describe a very basic one here that serves our purpose. The purpose is to develop a habit of keeping your mind calm, with your focus in one place; without training, the mind has a habit of chaotically running from thought to thought, distracted by any new impression that can pull at your attention. That's how some people get the problem of having a brain that won't shut up at night, staying awake while their mind just runs.
So, here's the meditation. Sit in a position where you can be comfortable enough that your body isn't a distraction, but not so comfortable that you might fall asleep. For me, sitting upright, without a chairback to lean against, accomplishes this. Gently place your attention on your breathing. Try to give all focus to what breathing feels like. No thoughts about it, no attention to anything else, no inner dialogue, no narrative about tomorrow or yesterday; just attention on the feeling of each individual breath. You will fail at this. Your mind will wander, you'll get an itch, you'll catch yourself planning tomorrow's work meeting, you'll remember a dream, you'll wonder how long you've been meditating. That's perfect, because here is where the practice comes in - you just guide your attention back to the breath. You don't have to fight, you don't have to shut out the thoughts, you just practice spending more time with your attention right where you intentionally put it.
It's like lifting weights - the more reps you get, the stronger you get, and eventually you're naturally very strong in your day-to-day life. It takes some time, but eventually your mind won't run when you try to sleep. If you've never done meditation, I recommend starting with just 2 minutes at a time, and gradually moving up to at least 10 minutes before bed.
5) Once I'm in bed, I'll get comfortable and start relaxing each muscle group, starting with my toes and moving all the way up, one by one. It's hard for me to go through this process twice without falling asleep, after everything else.
6) One more thing that was an issue for me was dreams. I had a long period of regularly shitty dreams, which I think was affecting my ability to fall asleep, or go back to sleep if I woke in the middle of the night. As I tried different ways of dealing with dreams, I found that Jungian analysis had the most benefit for me. I don't think that depth of focus on dreamwork will be necessary, but one useful concept from it is that dreams are often the subconscious trying to symbolically communicate meaning to you. If its message is important, and not being addressed in your life, the message is often emphasized through repeating and increasingly intense dreams.
Many people don't remember their dreams very well, and so are not aware of how negatively impacted their sleep might be by it, and can never integrate the emotional weight of the dreams into their conscious awareness. I recommend at least keeping a dream journal, because it really does develop the ability to remember your dreams. It doesn't have to be anything complicated. Just keep a pen and paper near your bed, and when you wake up in the morning, jot down quick notes about what you remember. You'll find that you increasingly remember more and more, and your dreams may get better over time.
7) The last thing I do is try to get sunlight shortly after I wake up. I bought a therapeutic lamp for days when the sun isn't out (it was like $40). It's supposed to help regulate your neurochemical cycles, so that your brain feels like it's time to be awake in the morning, and time to sleep at night.
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Besides those, I follow all the standard advice about caffeine, phones before bed, etc. The above advice has completely changed the quality of my life. I feel like an entirely different person now that I can regularly get plenty of restful sleep. I hope some of those suggestions help some of you.
Thank you
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