WHEN it comes to sleep, we have a lot to learn from our littlest companions. In many ways, babies reveal basic human tendencies and teach us about the natural sleep mechanisms deep in our brains.

    1. The same environment every night Watch an infant drift to sleep — breathing peacefully with arms splayed out in full relaxation. Sleep is a basic biological function that we’re programed to do. Even though sleep itself isn’t learned, the habits and associations around sleep are — especially as we fall asleep at the beginning of the night. We grow attached to the sights, sounds, and feelings in the environment at bedtime. If they change throughout the night, our natural stages of light sleep turn into full awakenings; if they stay consistent, we sail smoothly into deep sleep again.

    2. Realize your pre-bed routine Okay, maybe it doesn’t include a bubble bath and footie pajamas, but you do have a bedtime routine, whether you know it or not. The question is whether it’s helping you sleep. Routines should:

    Start at least 30 minutes before bed.

    Stay the same every night. Do them the same way every night and you’ve harnessed the power of habit and conditioning.

    Steer clear of any and all up-close electronic gadgets for 60 minutes prior to bed.

    Lower stress. If you talk about finances, check news feeds, or research a worrisome problem instead of leaving it for the next morning, your drowsy-making chemicals will be blocked.

    3. Don’t trust your ‘tired’ sensors Children are notoriously bad judges of their own sleepiness. In a famous series of sleep studies at Stanford, researchers restricted kids’ sleep to just four hours and they still said they weren’t sleepy.

    But studies suggest the same to be true of adults — we’re not aware of how tired we are. That means just like we do with kids, we need to set a bedtime based on our nightly sleep needs (7-9 hours), not on how tired we feel in the moment.

    4. Dim the lights before bed One of the first signs that a newborn’s circadian system is maturing is a rise in the drowsy-making chemical melatonin in the evenings. Melatonin begins to rise more or less as the sun goes down. In other words, humans are built to sleep with the darkness. Dimming the lights in the house and hour before bed and reading a book is the ticket to allowing natural sleep chemicals to rise. (SD-Agencies)