So your lying awake in bed, you’ve got a mild case of insomnia and somehow you just can’t drift off to sleep! Does ‘Counting Sheep’ really work?

Surprisingly, it does!

O.K. So that’s a bit of a sweeping statement, not everyone is going to drift off to the Land of Nod just by counting a few woolly lambs. But the basic philosophy behind the premise is based in fact.

You see the trick with counting sheep is to create a monotonous repetitive exercise. Don’t be imaginative and create individual sheep. Don’t give them separate names like Shaun and Lamb-chop and whatever you do, don’t let them roam through interesting countryside.

Make them fluffy white, identical, everyday sheep. Something you wouldn’t look twice at in a field. Then, as they parade past you in a slow orderly fashion, count them off one by one.

In fact if you make the exercise as monotonous as possible, the chances are you’ll fall to sleep even quicker than you’d expect.

Working in the same way as when you start to fall asleep at the steering wheel of your car, when you’re on a really long and boring journey. Some observers compare it to a form of mild meditation where the mind seems to ‘zone’ out.

So, the next time you can’t sleep, start counting those sheep and meditate your way to a good night’s sleep.