Thoughts spin in circles, while the creaks and noises around us insistently saw through the nerves. Trouble falling asleep plagues many people night after night. To help you fall asleep quickly right away, there’s a simple trick you can use. Soldiers from the US Navy SEALs special unit learn it to find calm even in extreme situations.

Falling asleep at the touch of a button – for many people with sleep problems, it’s a dream. For Navy SEALs (Sea, Air, Land), it’s even a necessity for survival. They must always be ready to intervene, despite irregular sleep patterns and high stress levels. So every break must be put to good use.

Without sleep, the body and mind cannot rest. The result is impaired concentration, reduced performance and psychological problems. Permanent sleep disturbance also disrupts metabolism, blood pressure and hormonal balance.

So that sleep problems don’t become a permanent burden for you, there’s a trick you can learn to fall asleep quickly. With a little practice, you’ll be able to fall asleep in just two minutes. Anywhere, anytime.

Falling asleep fast: 5 steps to immediate sleep

The Navy SEALs’ method of falling asleep dates back to the autogenic training approach of physician Johannes Heinrich Schultz. As early as the 1930s, Schultz was able to demonstrate that it was possible to relax muscles in a targeted way through mental exercises – autosuggestion – and that this in turn had an impact on mental health. The Navy SEALs summed up this approach as a technique for falling asleep.

Here’s how it works:

  1. Relax your facial muscles: concentrate on the muscles around your eyes, on your tongue, on your jaw – and imagine them getting heavy.
  2. Keep walking in your head to your shoulders: feel how they relax and sag downwards. Continue with your arms and forearms.
  3. Put your breathing into the rhythm of sleep: inhale for 4 seconds; hold the air for about 7 seconds, but don’t tense up; then exhale for 8 seconds.
  4. Repeat the breathing cycle until your chest is completely calm. Finally, relax your legs: feel them get heavier from your thighs to your feet.

In addition to these four muscle relaxation steps, you can simultaneously conjure up a mental image that helps you to calm down: imagine yourself, for example, lying in a boat on a calm lake, gently rocking back and forth.

Irregular sleep schedules and stress – Navy SEALs are certainly not alone in experiencing this problem. So it’s worth trying this tried-and-tested trick for falling asleep on a daily basis. According to insiders, it takes around six weeks to assimilate the steps to the point where you can fall asleep even in the supermarket checkout queue.