My favorite go-to-sleep move is to load up Ben Eater on YouTube. I actually love Ben Eater’s content, but his voice and his lack of dopamine-chasing production make for perfect go-to-sleep encouragement. And then I have a genuinely interesting video to pick up when I’m not tired.
Northwoods Baseball Radio Network is my favorite. It’s a fictional baseball league based primarily in Wisconsin. Games are called by a droning announcer. Even the fake commercials between innings are monotonous.
I listen to it during the day too. I’m very tempted to score some of the games, but I’m a little worried I’d find holes like only 2 outs in an inning or missing innings in a game.
The problem with that podcast is that most of their selections are genuinely interesting - I even listened to them on long drives (e.g. "Origin of Species"). Even something I thought would boring like or "Farm Engines and how to Run" them turned out to be fascinating.
This one, on the other hand, seems to be genuinely boring. I couldn't get past the intro.
The Sleep With Me Podcast is very good. It helped my wife when she had a period of insomnia.
He has a number of tricks he uses from a monoto delivery, to meandering stories where the narrative constantly interrupts itself with. So you can’t really “follow along”.
Lifelong insomniac (racing thoughts, probably ADHD-related) and this podcast cured me.
To anyone who tries it, it's important to know upfront: there's nothing to "get." It's nonsense. It exhausts the brain without being interesting enough to keep it running.
Woke up too early this morning and tried it, after Mafra public radio did not work for me. This worked great, and now that I am listening to it again it is quite hilarious that I just cannot follow what he is talking about
A similar one I recently discovered is https://www.youtube.com/@SleepOnPhysics. I think it was meant to put you to sleep with the detailed narrative, but I found it to be very interesting and captivating, especially for long drives.
The content quality is pretty good, I am almost certain the audio is AI generated, but wonder how the content itself was authored.
Amazes me how people in a tech industry paying six figures refuse to pay a tiny percentage of their income to get rid of adverts on something that consumes so much time.
There's a very emotional "I'm not paying for YouTube" feeling that some people have. They try and justify it with logic after the fact, but the underlying principal seems too simply be "I'm not gonna pay for YouTube, I deserve to get everything for free!" Like, you get paid at your job where you work, which gets you money. Paying other people money for their work, however, suddenly that's just not ok. Somehow.
Not sure how accessible all this is outside of the UK (you'd need to check the BBC Sounds website & app), but the BBC has perfected a couple of great "gets you to sleep" radio outlets.
The oldest is Radio 4, the BBC's national spoken word radio station (there's also Radio 5 which focuses on sport and news, Radio 4 is more a mixture of comedy, arts, culture and news).
Late at night (UK time), there are programmes that were for many years my soundtrack to getting to sleep - news, a short programme (on Sunday it's a recording of some church bells from some church somewhere in the UK countryside - it changes each week), followed by the shipping forecast. The service "signs off" with the national anthem before switching over to the BBC World Service at around 1am through until 6am when it switches back to the iconic Today programme.
The shipping forecast though - that's the gold. If you've never listened to it before, try and find a recording. As an island nation with a decimated but still strong fishing trawler fleet, it's framed as essential safety information, but in truth its just an iconic, beautiful, ever-changing structured poem, read on national radio several times a day. It is perfect for helping calm the mind, it's a weighted blanket for the brain.
Somebody, somewhere realised that a continuity announcer slowly rattling through the shipping forecast was so good at putting over-active minds to sleep that they created a podcast - "The Sleeping Forecast" - which is a mix of slow/ambient music with old shipping forecasts read over them. I love it, but my partner finds it "weird" so I can't listen to it without wearing headphones late at night.
This, somehow, then led to the realisation that Radio 3 (the national classical music station in the UK), could provide more of the same. Cue other programs - Sleep Tracks, Night Tracks - where there is a composition of calming, quieting music, mostly rooted in classical tradition but overall just very ambient and calm.
And then the final inevitable chapter: in the world of DAB radio and digital platforms (including the BBC Sounds app that seemed absurd at its inception but now slowly becoming loved), the BBC realised they could cheaply put together a whole new station: BBC Radio 3 Unwind (or "3U" for short).
All of this being the BBC, there are no ads. No pledge drives. 3 Unwind has no news programming. It's my new go to when anxiety hits.
