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You can’t get six-and-a-half hours sleep all the time because you cannot control sleep. For as long as you try to control sleep or make a certain amount or type of sleep happen, there’s only one possible outcome — more struggle and more difficulty.
It might be helpful to bear in mind that a sleep window isn’t intended to make a certain amount or type of sleep happen. It’s simply a tool that’s intended to help you move away from chasing after sleep — because that only makes it more elusive.
What tools have you been practicing to help you build skill in moving away from trying to control what is out of your control so all that stuff can start to lose its power and influence over you?
—If you are ready to stop struggling with insomnia you can enroll in the online insomnia coaching course right now! If you would prefer ongoing phone or video coaching calls as part of a powerful three month program that will help you reclaim your life from insomnia, consider applying for the Insomnia Mastery program.
The content of this post is provided for informational and educational purposes only. It is not medical advice and is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease, disorder, or medical condition. It should never replace any advice given to you by your physician or any other licensed healthcare provider. Insomnia Coach LLC offers coaching services only and does not provide therapy, counseling, medical advice, or medical treatment. All content is provided “as is” and without warranties, either express or implied.
You cannot control sleep through effort — so, to answer your question, it’s impossible to say when you’ll experience a “regular” sleep pattern.
Sleep happens best when it’s effortless. When there’s no trying. No effort. No pressure to “perform”. No battling. No struggling.
All the ongoing attempts (past or present) are completely understandable! And they might contribute to why you feel wide awake when you go to bed. As your brain does its job of looking out for you, it’s trying to protect you from the upcoming battle.
Through your actions, how might you help train your brain that the bed isn’t a battleground that requires sounding the alarm bells and hitting “action stations”?
—If you are ready to stop struggling with insomnia you can enroll in the online insomnia coaching course right now! If you would prefer ongoing phone or video coaching calls as part of a powerful three month program that will help you reclaim your life from insomnia, consider applying for the Insomnia Mastery program.
The content of this post is provided for informational and educational purposes only. It is not medical advice and is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease, disorder, or medical condition. It should never replace any advice given to you by your physician or any other licensed healthcare provider. Insomnia Coach LLC offers coaching services only and does not provide therapy, counseling, medical advice, or medical treatment. All content is provided “as is” and without warranties, either express or implied.
My question is, to overcome insomnia, do I have to be happy and do I have to like it?
No!
Am I supposed to fake it to make it?
No!
I find it so hard to not think about sleep during the day time like I am obsessed over it. How do I manage not being sad?
You cannot “not think” about something — to check if you aren’t thinking about something, you have to think about it. Similarly, you cannot permanently delete certain feelings and emotions from your brain.
Acceptance is about accepting what is out of your control.
It’s about acknowledging your reality — everything you are thinking and feeling.
It’s about moving away from the struggle that comes from trying to fight or avoid what cannot be fought or avoided.
It’s about being kind to yourself when things are difficult.
It’s about committing to actions that reflect who you are and who you want to be, even in the presence of all this difficult stuff.
For as long as you try to fight or avoid or change something that you cannot control, what is the only possible outcome?
—If you are ready to stop struggling with insomnia you can enroll in the online insomnia coaching course right now! If you would prefer ongoing phone or video coaching calls as part of a powerful three month program that will help you reclaim your life from insomnia, consider applying for the Insomnia Mastery program.
The content of this post is provided for informational and educational purposes only. It is not medical advice and is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease, disorder, or medical condition. It should never replace any advice given to you by your physician or any other licensed healthcare provider. Insomnia Coach LLC offers coaching services only and does not provide therapy, counseling, medical advice, or medical treatment. All content is provided “as is” and without warranties, either express or implied.
I hope things are OK with your son. As you said, that’s another example of something that’s out of your control.
As you shared, the nights can be very lonely. Some people find it helpful to remind themselves that, in the presence of the loneliness they feel, there are millions of people out there experiencing the same thing at that exact moment. It’s a shared experience.
As for strings of sleepless nights, they can happen during withdrawal, after withdrawal, before withdrawal, without any medication use, and at any time or place.
Trying to fight or avoid being awake is what makes being awake more likely and more difficult. Even then, sleep will always happen in the end — because every human being has the natural ability to sleep (just as every human being has the natural ability to breathe).
The practice of accepting being awake when you’d rather be asleep is easier said than done. It’s something that requires ongoing practice. And, it’s more of a practice, rather than a goal.
—If you are ready to stop struggling with insomnia you can enroll in the online insomnia coaching course right now! If you would prefer ongoing phone or video coaching calls as part of a powerful three month program that will help you reclaim your life from insomnia, consider applying for the Insomnia Mastery program.
The content of this post is provided for informational and educational purposes only. It is not medical advice and is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease, disorder, or medical condition. It should never replace any advice given to you by your physician or any other licensed healthcare provider. Insomnia Coach LLC offers coaching services only and does not provide therapy, counseling, medical advice, or medical treatment. All content is provided “as is” and without warranties, either express or implied.
If the goal is to change anxiety or get rid of it, that might set you up for some struggle.
