Goodnight Mind (5 page)

There are a few ways to select a standard rise time. First, let’s clarify the rules. A rise time is the time at which your feet should be on the floor and you should be out of bed. We say this because many people set an alarm but then do not rise until some time later. The time at which you become active (when you get out of bed for the day and start to go about your business), not the time at which you wake up and hit “snooze,” is the time at which you begin building your drive for the following night’s sleep.

Here are some questions to help you select the best time to get out of bed.

What is the earliest time at which you routinely have to get out of bed?
If you have to be awake at a set time several mornings per week, this set time is often the best place to start.

What time does your body wake up naturally?
If your body naturally wakes up much earlier than the regular time at which you get out of bed, it is preferable to rise earlier. For example, if you tend to get out of bed at seven most mornings, but your body wakes you up at five thirty most mornings, this is a clue to your body clock type and you should strongly consider a 5:30 a.m. rise time. If you get out of bed earlier, you will build even more drive for quality sleep by being out of bed for longer during the day; your body is not producing quality sleep anyway when you linger in bed and doze.

If on the other hand your body naturally wakes up much later than your usually scheduled rise time, meaning that you sleep soundly right up until your rise time and have substantial difficulty getting up each morning, you may have difficulty selecting your current earliest rise time as your new set rise time. In that case, if it is generally difficult for you to get out of bed no matter what time you have to get up, here are a few tips:

• Force yourself to get up.
  
• Expose yourself to bright light.
  
• Engage in an activity with lots of movement as soon as possible.
  

This will help you shake off your grogginess so that you can get on with your day more quickly. If you have difficulty getting up because you have a job that requires you to be awake and out of bed much earlier than your body clock would dictate, you can explore ways to save time in the morning so that you can set a slightly later rise time. For example, do whatever you can at night to prepare for the following day (shower, lay your clothes out, set the automatic start on the coffee maker) and remove unnecessary activities from your morning routine. Then stick to this rise time even on your off days, and most likely your body will eventually shift toward being more alert at this earlier time.

“But I Hate Schedules.”

Do you have a negative reaction to the idea of keeping a schedule? Why? Is it because you associate routines with childhood? Perhaps when you were growing up, your parents were overly strict or inflexible when it came to routines. Perhaps your mother or father told you things like: “No, you can’t watch the fireworks. They start at eight, and that’s your bedtime.” Maybe you think that following a schedule is too boring or limiting for you—you need freedom to do as you would like and room to be spontaneous.

Keeping regular times for basic human functions such as sleeping and eating does not mean that you cannot be spontaneous. Also, humans do not outgrow the need for routines. Although some people may think that only children need routines to help them regulate their mood and alertness, adults need routines too. Routines help “set” the body clock that regulates sleep, mood, and alertness. Aversion to a schedule may interfere with your ability to make the changes needed for you to sleep better. You may want to consider examining and challenging your beliefs about schedules; it may help remove obstacles to improving your sleep.

After you identify any beliefs about keeping a set rise time that could get in the way of following this recommendation, try this experiment: Set aside your belief that routines are ___________ (fill in the negative word or phrase, such as “boring” or “limiting to my freedom”) for one month and see how you feel. In other words, commit to following the set schedule for one month (not for life) and see whether avoiding social jet lag leads to an improvement in your sleep and in how you feel during the day.

What about Setting a Regular Bedtime?

If the body clock works best when you keep a regular schedule, then should you set a bedtime? This is a tricky question to answer. It is best to have a set bedtime that matches your body clock; that is, a bedtime that coincides with when you regularly feel sleepy. However, sleepiness also depends on how much sleep drive you have built up over the course of the day, so keeping to a bedtime does not always make sense (a) on nights when you have not yet built enough drive for deep sleep or (b) if you often become upset as bedtime approaches and the resultant distress interferes with your ability to sleep.

The time at which you become sleepy can vary from night to night. However, the time at which you have to get up in the morning is often dependent on external factors such as work or other obligations; therefore, you should focus on establishing a set rise time. By observing this rise time seven days a week, you will begin to feel sleepy around the same time each night. This sense of sleepiness will act as your new cue for bedtime, rather than a precise time on a clock. But remember not to go to bed much earlier than your ideal bedtime (see chapter 2).

If It Does Not Work

If you maintain the exact same rise time every day, this practice should lead to feeling sleepy around the same time every night. However, it should be noted that even with your body clock sending sleepy cues around the same time each night, you may be doing things that interfere with or undermine this natural process. For example, do you remain active and engaged in your environment right up until your bedtime? Do you feel as if you have too much to do at night, preventing you from following a relaxing bedtime routine? Activity can override the sleepy cues or make it difficult for you to actually notice them. A failure to unwind before bedtime will result in an overactive mind and lead to sleep disturbance. For more on the importance of protecting your wind-down period and for help in doing so, see chapter 5.

Summary

This chapter taught you to identify your body clock type to determine your ideal sleep window, the time during which you are most likely to sleep well. You can then set a new sleep schedule. The most important part of your new schedule is your rise time—you should rise at the same time every day. Varying your rise time can lead to social jet lag, which contributes to sleep problems.

You may be reluctant to follow a new sleep schedule, even if it means better sleep for you, if it would conflict with your sleeping partner’s schedule. If so, you can avoid friction in the relationship if both of you are understanding and willing to make some adjustments and compromises. If you have objections to scheduling your sleep time because you have a distaste for schedules and routines, experiment with keeping a schedule for a month.

Don’t forget:

• Everyone’s body clock is different. Accept that your body clock type may not be the same as your partner’s or friend’s.
  