The BBC isn't perfect, the funding model needs to evolve, but while we have this - just in case one day we don't - do try and enjoy this stuff if you can.
Marfa is an amazing little town. I was there 3 months ago; while it is out of the way, even as a visitor, everyone is nice and genuinely there to provide an amazing artistic experience. If you ever want to experience the actual weird, southwestern, cowboy country, go to Marfa. And have a drink outside this public radio station. It's quite a nice getaway.
My wife and I had our wedding in Marathon which is in the other side of Alpine. We both love the area and my oldest son is named Jett after James Dean’s character in the movie Giant which was filmed in and near those towns. Did you find the pay phone in Marfa that just plays Taylor Swift’s Shake It Off through the handset? Hah it’s a magical desert out that way.
> Ever wondered what NPR's code of journalistic ethics involves for the newsroom?
I have been thinking a lot through the years about the choice between joirnalistic ethics and journalistic activism in the ranks of organizations like NPR. This is an extremely important topic because today's media are as impactful politically as the "regular" political process.
My point is, such discussion would not make me sleepy, the opposite would happen.
One trick that makes me sleepy really fast: After I close my eyes, I imagine someone throwing black paint on them. The first coat is kinda gray and has lots of blob and not fully black. Then another coat. And another. Each one gets darker until it's just pure black and I'm usually asleep by then.
For some reason, my brain follows it, and I fall asleep much faster. It works way better for me than box breathing or most other sleep tricks I've seen. Sharing in case someone else finds this useful.
If noise keeps you awake (loud neighborhood) then a white noise blanket could work. I downloaded a 10 hour beachwaves sound and played it to cover the noise. Two small speakers left and right made it feel like I was there with the stereo. It took a little bit to get used to, but it did the trick.
I close my eyes and set out on a journey to explore an imaginary island. It almost always begins on a sun-drenched beach. Usually, I’ve already fallen asleep after just a few meters...
One of my greatest memories is performing at the Chinati Foundation. Marfa is such a gem with tons of cool people just being creative out in the desert.
Anything works really. I think whatever music you enjoy works. I have fallen asleep to Morbid Angel and Vader, so I assume those who like this type of music would also fall asleep to Stellardrone.
It's a progressive web app (you may install and use it both on android and ios)
Simply visit the page and click Install.
This may even be used without installation though...
Even no sign-up is required to try this.
Same here. Love the Mindscape podcast. It taught me everything I know about quantum physics (haha).
But for me, the bedtime listening is ALWAYS fascinating. It has to be. And I fall asleep nevertheless.
My routine is to play a podcast that I am interested in, put a sleep timer on 20 min (Overcast app FTW), and just enjoy the content.
No matter how interesting it is, it very rarely takes me setting the timer for another 20 min, almost always I fall asleep in the first run, often times within the first 10 min.
What makes it funny is I will be listening a single episode for weeks sometime, often listening the same parts over and over again simply because I can’t precisely start today where I fell asleep yesterday.
It became a part of a routine that I am genuinely looking forward to. This is how I worked through the entire Mike Duncan opus (Revolutions first, and then the History of Rome), I am currently working through the History of Byzantium by Robin Pierson, but occasionally I am listening to Sean Carrol, and sometimes I will go back to In our Time by BBC’s Melwyn Bragg.
Actually, come to think of it, most of my podcast listening time is bedtime. I would hate to waste it to listen something boring.
Listen to The Public Broadcasting Act of 1967. It's bureaucratic language, which could put you to sleep. But then it also contains some ideas that sound utterly unrealistic and utopian in our current times, even as mere aspirations. Thinking about what we've lost since 1967 makes me lose my sleep.
It’s really annoying, but even if Cloudflare/AWS etc. offer a big “block all access from abroad/evil GDPR abroad/…”, I feel like the site owner is still the one to blame for pressing it.
i want a sleep app that reads me things that will put me to sleep, but i need it to track when i may have gone to sleep, or more importantly when I have not, so i can restart the next night past the point i've listened to. but it needs to be some crazy simple UI, i don't want the light on my phone to turn on, i don't want to fiddle, just skip forward, skip back, that's about it
there's all sorts of stuff that is dry but interesting that I'd like to plow through over time, a few paragraphs a day would suit me fine
I think it'd be an outstanding feature on the iPhone to turn off audiobooks/podcasts at ~5 min into sleep or whatever. Seems like they already have the data via the Watch...
