Always tired? How to stop the evening slide

How is it that no matter how much you intend to get to bed earlier, you never do? And morning mercilessly comes at the same time no matter how little sleep you’ve gotten.

If you struggle with the evening slide where you stay up too late to get things done, or to have some “me” time, you’re not alone. It’s a common issue that I see with my time management coaching clients.

Here are three of the strategies that I’ve found most effective to stop the evening slide, get to bed on time, and still get everything done.

Keep the Dominos Up

Getting to bed late is often the final block in a chain effect that began much earlier in the day. So to beat the evening slide, you need to keep the dominos up starting in the late afternoon.

I recommend aiming for a standard time when you wrap up work for the day. Then if permissible, block the 30 minutes before that time on a recurring basis. That keeps meetings from getting scheduled to end when you want to be logging off. That also gives you a few minutes to do a final email check, glance at your daily plan to ensure all the most critical items are completed, and tidy up your desk area.

The next domino that you’ll want to keep upright is when you eat dinner. If you’re not intentional, you can suddenly realize it’s 8 p.m. and that you haven’t decided what you’re eating that night. I recommend deciding what’s for dinner by the time you get off work. And if you’re not The Food Channel-type, have some easy options on hand. That could look like frozen or premade food from the grocery story, cooking extra on the weekend, ordering a big lunch so that you have some leftovers, or putting in a delivery order as you’re finishing work. Eating earlier not only helps you get to bed earlier, but also can also help your digestion. For some of my coaching clients, eating less than three hours before they went to sleep lead to heartburn.

The final domino is recognizing how long it takes between when you start getting ready for bed and actually turn the lights out. This really varies from person to person, but in my experience, it usually takes at least 15–20 minutes and for some can take up to an hour. I’ve had to accept that even though I wish it was faster that I take about 30–45 minutes to tidy up the house, double-check the doors are locked, brush my teeth, wash my face, and do the other little items in my evening wind down routine. I actually set an alarm on my phone Sunday through Thursday to remind me that if I want to get to bed on time, I need to start getting ready for bed now.

Seize the Moments

If you find the reason that you’re staying up late after you’ve gotten home, eaten dinner, walked your dog, and put your kids to bed, is that you feel like you have no other time to get things done, then it’s time to explore how you could better seize the moments.

There might be underutilized pockets in your day where bit-by-bit you could check items off the list. For example, instead of turning to social media, you could turn to your to-do list on your breaks, call your insurance agent on your commute home, listen to a self-development podcast while you’re working out, or look at reviews for new running shoes while you’re waiting in line.

I find the two necessary components to taking advantage of these times is to first of all recognize them as opportunities. And second of all, have ideas on hand of what you’ll do so that you’re prepared. For example if I know I’ll have some drive time, I’ll write into my daily plan who I intend to call or what I’d like to listen to or think about. Sometimes, I just need to chill and zone out. But many times, it feels good to get things done in the car. If you don’t prefer to decide exactly what you’re going to do in advance, you could at least have a task list on your phone of potential ideas you can pick from when the pockets of time open up.

Getting more done that you need to do or want to do earlier in the day can keep you from feeling like you must stay up later.

Script Your Night

If you really have to get something done in the evening that just couldn’t happen during the day, it’s important to script exactly what that looks like.

For example, you’ll want to decide on the specific task, like reviewing a report or ordering a birthday present. Clarify an ideal stopping point, such as I’d like this wrapped up by 9 p.m. And a must-stop point such as I have to end by 10 p.m., or I’ll be exhausted tomorrow.

The reason why you want to decide these specifics in advance is that a script prevents you from wandering from: I guess I’ll catch up on email and then maybe I’ll check a few things off of my task list and then how about I take a peek at the news? Then before you know it . . . three hours have gone by, and it’s midnight.

To really have the ability to script your evening, you’ll also need to not work to the deadline. If the report isn’t due that day or the deadline for ordering baseball uniforms isn’t that night, you can choose to stick to your drop-dead deadline and finish the task tomorrow. But if you are down to the wire, you might need to stay up no matter what.

Mornings don’t have to be so excruciatingly painful, and your time doesn’t have to feel so limited. With the right time management strategies you can beat the evening slide, get to bed on time, and still get everything done.

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