Going to sleep

I'm not thinking of this as a metaphor for anything. Getting to sleep is a really interesting theoretical problem for me and a very practical problem as well. Anyone who can clarify the theory or share things that worked for you is encouraged to jump in.

The theoretical problem is that I so associate effort with success. You formulate a goal and you collect the resources and build whatever networks are necessary and you act so as to achieve the goal and monitor progress and take whatever modified paths are indicated. And all that. It's just a style, really. But just describing it shows how poorly adapted it is to getting to sleep.

All of you, probably, have had trouble falling asleep or staying asleep. You know how unhelpful "trying really hard to get to sleep" is. For one thing, since you are trying so hard, you are also monitoring. "Am I sleepier now? Am I closer to the goal?" And if there is some reason why you really really need a good night's sleep on a particular night, then the cost of not getting the sleep would be high. So to the monitoring, you add the anticipatory anxiety. "Oh, no! I'll doze off during the job interview! I'll go to sleep on that long stretch of driving!"

So here's what I'm trying now and have been for the last few years. I minimize the consequences; I experience the breathing; I count. It works as well as it works. I'm still thinking about it.

The first one is a little bit of sleight of hand. I try to focus on "resting" rather than "sleeping." I think there really is something to it. I have (rarely) had the experience of resting peacefully for most of a night and actually sleeping very little and feeling rested the next day. So, experientially, it isn't really nonsense. On the other hand, composing myself to rest is something I can do if I am clear about it and don't make it stressful. Going to sleep because I really want to is beyond me.

Counting makes it all seem doable to me. I breathe to the count of sixteen, for reasons that are deeply idiosyncratic and probably beside the point. Part of that is just having a number. I know I can count to sixteen, giving the number on the exhalation. If I lose track within one of the fours, I have to go back to the beginning that that four. One night it took me nearly an hour to breath with conscious awareness from five to eight. But many more times, I get up somewhere between eight and twelve and drift off.

Another part of the counting gimmick is I can say something like, "I'll do this twice, and if I'm not making any progress, I'll get up and read. Then' I'll come back and try it again." That's a little bit of sleight of hand too, I think. When I'm trying to count and breathe and relax, the question comes, "What if it doesn't work?" The approach I described says, essentially, "It's not that big a deal. If it doesn't work, you go read a little and come back and try again." Making it "not a big deal," of course, makes me less anxious and sleep more likely.

I've made the breathing the most intricate part of the whole process. How I wish there were words for the feelings in inhaling and exhaling! I feel very constricted, sometimes, when I begin. It is as if the expansion of the lungs was pushing against a wall, like trying to blow up a balloon inside a box. Even in that case, there are different feelings that go with the different stages of inhaling. But when I am more relaxed and my lungs expand freely and then settle back gratefully to rest, there are many more stages.

I've never tried to describe this before. It's starting to sound a little weird to me On the best nights, though, I treat those feelings more as if they are what I want to experience. I like the feelings themselves. They are not just as markers on a journey that matters only when you get to the destination. They are not purely instrumental, in other words.

And finally, the numbers. Breaking the sixteen into fours has helped me associate different feelings with each number. The fact that the end of the long exhalation at two is halfway to four, when I declare a mini-victory, means that the end of two feels like something in particular. And it feels that way night to night because it is an artifact of the counting, not of the breathing. Thirteen is the first breath on the very last phase. In any case, each number is coming to have a "feel" associated with it and the more that is true in my experience, the more something else matters to me apart from just "getting to sleep"...and...the more likely I am to get to sleep.

Or to rest well.

Does any of this sound familiar?