Am I the only one that can't fall asleep to music? I need human voice rhythms, so podcasts, or whatever. The downside is not learning anything from the podcast because I'm asleep and it works its way into dreams sporadically
I can't fall asleep to either. I can tolerate noise, like a thunderstorm, but even construction sounds are interesting enough to keep me up with questions like: "I wonder what tool makes that sound."
Too many American websites these days put random geoblocking in place.
What’s even more frustrating is when it happens without any explanation in mobile apps via breaking a few specific APIs.
Just yesterday I was struggling with a bank/fintech that would send me through KYC every time I’d open the app from abroad as an existing user, which would then hang forever. Using a US VPN, everything would work normally. Good thing fraudsters don’t have access to US VPNs…
The geoblocking is mostly a desperate attempt at self defense against a flood of scrapers crushing the site for everyone. Don't take it personally unless you are one.
Why wouldn't I take it personally if some corporation decides that blocking their existing customers based on purported geographic location (VPNs exist, people travel etc.) is acceptable collateral damage in their presumably largely ineffective attempts to block scrapers?
been using long youtube lectures for this for years. the sweet spot is something just interesting enough that your brain can't fully let go, but not interesting enough to actually keep you awake. theoretical physics talks hit it perfectly for me.
the problem is occasionally you find one that's genuinely fascinating and you're suddenly wide awake at 3am having learned something.
https://archive.ph/GkyK5
They've seemed to configure Cloudfront to block access from Singapore.
At least one can see the html there.
My favorite go-to-sleep move is to load up Ben Eater on YouTube. I actually love Ben Eater’s content, but his voice and his lack of dopamine-chasing production make for perfect go-to-sleep encouragement. And then I have a genuinely interesting video to pick up when I’m not tired.
Northwoods Baseball Radio Network is my favorite. It’s a fictional baseball league based primarily in Wisconsin. Games are called by a droning announcer. Even the fake commercials between innings are monotonous.
I listen to it during the day too. I’m very tempted to score some of the games, but I’m a little worried I’d find holes like only 2 outs in an inning or missing innings in a game.
https://www.sleepbaseball.com/
I almost think the possible scoring inconsistencies would make it better, not worse
Michigan. Though there are fictional Wisconsin teams in the fictional league.
There is a similar podcast, "Boring Books for Bedtime": https://www.boringbookspod.com/episodes.
The problem with that podcast is that most of their selections are genuinely interesting - I even listened to them on long drives (e.g. "Origin of Species"). Even something I thought would boring like or "Farm Engines and how to Run" them turned out to be fascinating.
This one, on the other hand, seems to be genuinely boring. I couldn't get past the intro.
The Sleep With Me Podcast is very good. It helped my wife when she had a period of insomnia.
He has a number of tricks he uses from a monoto delivery, to meandering stories where the narrative constantly interrupts itself with. So you can’t really “follow along”.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sleep_with_Me_(podcast)
There's a real craft to making something feel safe, low-stakes and impossible to get invested in
Lifelong insomniac (racing thoughts, probably ADHD-related) and this podcast cured me.
To anyone who tries it, it's important to know upfront: there's nothing to "get." It's nonsense. It exhausts the brain without being interesting enough to keep it running.
Woke up too early this morning and tried it, after Mafra public radio did not work for me. This worked great, and now that I am listening to it again it is quite hilarious that I just cannot follow what he is talking about
I don’t need it now but this was a godsend a few years ago.
That's the funny trap with a lot of "boring" material: the moment it's old, technical or oddly specific, it becomes interesting again
A similar one I recently discovered is https://www.youtube.com/@SleepOnPhysics. I think it was meant to put you to sleep with the detailed narrative, but I found it to be very interesting and captivating, especially for long drives. The content quality is pretty good, I am almost certain the audio is AI generated, but wonder how the content itself was authored.
I don't believe it to be ai generated voice. It's too good.
Or if it is - why e.g. automated voices reading nyt articles are so bad?
