Field note · 1 min read
What is a cognitive shuffle?
A plain-language guide to picturing unrelated things before sleep.
A cognitive shuffle is a simple imagination exercise: bring to mind a series of unrelated, emotionally neutral objects—lantern, apple, bridge, cloud—and picture each briefly before moving on.
The technique has a named author. Luc P. Beaudoin, an adjunct professor at Simon Fraser University in Canada, first described it in a 2013 paper as serial diverse imagining: picturing one concrete thing after another and deliberately not letting them join into a story. In 2014 he released an app, mySleepButton, that supplies the prompts so the person in bed has nothing to prepare.
The sequence is intentionally disconnected. There is no story to solve and no perfect image to make. The task merely gives a busy mind a succession of small, non-urgent places to rest.
Its evidence base is still young. This site presents the words slowly, for use with closed eyes, as an entertainment and general-information experience rather than a treatment or a substitute for professional care.