A good night’s sleep can bring it all together. Recharge your brain, rest your weary bones, dream up some solutions for tomorrow’s challenges, and in the morning everything seems brighter and more achievable. Unfortunately, for many of us the very problems whose solutions we seek are what keep us awake at night, spinning and spinning around our minds without actually getting solved. Worry is self-perpetuating: it deprives us of the sleep we need to solve the problems that keep us awake!
So perhaps you have turned towards some of the wonder-cures your mother told you about. Changing the lighting, reading a book, quitting caffeine. They’re all good ideas, but used in isolation they are rarely as effective as they could be. This is because our sleep is reliant on a number of interdependent factors, from lifestyle, to environment, to what goes on in your mind.
Indeed, your mind is the best place to start – though it should be backed up with a host of other smart adjustments and tools.
Have you heard of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT for short)? It is essentially a mindful approach to your troubles. It won’t make them go away, but it should help you to put them in perspective. At its most basic level, ACT requires you to accept the things you can’t change, to change the things you can, and to understand the difference between the two. Sound familiar? It’s classic wisdom, but applied meaningfully to your own sense of mental hygiene in the evening, it can really help you to sleep – studies have proved it. Your sleep issue itself is at the peak of your ACT therapy: accept that you are not a good sleeper, and it is one less thing to worry about.
Instead, try to objectify such unwelcome thoughts, and name them to reduce their power over you. Visualize the act of taking these worries and putting them in a different space in your head. Try to enjoy the feeling of laying awake in bed, rather than striving for sleep. Accept that it is where you need to be for now, and that sleep will follow sooner or later.
Of course, there are plenty of steps you can take earlier in the day to make yourself more comfortable while you wait – from the way you make up your bedroom, to the things you do before bedtime. Check out this new infographic for some ideas on the practical things you can try – because good intentions alone won’t get you to sleep!
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