In the middle the YouTube Advertisements starts playing at a louder volume and you wake up :)
Amazes me how people in a tech industry paying six figures refuse to pay a tiny percentage of their income to get rid of adverts on something that consumes so much time.
Paying for YouTube does not get rid of ads. Only using sponsor block does.
There's a very emotional "I'm not paying for YouTube" feeling that some people have. They try and justify it with logic after the fact, but the underlying principal seems too simply be "I'm not gonna pay for YouTube, I deserve to get everything for free!" Like, you get paid at your job where you work, which gets you money. Paying other people money for their work, however, suddenly that's just not ok. Somehow.
> This one, on the other hand, seems to be genuinely boring. I couldn't get past the intro.
The professionals…
On a related note reading HN comments is a prime example of sleepy text. Gets me every time.
Not sure how accessible all this is outside of the UK (you'd need to check the BBC Sounds website & app), but the BBC has perfected a couple of great "gets you to sleep" radio outlets.
The oldest is Radio 4, the BBC's national spoken word radio station (there's also Radio 5 which focuses on sport and news, Radio 4 is more a mixture of comedy, arts, culture and news).
Late at night (UK time), there are programmes that were for many years my soundtrack to getting to sleep - news, a short programme (on Sunday it's a recording of some church bells from some church somewhere in the UK countryside - it changes each week), followed by the shipping forecast. The service "signs off" with the national anthem before switching over to the BBC World Service at around 1am through until 6am when it switches back to the iconic Today programme.
The shipping forecast though - that's the gold. If you've never listened to it before, try and find a recording. As an island nation with a decimated but still strong fishing trawler fleet, it's framed as essential safety information, but in truth its just an iconic, beautiful, ever-changing structured poem, read on national radio several times a day. It is perfect for helping calm the mind, it's a weighted blanket for the brain.
Somebody, somewhere realised that a continuity announcer slowly rattling through the shipping forecast was so good at putting over-active minds to sleep that they created a podcast - "The Sleeping Forecast" - which is a mix of slow/ambient music with old shipping forecasts read over them. I love it, but my partner finds it "weird" so I can't listen to it without wearing headphones late at night.
This, somehow, then led to the realisation that Radio 3 (the national classical music station in the UK), could provide more of the same. Cue other programs - Sleep Tracks, Night Tracks - where there is a composition of calming, quieting music, mostly rooted in classical tradition but overall just very ambient and calm.
And then the final inevitable chapter: in the world of DAB radio and digital platforms (including the BBC Sounds app that seemed absurd at its inception but now slowly becoming loved), the BBC realised they could cheaply put together a whole new station: BBC Radio 3 Unwind (or "3U" for short).
All of this being the BBC, there are no ads. No pledge drives. 3 Unwind has no news programming. It's my new go to when anxiety hits.
The BBC isn't perfect, the funding model needs to evolve, but while we have this - just in case one day we don't - do try and enjoy this stuff if you can.
The Shipping Forecast is such a strange cultural object from the outside
In Our Time. Is always fascinating and always puts be to sleep - I have to consume it in 10 minute nightly chunks
What do you mean in the last paragraph? I don't know much about the BBC, but I cherish our local equivalents.
When I first read that, I saw "Mafia Public Radio."
"Youse gonna sleep wid' da fishies..."
I love this. It's funny but also weirdly effective as a reminder that local radio is held together by a huge amount of invisible, unglamorous work
Marfa is an amazing little town. I was there 3 months ago; while it is out of the way, even as a visitor, everyone is nice and genuinely there to provide an amazing artistic experience. If you ever want to experience the actual weird, southwestern, cowboy country, go to Marfa. And have a drink outside this public radio station. It's quite a nice getaway.
Don’t pass up Marfa Burrito, just off Highland Ave. Gigantic and extremely good. It’s a cool town on the edge of nowhere.
Agreed!
The ambience there fits Marfa perfectly.
My wife and I had our wedding in Marathon which is in the other side of Alpine. We both love the area and my oldest son is named Jett after James Dean’s character in the movie Giant which was filmed in and near those towns. Did you find the pay phone in Marfa that just plays Taylor Swift’s Shake It Off through the handset? Hah it’s a magical desert out that way.
> Ever wondered what NPR's code of journalistic ethics involves for the newsroom?
