Why is it so hard to go to bed? Maybe science has the answer | Emma Beddington

This says nothing good about me, but when I read that Oxford quantum physicists had made an exciting step towards teleportation, my first thought was: “Will I live long enough for science to teleport me from the sofa into bed at night?”

I’m an intractable bedtime procrastinator. However exhausted I am, once I achieve couch horizontality, bed seems pointless. With a heated blanket and the whole internet in my hand, why do the sensible thing when I can do what feels good right now?

Apparently, I’m displaying “present-hedonistic” time perspective, which is fuelling a “volitional delay of sleep in the absence of external factors”. Because even if science doesn’t have my back quite yet, social science is on it. Dr Jacqueline Nesi’s excellent Techno Sapiens newsletter recently outlined research on bedtime procrastination and yes, it’s a totally valid topic for study: all those wasted hours lost in thrall to the gravitational pull of soft furnishings (not to mention the risk of sleep disturbance and mood disorders).

The three main potential causes, Nesi explains, are “non-balanced time perspective” (insufficiently considering how our present (in)action affects future us), “incorrect beliefs about willpower” (we don’t believe we have it in us to go to bed, especially, one study suggests, if we’ve had a tough day) and “procrastinatory cognitions”. Believing you’re a procrastinating piece of trash hampers you in doing anything about it, apparently.

I think my main problem is what Nesi’s literature review identifies as “bedtime routine aversion” and I call “bedmin”. All that brushing, flossing and poking of interdental brush into crannies, the face-washing, peeing and undressing required before I can finally rest feels impossible; I fight it with all the inertia I can muster (and that’s a lot of inertia).

Cognitive-behavioural strategies may help: identifying what causes you to procrastinate, challenging your thought patterns and setting up your environment for success (yes, that’s putting your phone away). Some genius suggested setting an obnoxiously loud alarm to go off in my bedroom at bedtime, forcing me to go there. All of which I fully intend to try. Just, maybe not tonight.