Turning off your brain at night

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Barb D

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So how do you do it? How do you stop thinking about plot and dialogue and actually, like, get to sleep? It doesn't help that some of my best ideas come then, and are forgotten by morning. But if I were to get up and write them down, I would never get to bed!
 

Tasmin21

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I actually do my best brainstorming in that fuzzy place between awake and asleep. It took me a while to program myself to remember what I'd thought up, but now it works pretty good.

Problem being, when I'm feeling stuck on a book, my first impulse is to go to bed early so I can ponder it, and I think it rather annoys my husband. ;)
 

Kitty Pryde

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1. No caffeine after 3 pm
2. Go to the gym so your body is tired
3. Be extremely sleep deprived over a long period of time so you can fall asleep right away!
4. Sleep with a pen and notepad just in case

Works for me. Sometimes my dreams take over and plot stories I'm not actually writing, but I don't think it can be helped.
 

citymouse

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If you can't turn off then keep a note book handy and jot down jog lines that will prompt you when you're ready to write.

After you've done that, pick up and read aloud the transcript of the latest UN General Assembly session. That will send you into the land of Nod pronto.

If you don't sleep alone... well?
C
 

Clair Dickson

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I have a notepad next to the bed. Granted middle-of-the-night-in-the-dark scrawlings aren't the most legible, but it's better than hauling my tailfeathers out of bed to write things down.

I don't know how to turn off my brain. It doesn't listen to me.
 

Mad Queen

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Sleep is overrated anyway.
 

vixey

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Wow! This is like an 'all of the above' for me.

Drink.
Write it down anyway, while you're supposed to be sleeping.
Take a blue pill.
Get up and channel your muse into your laptop (that's for when the buggers won't shut up inside your head!).
 

Jimmyboy1

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When I'm writing a novel I never, ever go to bed without a pen, maybe two, in my bed. (Yes, I sleep alone, thank you!)
Where the other person is supposed to be I have several books that I'm reading, all with envelopes as book markers. On these I write the ideas that come to me.

And most important, I get almost every single idea worth writing while lying down. Furthermore, if it's a plot thing I'm searching for, I lay on the right side so the blood sits in that half of my brain. Emotional scene, left side. Erotic scene, shower.

Hey, maybe I should get a life!
 

NicoleMD

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I think I'm functioning pretty well on 3.5 hours of sleep today, due to a story idea that hit me right before bedtime. Just write until you're too tired to do anything else but sleep.

Nicole
 

Alpha Echo

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I don't turn off my mind. I let it wonder. I dream up scenes and characters and let my story float around in my head.

I am an insomniac though. So I'm not sure this will help you.
 

DonnaDuck

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Strangely enough, when I'm going to bed/sleeping is the only time I don't think about my writing. I have a tendency to do it more at work (not good, I know) but when I'm ready to sleep, it's like my brain's break from writing. I don't think I've ever got any motivation or inspiration from dreams or being on the brink of sleep or anything like that.

I'm not much help, am I?
 

willfulone

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I sleep, but I never turn off my brain, I sleep really light and can wake with the sound of a light switch from another room. I keep a tape recorder on my nightstand. If I wake up, I can record my thoughts/dreams that way.
 

tehuti88

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Turning it off just doesn't seem to be a problem for me. I don't know, maybe either 1. I'm not a before-sleep-thinking type of person, or 2. I spend so much time during the day (like, my entire life) thinking about my stories and plots and characters that, by the time I go to bed, I don't need to think about them anymore...?

I do know that if I actively lie there and think about some aspect of something, it'll delay me from getting to sleep, so I just don't mull over it. I realize this is easier said than done, so I have no explanation whatsoever how it works. It's weird it even works at all, seeing as I'm very obsessive and usually CAN'T stop thinking about things when I want to.

Oh! Hm. As someone with OCD, one of the things I've learned is that the harder you tell yourself NOT to think about something, the more you think about it. You have to learn to compromise. Maybe that's the key? Let yourself think about it for a reasonable amount of time, then make a deal with yourself to let yourself sleep?
 

Darzian

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Hope it lasts longer than your post.

:ROFL:



I actually brainstorm while waiting for sleep, and just after waking up. I never get anything out of it- but it helps me fall asleep, and it helps me feel more 'awake' in the mornings.
 

Deccydiva

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I sleep alone (apart from one of the dogs) but I am currently on fairly strong medication which I take at bedtime. It knocks me out within 15 minutes so that's it for at least eight hours, then I'm on planet stupid for a while after I get up.
I have pretty lurid dreams but nothing I would wish to convert into words... :e2faint:
 

Diana W.

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Some nights I've tried mulling over details in my story. Picturing scenes as if watching a movie. the trouble is whenever I do this my brain becomes wired and I can't get to sleep. It would be perfect if I could do that as I fall asleep but as I can never sleep I don't get the chance to sleep on things!
 
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