I have been thinking a lot through the years about the choice between joirnalistic ethics and journalistic activism in the ranks of organizations like NPR. This is an extremely important topic because today's media are as impactful politically as the "regular" political process.
My point is, such discussion would not make me sleepy, the opposite would happen.
I suppose it depends on how it is presented. You can definitely present boring things interestingly, and interesting things boringly.
> It's a sleep podcast wherein we read you the boring documents essential to our jobs, in the hopes we might lull you into slumber.
What a great idea, I feel li... zzz
One trick that makes me sleepy really fast: After I close my eyes, I imagine someone throwing black paint on them. The first coat is kinda gray and has lots of blob and not fully black. Then another coat. And another. Each one gets darker until it's just pure black and I'm usually asleep by then.
For some reason, my brain follows it, and I fall asleep much faster. It works way better for me than box breathing or most other sleep tricks I've seen. Sharing in case someone else finds this useful.
If noise keeps you awake (loud neighborhood) then a white noise blanket could work. I downloaded a 10 hour beachwaves sound and played it to cover the noise. Two small speakers left and right made it feel like I was there with the stereo. It took a little bit to get used to, but it did the trick.
Similarly, I never try to imagine a bright sunshine. It can wake me up
I close my eyes and set out on a journey to explore an imaginary island. It almost always begins on a sun-drenched beach. Usually, I’ve already fallen asleep after just a few meters...
Love this. I'll try it.
Ive found great success with the Military Sleep Method where you progressively shutdown your body from head to toe.
For me, Edward Witten (1), Sheldon Axler (2), Patrick Winston (3) and many others do a far better job.
1. https://youtu.be/UW_M7hotSlk
2. https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLGAnmvB9m7zOBVCZBUUmSinFV...
3. https://youtu.be/TjZBTDzGeGg
Sean Carroll’s Mindscape for me
One of my greatest memories is performing at the Chinati Foundation. Marfa is such a gem with tons of cool people just being creative out in the desert.
agreed, it's a gem. wasn't familiar with Chianti, though!
short of this radio, you can also play Stellardrone https://stellardrone.bandcamp.com/
Anything works really. I think whatever music you enjoy works. I have fallen asleep to Morbid Angel and Vader, so I assume those who like this type of music would also fall asleep to Stellardrone.
I used to fall asleep to NPR as a kid, so this resonates. Curious if anyone else has a go-to station or podcast they use as a sleep aid?
No Agenda is a regular of mine... the sound levels on it are incredibly well done, also for all clips they play.
The Odd Lots podcast puts my wife to sleep
Just thinking about that little big neck of the world puts me to sleep. In the best of ways. I love West Texas.
I wonder why the telephone number read aloud, and that on the web page, are different.
fastsleep.app does kinda similar thing... but instead of long podcasts, you are given something to imagine at a time interval.
Like if you hear "calm river", imagine that. If you hear "heavy rain over a tree", imagine that.
In short → Close your eyes, listen & imagine.
I wasn't able to find this, is it iPhone only?
I may have missed the joke but no, https://fastsleep.app/ is not iPhone only!
It's a progressive web app (you may install and use it both on android and ios) Simply visit the page and click Install. This may even be used without installation though... Even no sign-up is required to try this.
Sean Carroll's Mindscape is my favourite.
Though sometimes it is very interesting and might delay sleep a bit
Same here. Love the Mindscape podcast. It taught me everything I know about quantum physics (haha). But for me, the bedtime listening is ALWAYS fascinating. It has to be. And I fall asleep nevertheless. My routine is to play a podcast that I am interested in, put a sleep timer on 20 min (Overcast app FTW), and just enjoy the content.
No matter how interesting it is, it very rarely takes me setting the timer for another 20 min, almost always I fall asleep in the first run, often times within the first 10 min.
What makes it funny is I will be listening a single episode for weeks sometime, often listening the same parts over and over again simply because I can’t precisely start today where I fell asleep yesterday.
It became a part of a routine that I am genuinely looking forward to. This is how I worked through the entire Mike Duncan opus (Revolutions first, and then the History of Rome), I am currently working through the History of Byzantium by Robin Pierson, but occasionally I am listening to Sean Carrol, and sometimes I will go back to In our Time by BBC’s Melwyn Bragg.
