you wont like this answer:
sometimes** start your day by wakeing up at 3am

Some things that help me at least:

• Only use bed for sleeping.
• Don’t use screens at least an hour before bed.
• Keep phone out of arms reach when in bed. Ideally in another room (these devices weigh heavy on our psychology, and the further they are from us, the less distracting they are).
• Leave blinds open at night so you wake up with the sun. Try to sync your body / circadian rhythm with your environment if possible.
• Get lots of walks and outside time during the day. If you have a lot of energy, work out more during the day.
• No coffee / intoxicants in the evening.
• Drink lots of water.
• Don’t try to fix your sleep problems at night. Most of your remedies should be getting on the right foot the next day, and making habits of those.

My husband can do that, and honestly I think it’s because he doesn’t sleep deeply enough, and gets up too early. So exhaustion works.

I fall asleep in a reasonable amount of time (satisfied with it) and exercise is the main thing I can tell helps me. Next most important I wait until I am actually sleepy before trying to sleep. Smaller factors but still helpful - progesterone (post menopause) before bed, putting down the phone an hour before bed, and a routine - I take a shower & do skincare.

I’ve always been this way, but every so often I still have trouble turning my thoughts off enough to get to sleep.

There’s a technique I use on those occasions that helps a lot. Basically, just try to imagine a shape - it could be a circle or a sphere or a triangle or whatever - and just try to rotate it in your head. Pick a colour too. Try to keep it going. Any time you lose focus because another thought takes over, try to get the shape back.

Narcolepsy - a blessing and a curse.

I only use my bed for sleeping, when I go lie down body knows it’s night night time

I lay down, close my eyes, and then in my mind I imagine slowly pushing all sensation down to my feet starting from my head while I slow my breathing. I’m usually out before I even get to my knees.

Genetics
Don’t even need to hit a pillow

I used to take at least an hour to fall asleep. Then I had two kids. I can now fall asleep within a minute or two.

Worth it.

Parenthood. You reach the point of pure exhaustion somewhere around 6 months. Depending on your child, it can last for years.

Hey, I can do it in minutes. Just, like, 90-120 of them.

Easy, I wake up three hours later and toss and turn or give up and read.

It doesn’t work every time (I am very much not someone that can just switch off), but I have found “floor time” to help as a method of meditating. Initially I was just doing stretches of time for the sake of countering being slumped posture all day without a specific intention of being a sleep aid. Some of us randomly do it on the cold floor at work if physically stressed out, which is why I thought to try it at home in the dark.

Tend to either have some long form video play that I have watched before and find nice for sound, or put buds in and set like a 20~30min sleep timer for podcast episodes I like and marked to never delete in a favorites section of the app. Ended up also finding some buds (Soundcore Sleep A10 for anyone that wants to know) that can auto-stop playback if they detect sleep (guessing they use like a heart-rate sensor). So they can act as an additional stop if I fall asleep before the actual sleep timer (sadly I have misplaced them ATM). Which help silence my own thoughts, and anchor onto the audio (and thoughts get kept to the video/podcast). And use the timer to formerly end the “floor time” or to avoid losing my place.

Only other thing I try to allow myself to drift into thinking about is if I feel like I have tensed-up or periodic moving my head to each side for a few mins each to stretch my neck. I just stare into the back of my eyelids, but sometimes the darkness of the room (or into something covering my eyes) for times that staring into the back of my eyelids feels weirdly stressful in the same way a staring contest does when open (very annoying feeling).

I have a high level (in my understanding) of Aphantasia, which for people that haven’t heard of it, is not being able to “see” imaginations like folks that talk about “imagine a ball of light” or other guided things. Not fully lacking complete ability to “see” things, but ranging from only the idea (nothing) to extremely quick flashes of mostly super low details. So I try to learn how to focus on keeping the flashes a little longer and “see” simple things or pull the image of the room as I would be seeing it from my spot on the floor if my eyes were open. Made some progress here and there, while still not being able to do it outside of these times. Which I think might be helping me start to nod-off into really light sleep where dreams are close to starting.

Which can slip into that weird sudden falling feeling people have sometimes before fully falling asleep. However even if that happens, I can use that as a stopping point for “floor time” and move into the bed and fall asleep soon after. As my mind/body are much closer to whatever state needed for going over the edge of sleep. If the “falling” thing doesn’t happen, I might reach a slightly deeper sleep where I am dreaming but can either still hear the show/podcast in the dream or it is influencing the dream to some in the short time I nod-off.

I avoid screens (with one exception mentioned in a bit)—especially social media (including fediverse)—for like an hour ahead of time, read a book, make sure I’m well fed and hydrated without eating too close to bedtime, wear a sleep mask, and put on some soothing music, podcast or (mostly audio-based) video—with the screen off as soon as I hit play. Sometimes I even resort to my noise-cancelling headphones—or earplugs, if the sounds of my own breathing, swallowing, and bloodflow don’t bother me too much that night. It helps to meditate and/or make sure to exercise/work hard enough to wear myself out each day.

Comfort helps. Finding the right position, having the right sheets, mattress, pillow, getting the ac/fan/heater so the room feels perfect, maybe cracking a window for fresh air. Feeling secure and safe where I’m sleeping, confident that I’ll make it through the night without rude awakenings. Each isn’t very powerful on its own, bit all together make a big difference in how readily I drift off.

Finally, I just try not to worry too much whether I fall asleep or not; if it’s not looking like it’s happening, I’ll try to write a story for myself or draw a masterpiece in my minds eye. If that doesn’t work, I’ll focus on invoking some Wake-Induced Lucid Dreaming instead: forcing myself to lie perfectly still with my eyes closed, not even shifting for comfort nor to scratch itches nor swat flies, letting my mind wander wherever it wants to and just going with the hypnagogic hallucinations (they can get a little uncomfortable at times). This rarely has the intended effect, but I usually do end up waking up later, realizing I fell asleep without knowing it.

Disclaimer: my routine won’t solve insomnia, it won’t fix neurological disorders that affect circadian rhythm, it probably won’t work on the first night even if you don’t have the aforementioned issues. But adding any part of it to your routine (if you can) will make it just that much easier to fall sleep, when you can get around to it, even if you do have underlying conditions.

Also, at the risk of sounding like a boomer, screens are really bad for sleep. I grew up with them: my family had a habit of watching tv until bedtime, I trained myself to fall asleep while staring at my laptop (which I often have on my bed), or I’ll pick up my phone after I put the laptop down. Nowadays I can feel how awake my brain gets when I check lemmy or read news around bedtime. If I have my phone near me, I’ll have this nagging feeling to do “just one more” check of all my socials.

And it always keeps me awake until I will myself to turn it off and close my eyes.

Ive always had trouble sleeping, too active an imagination I suppose. So for me the trick was drugs, they work a treat… Maybe too much of a treat.