At night, there’s more opportunity to sit with anxiety as more of an observer without any time limit (and what would the alternative be, if you did implement a time limit?).
By day, you might be more likely to want to refocus your attention on where you are and what you are doing — and that can be done while anxiety is still present.
So, there’s still no need to put a time limit on sitting with anxiety. You might, for example, acknowledge the presence of anxiety, then deliberately bring your focus back to where you are and what you are doing.
And you will likely need to do that (especially early on) over and over again until you get better at refocusing!
We’ll be exploring this more in Week 3, too 🙂
—If you are ready to stop struggling with insomnia you can enroll in the online insomnia coaching course right now! If you would prefer ongoing phone or video coaching calls as part of a powerful three month program that will help you reclaim your life from insomnia, consider applying for the Insomnia Mastery program.
The content of this post is provided for informational and educational purposes only. It is not medical advice and is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease, disorder, or medical condition. It should never replace any advice given to you by your physician or any other licensed healthcare provider. Insomnia Coach LLC offers coaching services only and does not provide therapy, counseling, medical advice, or medical treatment. All content is provided “as is” and without warranties, either express or implied.
Thanks for sharing, @casserieev — what are you learning from your ongoing practice of the AWAKE exercise?
—If you are ready to stop struggling with insomnia you can enroll in the online insomnia coaching course right now! If you would prefer ongoing phone or video coaching calls as part of a powerful three month program that will help you reclaim your life from insomnia, consider applying for the Insomnia Mastery program.
The content of this post is provided for informational and educational purposes only. It is not medical advice and is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease, disorder, or medical condition. It should never replace any advice given to you by your physician or any other licensed healthcare provider. Insomnia Coach LLC offers coaching services only and does not provide therapy, counseling, medical advice, or medical treatment. All content is provided “as is” and without warranties, either express or implied.
It sounds like there’s an opportunity to be kind to yourself when things are difficult @Whiskers25.
As you said, you are a human being. When things feel difficult that’s because they are difficult.
—If you are ready to stop struggling with insomnia you can enroll in the online insomnia coaching course right now! If you would prefer ongoing phone or video coaching calls as part of a powerful three month program that will help you reclaim your life from insomnia, consider applying for the Insomnia Mastery program.
The content of this post is provided for informational and educational purposes only. It is not medical advice and is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease, disorder, or medical condition. It should never replace any advice given to you by your physician or any other licensed healthcare provider. Insomnia Coach LLC offers coaching services only and does not provide therapy, counseling, medical advice, or medical treatment. All content is provided “as is” and without warranties, either express or implied.
This one might be useful: Mortality risk does not significantly vary according to sleep duration.
—If you are ready to stop struggling with insomnia you can enroll in the online insomnia coaching course right now! If you would prefer ongoing phone or video coaching calls as part of a powerful three month program that will help you reclaim your life from insomnia, consider applying for the Insomnia Mastery program.
The content of this post is provided for informational and educational purposes only. It is not medical advice and is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease, disorder, or medical condition. It should never replace any advice given to you by your physician or any other licensed healthcare provider. Insomnia Coach LLC offers coaching services only and does not provide therapy, counseling, medical advice, or medical treatment. All content is provided “as is” and without warranties, either express or implied.
Hello Michael! Your experience seems to be telling you that it’s not possible to permanently delete certain thoughts from your brain. How might trying to achieve such a goal set you up for an ongoing struggle?
—If you are ready to stop struggling with insomnia you can enroll in the online insomnia coaching course right now! If you would prefer ongoing phone or video coaching calls as part of a powerful three month program that will help you reclaim your life from insomnia, consider applying for the Insomnia Mastery program.
The content of this post is provided for informational and educational purposes only. It is not medical advice and is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease, disorder, or medical condition. It should never replace any advice given to you by your physician or any other licensed healthcare provider. Insomnia Coach LLC offers coaching services only and does not provide therapy, counseling, medical advice, or medical treatment. All content is provided “as is” and without warranties, either express or implied.
Ups and downs are not unusual at all. What you’ve described is evidence that your sleep system is working perfectly — when you’ve been awake for long enough, sleep is happening.
After a better night of sleep, sleep pressure is lower and so any ongoing effort to make sleep happen, any pressure to “perform” sleep, any battling with your mind, makes sleep even more difficult — because there’s less sleep pressure to override all your efforts.
The key to effortless sleep is to move away from the effort. Then, you won’t need to be awake for as long for sleep to overcome all your efforts.
—If you are ready to stop struggling with insomnia you can enroll in the online insomnia coaching course right now! If you would prefer ongoing phone or video coaching calls as part of a powerful three month program that will help you reclaim your life from insomnia, consider applying for the Insomnia Mastery program.
The content of this post is provided for informational and educational purposes only. It is not medical advice and is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease, disorder, or medical condition. It should never replace any advice given to you by your physician or any other licensed healthcare provider. Insomnia Coach LLC offers coaching services only and does not provide therapy, counseling, medical advice, or medical treatment. All content is provided “as is” and without warranties, either express or implied.