Actually, come to think of it, most of my podcast listening time is bedtime. I would hate to waste it to listen something boring.
I’d like to filter the offerings to get the most monotonic voice
Bryon Gysin wrote series of corresponding letters with William Burroughs on radio.
One refers to toothpaste manufacturing, the cold anticipation marketers should have.
clicks fingers instead of clapping.
What a brilliant idea. I’m here fo…zzz.
Too bad they missed the opportunity to read it, very, slowly.
IWTWMBY
Wdym... this is riveting stuff!
See also the Myths and Legends podcast: https://www.mythpodcast.com/.
I am using https://www.youtube.com/@EpicNate for the same purpose. Works like a charm.
Listen to The Public Broadcasting Act of 1967. It's bureaucratic language, which could put you to sleep. But then it also contains some ideas that sound utterly unrealistic and utopian in our current times, even as mere aspirations. Thinking about what we've lost since 1967 makes me lose my sleep.
https://www.marfapublicradio.org/podcast/marfa-public-radio-...
> The Amazon CloudFront distribution is configured to block access from your country.
Thank you very much.
So tired of the cloudflare shit.
I think you’re mixing up clouds here…
It’s really annoying, but even if Cloudflare/AWS etc. offer a big “block all access from abroad/evil GDPR abroad/…”, I feel like the site owner is still the one to blame for pressing it.
Can't wait for Cloudflare to start demanding digital ID verification from me.
Listening now, after a day long coding binge, and I need to wind down.
It has a decent sleepy background vibe to it too. Reminds me of Joe Perra Talks You To Sleep (Adult Swim). I dig it!
another is "Sleep With Me" by Dearest Scooter which are nonsensical steam of consciousness monologues.
i want a sleep app that reads me things that will put me to sleep, but i need it to track when i may have gone to sleep, or more importantly when I have not, so i can restart the next night past the point i've listened to. but it needs to be some crazy simple UI, i don't want the light on my phone to turn on, i don't want to fiddle, just skip forward, skip back, that's about it
there's all sorts of stuff that is dry but interesting that I'd like to plow through over time, a few paragraphs a day would suit me fine
If you have AirPods there’s a “Pause media when falling asleep” switch.
Any idea how that works? Something with the microphone maybe?
Probably the same accelerometers and gyroscope used for Spatial Audio.
Isn’t it annoying to have Airpods in your ears when sleeping?
I think it'd be an outstanding feature on the iPhone to turn off audiobooks/podcasts at ~5 min into sleep or whatever. Seems like they already have the data via the Watch...
audiobook software is almost there, I've used cozy like that myself
Meh, not math finance. Thats literally lorezapam.
Am I the only one that can't fall asleep to music? I need human voice rhythms, so podcasts, or whatever. The downside is not learning anything from the podcast because I'm asleep and it works its way into dreams sporadically
I can't fall asleep to either. I can tolerate noise, like a thunderstorm, but even construction sounds are interesting enough to keep me up with questions like: "I wonder what tool makes that sound."
The sound of a fan does it for me. Not the motor sound perse, but the blades of a powerful big fan cutting the wind. I’m addicted to it.
Too many American websites these days put random geoblocking in place.
What’s even more frustrating is when it happens without any explanation in mobile apps via breaking a few specific APIs.
Just yesterday I was struggling with a bank/fintech that would send me through KYC every time I’d open the app from abroad as an existing user, which would then hang forever. Using a US VPN, everything would work normally. Good thing fraudsters don’t have access to US VPNs…
The geoblocking is mostly a desperate attempt at self defense against a flood of scrapers crushing the site for everyone. Don't take it personally unless you are one.
Why wouldn't I take it personally if some corporation decides that blocking their existing customers based on purported geographic location (VPNs exist, people travel etc.) is acceptable collateral damage in their presumably largely ineffective attempts to block scrapers?
been using long youtube lectures for this for years. the sweet spot is something just interesting enough that your brain can't fully let go, but not interesting enough to actually keep you awake. theoretical physics talks hit it perfectly for me.
the problem is occasionally you find one that's genuinely fascinating and you're suddenly wide awake at 3am having learned something.
Marvin Minksky's AI lecture series FTW