• Ensure that your sleep window matches your body clock type.
  
• Use an alarm to enforce your new rise time.
  

Chapter 4

Train Your Active Mind to Be Quiet in Bed

O
nce you have adjusted your sleep habits and you start sleeping better (see chapters 2 and 3), it’s time to turn your attention to training your mind to be quiet in bed, so that your time in bed is even more restful. There are many reasons an active mind may keep you awake when you want to be sleeping. This chapter focuses on one common reason: you have unknowingly trained yourself to be alert in bed. In this chapter, you will learn to identify and banish culprits that could be causing this problem. You will also learn how getting out of bed when your mind is noisy will train your mind to be quiet in bed.

How the Brain Learns to Become Active in Bed

Does the following scenario sound familiar to you? “I was absolutely exhausted and could barely keep my eyes open. But when I got into bed, it was like a switch turned on, and I was wide awake.” The scenario described is very common for those who have sleep problems. So, how is it that you can feel so sleepy outside of bed, but once in bed, you become completely awake? The answer may be your bed itself. Before you rush off to buy a new mattress, however, consider the following.

Animals, including humans, learn to associate stimuli (as Pavlov’s dogs learned to associate the sound of a bell with the sight of food; see chapter 1) and can form very powerful associations between stimuli without intending to. Let’s say you get food poisoning after eating at a restaurant. The next time you go to that restaurant, you may feel physically ill, even though the offending food is no longer there. Why does this happen? The answer is because unconsciously, you now associate the restaurant with feeling sick. Strong associations are formed in the presence of strong physical reactions, and that one experience was all it took for your body to link the restaurant with the following unpleasant involuntary response to the food. Your body identifies the restaurant, accurately or inaccurately, as one of the causes of your illness. The restaurant is now a cue for your body to feel sick. Associations that do not involve such a visceral response often require repeated similar experiences (or “pairings” of stimuli) to take effect, but the mechanism by which these associations are learned is more or less the same.

What does this have to do with an overactive mind in bed? Consider your bed as a stimulus. (In psychology, a stimulus is simply something that may or may not influence behavior, not necessarily something you would consider “stimulating”—though it can be.) If you have spent many nights tossing and turning in bed, or lying in bed while upset and unable to sleep, your bed has often been paired with tossing and turning, or being upset and not sleeping; perhaps your bed alone has become a cue for tossing and turning and being upset.

Turn Your Bed into a Cue for Sleep, Not Alertness

If your bed has become a cue for “switching on” alertness, anxiety, or frustration, you need to learn how to turn off the switch. Since repeated pairings of your bed with being awake and alert are the cause of the problem, you need to un-pair your bed with alertness and begin to pair it with sleep. To retrain your body and mind to rest instead of becoming active in bed, follow the six simple rules below. We have already mentioned the first four, but we will discuss them as they relate to retraining your body to be asleep in bed.

1. Do not nap.
   
2. Avoid wakeful activities in bed.
   
3. Be in bed only when asleep (or very close to sleep).
   
4. Get out of bed at the same time every day.
   
5. Get out of bed if unable to sleep.
   
6. Take your active mind out of bed.
   

Rule 1: Do Not Nap

Napping includes attempting to nap (unsuccessfully), dozing, or nodding off. The reason we ask you to refrain from napping is that you need to associate sleep with only one location (your bed) and one time (your sleep window). Dozing is usually an unintentional habit, so avoiding it takes some planning. Most people doze in a particular setting or at a particular time of day, for example while watching television in the evening. If you sometimes fall asleep by accident while watching television in the evening, use some preventative strategies: Do not lie down or recline on the furniture; sit up straight. Perhaps you can incorporate some light activity, such as folding laundry, while you watch television. If you live with someone, ask that person to help you stay awake.

Rule 2: Avoid Wakeful Activities in Bed

If you want your bed to become a strong cue for sleep rather than a cue for sleeplessness, your bed must be associated with sleep, not wakeful activities. So anything that you would normally do when awake should not occur in your bed. This includes using the computer, texting, talking on the phone, playing games, reading, watching television, eating, or any other activity that will signal wakefulness to your body in bed.

You may be wondering,
Does having sex count as a wakeful activity?
The answer to this question may depend upon how you typically feel about sex and after sex. Is sex, for you, an activity that is more often relaxing or invigorating? If after sex you feel sleepy, then perhaps sexual activity can be an exception to the rule. If after sex you feel alert (or if it is highly unpredictable whether you will feel alert after sex), you may want to explore having sex earlier in the day and in locations other than where you sleep. Or you may opt to make sex an exception to the rule anyway.

Many people have routines that they associate with relaxation, such as reading or watching television in bed. You may be reluctant to give up such habits. Here are a couple of things to keep in mind when deciding whether to make a change.

First, you may feel as if such habits help you relax; however, if you find yourself wide awake once the lights are turned off or once your head is on the pillow, then whatever relaxation you had is gone. Instead, you are now in a state of alertness. This is not to say that habits such as reading or watching television are not relaxing or that they need to be eliminated from your routine. Relaxation is an important part of getting a good night’s sleep. Just move these habits out of the bed, and preferably out of the bedroom.

Second, you may not need to banish these activities forever. Given that you are reading this book, right now you probably experience sleep problems, but the tools we present will help rid you of them. When your sleep problems are under control, you may experiment with putting a previous habit back into your routine. (After all, you probably know people who read in bed yet sleep well. Perhaps as you begin to sleep well you will be able to join their ranks.) If you find that your sleep problems return, move wakeful activities back out of your bedroom and see whether your sleep improves again.