Insomnia is the pits, isn’t it? I don’t think there are too many things much worse than lying in bed hour after hour while your body won’t give in to the rest it desperately needs. One thing that can definitely cause insomnia is stress in your life. These are some ways that you can fight stressed induced insomnia. If you put them into practice, you’ll be sleeping better in as little as 3 days.
This sounds like such a simple and unnecessary step but it’s an important one. You need to acknowledge that the stress in your life is causing you problems. You can’t do anything about it until you admit that it’s an issue. From there you can move on to dealing with the stress and using stress management strategies. It’s comforting to decide that things may be stressful but you’re going to do something to change that.
This’s something that I’ve done for years. It helps to deal with stress-induced insomnia as well as when your mind is racing with things you’re afraid you’ll forget when you go to bed. Having a notepad nearby is handy to write down things you’re worried you won’t remember in the morning. It’s also great to write down whatever you’re stressing over. The best way the notepad trick can help is by giving you a way to write down ways you can deal with the stress in your life when a solution crosses your mind at bedtime.
Yoga is good for you in both mind and body. It’s good physical exercise as well as being good for you mentally. It helps you to calm your thoughts and get yourself focused and centered again. If you don’t have time for a yoga class, that’s okay. There are lots of yoga DVDs that you can do at home to fit in with your own schedule.
Mindful breathing is an exercise that’s very calming. If you haven’t practiced it before then you should give it a try. Basically, you focus on breathing in slowly and deeply so that your belly expands. Then exhale slowly. Try doing this 10 times and then take a break. This is actually an exercise that doctors recommend to help with anxiety.
While your insomnia may be completely stress-induced, excessive caffeine consumption won’t help. Not only will caffeine make it difficult to sleep but it can cause anxiety which is something you don’t want when you’re already on stress overload. You don’t have to cut it out completely but you might want to limit it. This is especially true in the late afternoon and evenings. You might be surprised by how much this helps.
Taking your laptop, phone, iPad or other electronic devices to bed with you isn’t a good idea. Those screens are not sleep inducing. In fact, studies have shown that your electronic devices can keep you awake. Turn them off and put them away until morning. Do something restful in the hour or two before bed such as some light reading or taking a warm bath.
If you feel like your problems are getting to you, perhaps you should try this mental exercise. Visualize yourself releasing them. You might picture yourself releasing them into the air to fly away or throwing them off a cliff. You can totally get creative here and picture yourself getting rid of them in whatever way makes you feel better. Exercises like this can offer you the peace you need to rest better at night.
These are 7 ways to fight stress induced insomnia. Which ones do you plan to try? Your comments are always welcome.