To calm evening anxiety and limit mental rumination before sleep, it is recommended to practice a 10-minute relaxation ritual combining writing down thoughts (or a to-do list), limiting screen time, gentle stretching, and abdominal breathing or cardiac coherence exercises.

noli's read

Pre-sleep writing, particularly in the form of a to-do list, is validated by a randomized controlled trial (RCT) by Scullin et al. (2018) published in the Journal of Experimental Psychology, which demonstrates that it significantly reduces sleep onset latency by offloading mental load. Regarding breathing, a meta-analysis by Fincham et al. (2023) confirms that slow breathing techniques, such as cardiac coherence, effectively decrease perceived stress by stimulating the relaxing nervous system. Gentle stretching and yoga also receive strong support, with a meta-analysis by Wang et al. (2020) associating light-intensity physical exercise with better sleep quality and a reduction in physical tension. Concerning screens, while the disruptive effect of blue light on the sleep hormone (melatonin) is widely documented, the direct link to anxiety is sometimes exaggerated: it is often the cognitive stimulation from the content consumed (social media, news) that generates worry, rather than the light itself. Finally, the idea that a 10-minute routine is sufficient to calm oneself is validated by research on the immediate physiological benefits of breathing exercises.

the sources

1. 1van Straten A, van der Zweerde T, Kleiboer A, et al. 2017
2. 2Mindell JA, Williamson AA. 2017
3. 3Zaccaro A et al. 2018
4. 4Frattaroli J. 2006
5. 5Choi H, et al. 2025