Can’t Sleep!

This being the hop-picking time of year reminds me that I sometimes used to keep a small pack of hops under the pillow. Mind you! I cheated by collecting my own freshly-picked hops whilst I was working on the hop harvest. I found it worked a treat. Out like a light and a lot of pleasant dreams. Hops are pretty close to hemp, I believe; both the legal and illegal types of hemp. With hops, the active ingredients are quite similar, but legal because of the needs of all those beer-drinking types (like me in the past ;-) Admittedly I was also working some quite strenuous days, But I think we all know that you have a very tiring schedule. Of course, you could also just get a hop pillow from newspaper ads etc. (Perhaps you could also collect wild hops and/or cultivated hops in your neck of the woods!)

But perhaps more seriously, your schedule really might be giving you far too much to think about in the evening. There are quite a few very practical books around these days on the sleep issue, but I suspect your reading list is already excessive. You might even need to read less! ;-) I have tried quite a few different approaches from such books, but have found that attempting self-hypnosis while lying down on the bed sends me to sleep remarkably quickly. So quickly that I rarely actually get around to the auto-suggestion part of the proceedings. And perhaps the resultant sleep is more important/necessary than the auto-suggestion anyway. If you go to bed fairly early and fall asleep quite quickly, you are also far more likely to wake up  (and feel refreshed) at the necessary 6 for the kids

I shall have to find some hops to place under my pillow! I do sometimes try counting slowly and making myself visualise the numbers as I count, this is actually a lot more difficult than it seems and I find the concentration on visualisation stops by brain from buzzing around thinking about loads of things so can induce sleep. I hope you slept well?

I shall have to find some hops to place under my pillow! I do sometimes try counting slowly and making myself visualise the numbers as I count, this is actually a lot more difficult than it seems and I find the concentration on visualisation stops by brain from buzzing around thinking about loads of things so can induce sleep. I hope you slept well?

I wouldn't concentrate too hard on visualizing and remembering the numbers. Too much fine detail can be unproductive. I sometimes find myself counting things like how many times I have repeated a deepening phrase or even a suggestion in my mind. But I have been told that if you lose count that it is basically because you are beginning the transit thru' the alpha wave state towards the theta and delta states. Your changing state is thus a distraction from your conscious process of counting, but the distraction is still actually heading you in the right direction. If you forget what the last number you counted was, just guess roughly and restart the count at that number. Invariably, you still won't reach your number target; but will already be heading into real sleep. You may well wake up in the morning and remember you never actually saw the count all the way thru'. It works for me, anyway.