The importance of sleep is so under estimated. It’s a well known fact that the lack of sleep is a major factor in anxiety and increased stress. You can either get out of bed full of zest and ready for all that the day brings you, or the start of the day just never seems to take off and often can lead to what feels like nothing is going right…. we have all felt those days right?
I must hear daily how the lack of a decent sleep has affected people and yet it still seems that we are unwilling to take this subject seriously. I often talk about the skill of getting to sleep and people roll their eyes as though to say this is just so boring. I feel this has something to do with when we are younger.
As a mum I would look at my son sometimes and say "you are looking tired", you can always tell can’t you?
It’s the bits of grumpiness that come in, a change in attitude not quite as patient as you can be, so I would say "why don’t you have an early night or curl up for a while". You would have thought I had just suggested the most boring thing ever! Going to bed early I guess when you are younger equalled being told off or a punishment and I am still convinced to this day we all carry this around a little with us. So instead of going to bed if we feel tired we have a conversation with ourselves that says nope I will stay up until my normal bed time nobody is making me go to bed early!
May I just say now one adult to another that it is ok to firstly feel tired - that’s your body saying to you I need to rest. Secondly it is not only ok but ultra important that you take notice and give yourself permission to have that early night or decide that you are going to have a night off your usual schedule to take that time out to look after you.
So why is sleep so important?
Sleep is your way of repairing both your body and your mind. Whilst you are awake your body is busy at work and once you go to sleep this is how it starts to heal and replenishes your energy, ready for the day ahead.
There are many different figures out that say X is the perfect amount of sleep needed and you should sleep from this particular time to another. If I may, I would like you to just for now put that to one side. This I feel, adds to the pressure on top of everything else in your life that you now also have to achieve the ‘perfect’ amount of sleep.
So rule number 1 – Do not compare yourself to anyone or anything, we can have a general guide but what I would like to do is help you find out what your sleep pattern is and create a routine around you that works for you in your world.
You see these studies around sleep often don’t take the reality of life into account. We can have those times where everything in life is going to plan, we have no worries and our schedule allows us to fit in the perfect amount of self-care and rest...and now that you have finished laughing thinking "yes right thanks for that Nicky you should see my reality!" you can see why looking at magazines that say X is the optimum sleep, can then actually leave you in a place that can add to the reasons why you might not be getting enough sleep for you.
So what is your sleep problem?
Do you find that you have been so busy all day, you are absolutely exhausted and think right it’s time for bed, then as you lie down everything that had gone on through your day comes flooding back. Maybe the things that you didn’t get around to doing, the conversation that happened and did you say the ‘right’ thing?
‘What will happen if ….?’ It feels like your mind just will not switch off, my husband calls this ‘train brain’, the feeling at being at a station waiting for a train and it just keeps rushing past and not slowing down and you just know that you’re not going to get to sleep.
Or maybe getting to sleep isn’t the problem. Maybe it’s the waking up during the night that is the problem, that at a certain time each night, bang you are wide awake. You start counting how many hours you have left until you have to get up and telling yourself this just isn’t enough. This then, as you can imagine, starts to get you worrying and just like that you aren’t going back to sleep for a while.
Maybe you have trouble getting up? That feeling of just ‘5 more minutes ‘ and your snooze button become your new best friend and even then after that, you just seem to not be able to get going.
Or lastly maybe you just feel tired all of the time, no matter how much sleep you get, that feeling of never feeling refreshed or always just wanting to curl up in a ball and go to sleep.
I want to tell you over time I have managed to fit into each one of these categories because life is always going on, what I would say to you is that these are moments in time and it isn’t something that you are destined to be for the rest of your life.
The workbook and classes are here to help you look at where you are now, what’s going on around you and lastly to help you to change your mind set and change your story around sleep.
Relaxing sleep meditation
Helpful tips and ideas to help with sleep, Part 1
Relaxing sleep meditation
Helpful tips and ideas to help with sleep, Part 1
Gifts, goodies and resources for your mental and emotional wellbeing, all designed to help you de-stress, feel more positive and manage your worries.
Sign up to our newsletter: