Are you feeling less alert?
Are you unable to think clearly or sustain your focus?
Do you have difficulty falling asleep or problems with frequent awakening during the night?
If so, you may be suffering from insomnia.
We tend to think of insomnia as the constellation of symptoms that we experience just before sleep or during the night when we awaken with our mind racing and the bed sheets twisted. The process of insomnia actually begins much earlier in the day for most of us.
How?
Through the choices we make about how we spend our time.
It could take between 9-14 hours to fully metabolize the caffeine. Even if you have no difficulty falling asleep, the caffeine could undermine the quality and duration of your sleep.
Blue light from many of these devices is as brightas daylight and activates the nervous system sending the brain and body into“wake up mode”.
And what about the emotional responses that are triggered by these late night, last minute, urgent communications?
Life in the twenty first century is stressful and fast paced. A full, zoom-zoom workday of 8-12 hours is often followed by a long commute and sometimes a cocktail or a glass of wine to take the edge off. We eat late, do a few more email or text messages; watch a movie, read or log on to Facebook in an effort to wind down. Unfortunately very few of these activities actually promote relaxation and set the stage for a good night’s sleep. Most of them tip the nervous system far in the other direction to a state of hyper-arousal.
Hyper-arousal is a chronic over-activation of the body’s stress-response mechanism. There’s no instant ON/OFF switch. When these pathways are repeatedly excited, they become the default setting. We essentially travel a well-worn path leading us in the direction of elevated blood pressure, holding our breath, clinching our jaw and lifting our shoulders, without respite. Many of these sensations fly below the radar of our self-perception and become the background noise of our busy, over stimulated lives.
What to do?
“For fast acting relief, try slowing down”.
--Lily Tomlin
On the one hand, we can increase the quality and duration of a good night’s sleep simply by making better choices. Following a good sleep hygiene program is an empowering start. For more detailed information about sleep hygiene refer click here.
We also need to hit the pause, re-set button during the day to get off of the cortisol/ adrenaline high that many of us associate with feeling good and being productive. Functioning under the influence of stress hormones is not a sustainable practice. Biological systems thrive with ebb and flow. Metabolically speaking, we need to interrupt the cycle of prolonged excitation and dial things down to a more balanced, calm and functional neutral.
Learning to move more fluidly between states of stress and relaxation is key. It is positive motion in the direction of re-establishing the natural biological rhythms of exertion and recuperation. Think of it as self-regulation with applied intelligence. When we develop the capacity to meet the demands of a stressful moment and the flexibility to return to a state of equanimity in a relatively short amount of time, not only will we sleep better, but we’ll also be a kinder, gentler, version of ourselves.
Becci Parsons
Offers workshops and private coaching in the techniques of the Sounder Sleep System® in the interest of helping to create a more sane and peaceful world. Restful sleep is necessary for the healthy function of every system in the body and helps to regulate mood, energy and emotional intelligence.
The Sounder Sleep System® is comprised of a variety of calming and sleep inducing techniques to be used during the day and at bedtime, taught while sitting or lying down. The simple exercises are designed to restore our natural capacity to rest, recover and heal from the stress of daily life, one breath at a time. They are elegantly simple and simply profound.
For more information about workshops, classes or private sleep coaching contact me:
Becci Parsons, Authorized Teacher, Sounder Sleep System®
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As the year closes all of us at Soaring Heart want to express our gratitude to you, our customers and supporters of the sustainable, organic lifestyle our brand represents. These last few years have been a wild ride for all of us - and it is clear our "new normal" is still evolving. The good news is we are continuing to grow our staff, expand our stores, add new products and nurture the supply chain relationships that we've built over the past decades. This means we can be confident in our ability to provide the great sleep products we have learned to craft with excellence.
As always Soaring Heart believe we all sleep better knowing we are part of healthy, vibrant communities. All our best for 2022!
Living with the pandemic for over a year now, surely you have heard the mention of supply chain issues from businesses both big and small. You have likely experienced the symptoms of these issues--Whether this be your favorite snacks missing and out of stock from the grocery store, or your online order taking longer than anticipated to arrive at your home. How does this happen? And how might it impact your Soaring Heart order?
Eoin Hudson
Author