The Source of This Blog

Honestly, I'm not quite sure how my body is awake enough to have coherent thought at this point. Last night I was in bed at about midnight which is not too unusual; in fact, it is far more common than I'd like. Something I'm working on. But coupled with that time is the fact that I wound up lying there tossing and turning for almost two hours. Add to that a 5:45 wake-up time and you have one tired me. As I said in the opening, I'm not at all sure how I am awake nor how long I will be able to maintain this state of being awake.

And yes, this does tie into today's topic, which is today's topic by virtue of the thing that certainly contributed to my lack of sleep last night; why it is that we can't sleep and what to do to prevent it. Again, a quick disclaimer here; this is in no way a scientific paper. I've done no real research myself; everything here is stuff I have been told and experienced personally.

The first thing, which a lot of people seem to be talking about now, is the concept of sleep cycles. Apparently we go through one sleep cycle every hour and a half. Waking up in the middle of a sleep cycle results in feeling as tired or even more exhausted than when you went to bed, whereas waking up at the end of one and just before the next means you'll feel refreshed and ready to go. It is an interesting concept and not without scientific back-up. I have yet to really try hard to line up sleep cycles but I always do make a note of where I would be waking up. I often find it's in the middle of one and yes, I do always feel exhausted in the mornings. That's part of the reason I'm writing this; it's my coffee until I get to Tim Hortons. And oh look, I'm rambling because of lack of sleep. So before my fingers take me down the rabbit hole let's move on.

The second thing is the ignore your body's signals while trying to fall asleep. I read in an extremely unscientific way (as in, I wouldn't dare quote it as factual) that as we fall asleep the brain sends out signals to the body to see if it is ready to sleep. These include things like sudden, random itches, the urge to change position, and wanting to move your eyes around, whether they are closed or not. I'm sure you've all noticed at one point or another how you always seem to get those itches just as you're falling asleep. Don't scratch. It will prolong being awake. In fact, if you can willfully ignore all these signals and stay awake you will actually be able to feel your muscles and body shut down for the rest period; staying awake during this process can actually lead to lucid dreaming. But that's a whole other topic.

Finally, try very, very hard not to think. About anything. Last night as I was desperately trying to fall asleep my mind kept turning back to two things; football and my current inability to fall asleep. Football was an obvious thing as I had just watched my Packers destroy the hapless Vikings but as I will henceforth try to refrain from bringing sports into this blog I shall immediately move to the next topic that kept me up, specifically that it was keeping me up. I knew I needed sleep. I knew I was getting up early. I knew I had a long day ahead of me today. All this made falling asleep seem more and more urgent and instilling more and more of a sense of panic. This was not helpful for falling asleep in any way. It wasn't until I was able to force myself to stop thinking that I was finally able to get to sleep. That's where counting sheep comes from; it clears the mind and focuses it on a single, mundane task. Rather than the actually quite interesting one of analyzing why we have difficulties sleeping and what to do to avoid them.

Now, I must be off. I'm still unsure of my plans for the day considering this extreme lack of sleep but, until tomorrow, have a restful day. I know I will whether it should be restful or not.