That’s exactly how I started every morning when I was feeling the impact of burnout.
I was tired and exhausted during the day, and then my mind would be amped up all night just racing.
I ended up laying in bed just about all kinds of details from:
- What I “had to do” the next day
- What I “should have done” during the day I just completed
- Random worries about friends, family, our house, my job, my health…you name it
Well, after struggling with this personally I’m extremely well versed
in how to quiet your mind so you can get a good nights sleep.
This is crucial because when you rest well:
- You’ve got more energy for your work and your family
- You’re happier
- You let things bother you a lot less
- You’re more flexible
- And you just think better
Today sleep deprivation is becoming a more common problem.
Sometimes it is because we fill up every possible hour of the day and night with to-do’s.
Sometimes it’s the constant temptation of readily available technology.
But other times it’s because we just can’t fall asleep or stay asleep
because our minds are racing with an ever cascading flow of stress and
yet-to-do’s.
According to the National Sleep Foundation, a proper night’s sleep for adults is 7-9 hours.
I don’t know about you, but when my mind is racing, getting 7-9 hours
sleep is impossible. According to Sleep in America polls, about 20% of
Americans report that they get less than 6 hours of sleep on average
So, of course, this has become a big issue. And it affects our daytime
as much as our night.
What’s Happening When Your Mind is Racing
A racing mind is the stress that comes with you not being able to stop thinking.
You don’t have the opportunity to fall asleep because you can’t let go of those thoughts long enough to drift.
You’re mind is swirling around thought of past, future, and present.
In general when you’ve got a racing mind at night, your thoughts fall into 3 categories:
- What Should I have Done Today – You go over and over all those things that you wish you’d accomplished, but didn’t have the time or energy to. Oftentimes, this leads to a negative emotional place where you start to beat yourself up for not getting enough done.
- What do I need to get Done Tomorrow- This, of course, doesn’t just encompass your workload, though that’s often the lead stress-causer. It’s really just a hodge-podge of everything that turns your tomorrow into a daunting mountain. And the temptation can be to jump up and get a head start. But that will only leave you exhausted and far less productive.
- Losing Sleep over Sleep – That frustration and feeling of defeat when you realize how much worse your day will be tomorrow when you don’t get any sleep tonight. And your thoughts start to focus on, “O my gosh, I should really be asleep right now!” “Why am I not falling asleep?”
The process of counting sheep doesn’t actually deal with any of the racing thoughts or the stress that accompanies them.
All it does is create a tug-of-war for your attention.
And the thoughts that win out over the sheep seem all the more important because it
appears that you can’t shake them even when giving it your best shot.
5 Methods of Quieting Your Mind When You Can’t Sleep
While there are a lot of resources out there for people who struggle
with racing thoughts or an inability to sleep well, there are a couple
things that I’ve found particularly helpful.
- Practice the Eckart Tolle Kung-Fu Way – It really helpful to bring you attention fully to the present when you trying to get to sleep. A great way to do this I picked from watching Oprah interview Eckhart Tolle. He held both hands out straight (like a Kung Fun Master), then he said outside the right hand is the future and outside the left hand was the past. Now bring your attention to the distance between your two hands that represents the present.
- Create Inward Focus – Focus on the physical world that you can control. Focus on your own body. Start by turning your attention to your hands over and really thinking about what you’re doing to the exclusion of all else. When that begins to work, move your elbows or roll your shoulders. The idea here is to focus so much on your body’s movements that your thoughts begin to fade. The added benefit being that these exercises will leave your body relaxed and ready for sleep.
- Breathe – Try taking deep breathes in through your nose and out through your mouth, holding each breathe for 3 seconds. Notice the tension leaving your body on each exhale.
- Pattering Quiet Activities – Think about activities that calm you and put you in a more open minded or relaxed state. For some people, it’s painting, reading, knitting, or puzzle books. The activity shouldn’t be overly physical or mental. Start making it a habit of this activity being the last thing you do before you go to bed. If you mind starts to race, for on the activity you just completed.
- Recount Your Successes – Buy a journal and before you lay down, make a list of your successes from the day or the moments which you were grateful for. This will slow down your thoughts and send out off to sleep in a positive mindset.
Note that the solution for each person varies depending how fast and frequently you find your mind racing.
So don’t be afraid to try any or all of these methods.
And if you stumble across a different one that works for you, feel free to comment and share it.
10 Comments:
Thanks, Erin. Loved writing this article and hope it helps a lot of people!
Hi
For me, I am practising meditation and it helps in quieten down my mind. I also try deep breathing or sit down quietly doing nothing (watching my thoughts running here and there) when my thoughts are getting a bit out of hand.
Awesome blog men.ill definitely follow you everyday. #informative
I'll try today! Sometimes I feel like I'm making a meeting minute in bed.
I'll share what has always worked for me: trying to engage my mind with a really difficult task. So, for example, I took a book on linguistics to bed with me, and tried to focus on the text as much as possible, ponder all the things implied in each paragraph and how I felt about them. I was sound asleep in no more than three pages! Now I don't even need a book, I simply pick a subject, like "How I'd like to rearrange the kitchen and how much each item could cost". I quickly become bored with making the list, and tired with calculating the cost. I pass out and don't wake up until the morning.
Try it. Take a complicated or boring book to bed with you and see what it does. Who knows?
In the last couple of years I've discovered a method that works for me, so I thought I'd share it in case somebody else found it valuable.
In my view the enemy of good sleep is the narrative, the conversation that is going on in one's head. Often it's one particular topic that is pre-occupying me, some worry or frustration.
To counter this I focus on taking long slow breaths as per your third suggestion, and don't allow myself to carry on the same thought 'topic' between each breath. I'm very disciplined in not carrying over the previous thought, and will try to focus only on my breathing, but failing that will make myself change subject.
I find that very rarely do I think of more than a few different topics before I'm asleep. I think this is become there's never a chance for that inner conversation to begin.
Kind of complicated to me. I just empty my mind of whatever fills it. Difficult to do at first but with practice, it becomes as easy as flicking on a night switch. The added bonus to this is that I never have to suffer headaches - http://withinyouisyoursuccess....
Thank you <3
Timely post. Thanks for sharing.
My pleasure, Skaf. Hoping the world will get a more peaceful night's rest tonight :)