Sleep disturbance

[trenton]

I have a ton of potential, but it is seriously being missed by my sleeping issues.  Sometimes when I go to bed I wake up after only 3 hours and can't get back to sleep.  This has happened on certain days with other days being fine.

One observation is that I occasionally have a hard time breathing and I suck in air harshly and quickly.  I will bring this up with my doctor when I see him next month.  I have a fan in my room which I can't tell if it helps more or hurts more.

Sometimes all of my methods for getting to sleep are ineffective.  This includes melatonin, shower before bed, and occasionally warm milk with a pretty consistent sleep schedule. 

This time I lost an entire day of productivity because of my poor sleep.  I failed to push through this day productively in order to move me closer to my life purpose.  How would you cope with days after sleepless nights?  Do you have any ideas for solving these disturbances?

Thank you.

[Osaid]

I can tell you some basic tips but it is wise that you are consulting a doctor 

-The white noise from your fan can have a significant effect on helping you sleep, so I don't think it is hurting you

-Try to keep your room as dark as possible by closing all curtains and such things

- It is better to have a cold room than a hot room, keep your room cool

-Avoid caffeine and stimulants

-Try to avoid blue light from computer screens, phones, and light bulbs. You can download blue light filters if you wish.

-Try not to force yourself to sleep

-If you exercise or go for a long walk early on in the day it could make you tired enough to sleep. Don't exercise too close to bedtime though.

[purerogue]

Osaid amazing advice! 

Judging by your comment it is because of psychological reason, it is hard to sleep if you can't let go and are eager to do something, I always find it hard to go to sleep and wake up early if I have something I really want to do later that day, or just in general am really motivated, full of energy to move my life certain direction.

Not really what to do, but it might be something worth looking into.

 

[TripleFly]

Hey I'll give you something a bit more radical to try

Get rid of your bed.

When I first heard about this, I didn't have major sleep issues, but I was having trouble falling asleep every few days because of RLS, it is a muscle spasm that causes you to spasm more the closer you are to falling asleep. It's very annoying. 

So I found this article about a couple who tried sleeping on the floor for a month just to experiment and have fun. And they fell in love with it so much that even the idea of going back to sleeping on a bed became repulsive(strong word...).

So I tried it.

first few days, a bit uncomfortable, exploring the different poses and which I like better, I had some minor back pain and muscle fatigue, as if I went through training during the night. After those initial days, the pain went away and the fatigue too.

Now, after a month and a half, I am never ever going back

-No RLS. I rarely get it, and when I do it's much easier to handle, as the floor gives it relief.

-My body can relax more deeply. It's like putting on glasses for the first time, jesus christ. My muscles just melt onto my bones and boom, you're done.

-I don't struggle with which side to sleep on. It's not a mattress in which I am 100% free to spread my entire body everywhere. my setup is mostly a 1 on 2 meter blanket. I like falling asleep on my sides, but winding down before sleep on my back.

-I fall asleep faster. I used to become anxious about when will I fall asleep, or how long it will take. Yeah I don't worry anymore. 

 

give it a try.

[trenton]

@TripleFly I used to sleep in a sleeping bag on the floor and did not have a problem with it.  I tried that recently, but not for an entire week or so.  I just kept getting into wierd positions on the bed with some parts sinking too deep and it gets uncomfortable.  This leads to rolling around and that's annoying.

[trenton]

@Osaid i did everything except the psychological problem.  That might be one of the causes.  I don't drink caffeine at all and I do a lot of walking around the block.  This messed up my tournaments so many times and sometimes the melatonin does nothing which is annoying.

[TripleFly]

On 9/6/2020 at 3:25 AM, trenton said:

@TripleFly I used to sleep in a sleeping bag on the floor and did not have a problem with it.  I tried that recently, but not for an entire week or so.  I just kept getting into wierd positions on the bed with some parts sinking too deep and it gets uncomfortable.  This leads to rolling around and that's annoying.

Maybe you didn't get past the transition period, it takes time to relearn how to sleep since you don't sleep on my floor the same way you sleep on a mattress.  

[Nahm]

@trenton

Schedule three days, asap, void of all doing & productivity. In nature is best. We can only put so much pressure on ourselves for so long. Feel rejuvenation in the waking state, rather than attributing it so heavily to sleep. 

[trenton]

@Nahm that sounds amazing.  There are rare days that I do a lot less and it actually feels better.  Otherwise, constantly looking into personal development and life purpose might slowly eat away at me.

One thing my mind is telling me is that it is a bad idea to schedule time off of work because I won't be as good as an employee if I request off to do nothing.  I can at least do one it two days this week to start.  I can walk up to one of the hiking trails and just sit.  I will be taking several bottles and lunch supplies though for the several hours to be there.  It sounds boring, but I think I will try it.

[Nahm]

@trenton

I think you’ll be glad. Zooming in and being productive is great and it’s equally important imo to zoom out and see the bigger & bigger picture. You might say it is creating, and remembering who’s creating. Let go, relax & enjoy.

[trenton]

@Nahm I tried that for this day I have off of work.  I managed to carve out a small chunk of time to go on a hiking trail near a creek where I meditated.  I noticed a difference in the quality of the meditation and how my mind quieted down a little more.  I think it was something about the environment that made the sensations change.

