Top Tips for Sleeping Well

“I had a dream I was awake, and I woke up to find myself asleep.” — Stan Laurel

Do you sometimes have trouble with sleep? Going to sleep? Or maybe staying asleep?

There are probably 3 main ways of improving your sleep

1. Often when we’re not sleeping well we get into a tiz: what’s happening? Why am I not sleeping? How am I going to manage tomorrow? How many hours have I not slept? All this involves much checking of the clock and much sighing and imagining how bad tomorrow will be. Instead of this method, I propose: a)get rid of the clock b) think about how you’d like to feel – maybe you’d like to feel sleepy or calm or both. And when have you ever felt like this before? Maybe you often get drowsy in front of the TV? Maybe when you were young you had the experience of being driven at night and you fell fast asleep?

2. Isn’t the middle of the night a fantastic time to do really dark thoughts? Assume the worst….ruminate on where you’ve gone wrong and where everything will go wrong. We can do this so well. I propose instead: a) a clear, calm, kind STOP and b) finding something you’d like to preoccupy yourself with instead…how about names of countries from A to Z? Or counting backwards from 100? Or any other kinder calmer mind games you’d like to focus on. Think: what would I like to be thinking about instead?

3. Most importantly, try and live a good day before you sleep. If you’ve been rushing around, panicking about this and that, then it may be more difficult for your brain to switch off. See if you can maintain as calm a state as possible during the day. If you are inclined towards feeling (dûing) overwhelmed then see if you can pause and take one thing at a time, congratulating yourself as you go; keep a calm coach on your shoulder as you go through the day.

(4. And if you’ve already done the Lightning Process then use it; it’s a great tool for sleep. You may find if you do it in your head you will fall asleep. Or you may find you need to get up and do it (I know, seems like the last thing you want to do, but it can be way more effective))