Tip #24: Keep Notepad Beside Bed

My brain decides to run faster than my feet ever could each night as I'm attempting to sleep.  "Remember that one time you did that one embarrassing thing five years ago or said that silly thing to your crush that made you look stupid when you was nine?  Now you remember!" Or when I need to get things done the next day or the coming week and my brain must go over in detail what to do and how to do it.  Its hard to push all those thoughts away to try and sleep.  How do I attempt to calm my brain down at night?

Keep a notepad and pen at your nightstand to write out your scattered thoughts before bed, or to jump start your morning with a list of to-dos already waiting for you.

This is also a good tip for fellow writers (or ones that call themselves writers like me) who get inspirations from dreams or random thoughts you have before bed away from your laptop.  It doesn't have to be coherent or in any type of format.  This is just a way to get it out of your brain and onto something tangible to deal with later.  It's helped me remember elaborate dreams, establish plot holes in my novels I say I'm "working on" but have yet to finish, and come up with blog ideas for this and my other blogs.

My notepad beside my desk is mostly used for writing references and notes as you can see, but I'll occasionally rip out a page and use it as a to-do list.  "I just HAVE to write something down before I fall asleep or I will most likely forget about it forever," says my brain, although the forgetting part is usually true.

Do you keep paper beside your bed?  What do you use it for?  Let me know in the comments!