Everyone here is the expert on themselves — and one question that might be helpful to consider is this:
If your experience tells you that sleep is out of your direct control, how does having goals related to experiencing a certain amount (or type) of sleep help you move away from an ongoing struggle with sleep?
—If you are ready to stop struggling with insomnia you can enroll in the online insomnia coaching course right now! If you would prefer ongoing phone or video coaching calls as part of a powerful three month program that will help you reclaim your life from insomnia, consider applying for the Insomnia Mastery program.
The content of this post is provided for informational and educational purposes only. It is not medical advice and is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease, disorder, or medical condition. It should never replace any advice given to you by your physician or any other licensed healthcare provider. Insomnia Coach LLC offers coaching services only and does not provide therapy, counseling, medical advice, or medical treatment. All content is provided “as is” and without warranties, either express or implied.
That jolting awake can be so frustrating — and it comes from your brain waking you up to declare victory: sleep is here!
Of course, this isn’t too helpful if your goal is to sleep! You cannot control what your brain chooses to do but you can always control your actions — how you choose to approach sleep and how you choose to respond to those jolts (and being awake when you’d rather be asleep).
With this in mind, how might you — through your actions — help train your brain that it doesn’t need to focus so much attention on sleep and that being awake isn’t a threat that requires protection?
—If you are ready to stop struggling with insomnia you can enroll in the online insomnia coaching course right now! If you would prefer ongoing phone or video coaching calls as part of a powerful three month program that will help you reclaim your life from insomnia, consider applying for the Insomnia Mastery program.
The content of this post is provided for informational and educational purposes only. It is not medical advice and is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease, disorder, or medical condition. It should never replace any advice given to you by your physician or any other licensed healthcare provider. Insomnia Coach LLC offers coaching services only and does not provide therapy, counseling, medical advice, or medical treatment. All content is provided “as is” and without warranties, either express or implied.
Hello Molly! It makes complete sense that your brain didn’t pay much attention to sleep when sleep didn’t feel like a problem or an issue.
It sounds as though you are resisting the appearance of fear. Perhaps because it’s uncomfortable to experience. Perhaps because you see it as on obstacle to sleep. Maybe both!
What does your experience tell you about your ability to:
1) Permanently delete fear from your brain so it never shows up again?
2) Permanently control sleep so it happens just as you want it to?Feeling as though you have more to lose makes sense — and you can only “lose” if you allow sleep and certain thoughts and feelings to control your actions in a way that creates more struggle, more difficulty, and pulls you away from living the life you want to live.
You have the power here. You control your actions. You get to decide how you live your life each and every day.
How do you choose to respond?
—If you are ready to stop struggling with insomnia you can enroll in the online insomnia coaching course right now! If you would prefer ongoing phone or video coaching calls as part of a powerful three month program that will help you reclaim your life from insomnia, consider applying for the Insomnia Mastery program.
The content of this post is provided for informational and educational purposes only. It is not medical advice and is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease, disorder, or medical condition. It should never replace any advice given to you by your physician or any other licensed healthcare provider. Insomnia Coach LLC offers coaching services only and does not provide therapy, counseling, medical advice, or medical treatment. All content is provided “as is” and without warranties, either express or implied.
A sleep window doesn’t make sleep happen — your body makes sleep happen all by itself 🙂
It sounds as though you are being reminded that sleep is out of your control. That you can feel sleepy and still not fall asleep as you want to.
Sleepiness is a feeling. It can mean conditions are better for sleep to happen but it’s no guarantee that sleep will happen.
As you know from experience, you cannot make sleep happen. You can only control your actions.
What’s the best way to respond when sleep isn’t happening (even when you feel sleepy) and why?
PS: The brain never switches off — not for as long as you are a living person! Therefore, trying might set you up for a bit of a struggle!
—If you are ready to stop struggling with insomnia you can enroll in the online insomnia coaching course right now! If you would prefer ongoing phone or video coaching calls as part of a powerful three month program that will help you reclaim your life from insomnia, consider applying for the Insomnia Mastery program.
The content of this post is provided for informational and educational purposes only. It is not medical advice and is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease, disorder, or medical condition. It should never replace any advice given to you by your physician or any other licensed healthcare provider. Insomnia Coach LLC offers coaching services only and does not provide therapy, counseling, medical advice, or medical treatment. All content is provided “as is” and without warranties, either express or implied.
What guidance does your experience have to offer when it comes to trying to make an extra hour of sleep happen? Where does that get you?
—If you are ready to stop struggling with insomnia you can enroll in the online insomnia coaching course right now! If you would prefer ongoing phone or video coaching calls as part of a powerful three month program that will help you reclaim your life from insomnia, consider applying for the Insomnia Mastery program.
The content of this post is provided for informational and educational purposes only. It is not medical advice and is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease, disorder, or medical condition. It should never replace any advice given to you by your physician or any other licensed healthcare provider. Insomnia Coach LLC offers coaching services only and does not provide therapy, counseling, medical advice, or medical treatment. All content is provided “as is” and without warranties, either express or implied.