Nevertheless, I still had a many thoughts concerning the life purpose course, my books, and other things about personal development.  The tragedy is that this thinking makes it harder to stay present.  Although it is important that I get the life purpose in order, I can pick it up again after meditation.

I could only stay in the woods for a little more than an hour.  My family still had demands that I came back to meet.  It is hard to get totally nothing to do even in days off.  I will still try something like this again in the future.  I was getting kind of bored at some points, but this was something I never did before.  If boredom comes up I can feel it more deeply which makes boredom interesting.  Maybe this can improve sleep.

[Nahm]

@trenton

Good to hear. I’d get in as much of that as you can. 

[trenton]

@Nahm I have tried this a few times now.  There are a couple of issues I encountered.

The first is that the sleep disturbance still did not stop.  I am waking up at 3 a.m. And failing to get back to sleep.  This causes me to sleep for 4-5 hours.  My mind gets more anxious when this happens.  I will still meditate when I can because it is still healthy.

Secondly, I encountered some deer.  They were disturbed by my presence and one and to make sure I don't do anything to scare them.  It would be nice to meditate in the morning, but deer have a routine and I never saw any in the area after 2 o'clock.  I will have to meditate later if I want to avoid the deer.

I have already been taking anxiety pills and my family does not want me in sleeping pills next.  One of my fears with modern medicine is that they will get me in As many pills as they can like they did to someone I knew.  She was on pills for anxiety and depression as well as there other pills.  She ended up mixing it with alcohol and dying. 

I will try other strategies for improving sleep, but I will not stop meditation.  Thank you.

[Nahm]

@trenton

You don’t have potential. That misunderstanding could keep one up at night. The pressure of it, etc. It feels false because it is false. You are more literally what potential is. Thinking it’s something you have, using it to pretend that how you feel isn’t because of how your thinking, is never going to resonate.

The other side of that wall is a thought. The actuality is that it is the infinite potentiality that you are which is appearing as a wall, as this whole place. When you claim, by the thinking, “my potential”...it doesn’t resonate with the very heart of you. That potentiality loves the bejesus outta you - while you’re using it as a means of justifying perspectives about the world and yourself, that you don’t even like. Things like pressure, expectations...they’re all false. Stuff you’re making up, minute to minute, which isn’t resonating. Again, this is because that heart of you quite literally is that potentiality, that potential ‘you’ are claiming as “yours”, is you. There is not “you and your potential”, there is infinite potentiality which is you, and is appearing as you & world. 

When you feel anxiety, take a minute to form the thought or perspective, verbalize it, and write it down. Then write the opposite, much better feeling perspective. Then pick one on purpose...not because of a story about yourself, but because of how it feels right now. Let the feeling be enough. Be the free potentiality that you are. Play with it, want and watch it unfold. Stop claiming it. In doing so, you split a surface from an ocean of consciousness. 

Make a dreamboard. Write what you’d like potentiality to unfold as, or materialize as. Then let go of so much thinking, and ‘shift awareness’ to seeing, hearing, feeling & breathing, as you watch, by some inexplicable miracle, what you wrote, what you want, appear. You’ll soon be reminiscing and laughing of the day you thought you were the doer, the thinker, the mover, and believed in all that pressure, etc. 

It is true...”They never add up anyway”. 

Rides are for fun. Nobody ever really gets anywhere. 

It never “all adds up”, because it’s potentiality. 

[trenton]

@Nahm thank you for the very helpful insights.

This is actually very accurate and I will probably be a lot happier without thinking I have potential.  You are also correct that I am justifying world views I don't even like.  You look like you read through a chunk of my journal and saw something I could not see.  My mindset was definitely along the lines your describing and I think I can call down more now.

I am discovering harmful thought patterns like these and working to correct them.  I don't know if "working to correct them" is good or not.

[sholomar]

Have a consistent sleep schedule.

Try to sleep in a pitch black room.

Use your bed for sleeping and sex only.

Most importantly, find a way to cultivate your parasympathetic before bed.  Don't stimulate yourself.  I find "do nothing" meditation can work, but so can meditation where you focus on a single point and hold your focus there, which will naturally cause me to start breathing deep, rhythmic breaths which is when I know it's working.

Another piece of advice is if you can't sleep, don't even get upset about it in any way, just roll with it.. use it as an opportunity to practice "do nothing" meditation.  Don't ruminate over the fact you can't sleep. You might find yourself surprisingly refreshed despite not sleeping if you get to mastering this approach. Good luck!

One more thing yet... practice emotional release...if you need anxiety pills read this article..

https://www.unlearninganxiety.com/amygdala/

If you bottle up emotions chronically and start to do mindfulness meditation they may start to release... let them.. be that emotional superconductor Leo talks about in his video... read articles on emotional release.... learn to ride the waves of emotions... great thing to do if you can't sleep also... sit there and observe any emotional garbage that comes out without judging it.. just let it flow out... like taking a dam and blowing it up with an IED and suddenly all that backed up water is flowing freely... it can take some time for it to drain all out.

Edited October 1, 2020 by sholomar