Battling with Tossing and Turning

We've all had those nights that we just couldn't find the comfortable part of the bed and spent hours tossing and turning till the break of dawn. Why does this happen?

Well, your desire to “toss and turn”, really isn't the result of you not being comfortable, it's the result of you not feeling relaxed. On a deeper feeling our mind wants us to relax, but most of the times we interpret the message as “find a comfortable spot on the bed.” True relaxation comes from within you, and has to be triggered by your inner thought process.

For example: You could be in a hammock on a hot summer day in Hawaii, but if you're thinking about whether the stock market will rise or fall, and you've got a 100 million dollars on the line and it's REALLY bothering you, it won't matter what position you're in that hammock, you won't relax!

If you're lying in bed and you get the urge to toss or turn, wait it out, you'll be surprised how quickly it fades! When you get the urge to toss and turn, ask yourself “How can I focus on something else right now to feel more relaxed?” As you lie there for about 15 seconds, you'll be surprised at how the urge to toss and turn simply fades, and you realize that all you really want to do is relax.

Understand that if you do start tossing and turning, it will not end with just ONE toss or turn, because of the momentum effect, you will just keep tossing and turning till the break of dawn!

Sometimes the urge to move is really intense, or maybe you really are in a very painful position on your bed. If you absolutely MUST move, do it in this way:

1) Move, but move very slowly. Remember what it feels like when you wake up in the morning and you're very sleepy, do you move very quickly then?

2) As you move very slowly, put a big bright smile on your face, and take a deep breath.

Another reason why tossing and turning keeps us awake is because we do it very quickly, and the more we do it, the more it agitates us! So do it very slowly, and make sure to smile and breath deeply, you will feel the difference :-

Avoiding Tossing and Turning

Tossing and turning is an often experienced phenomenon for most of us. There are nights when we are just not comfortable on the bed and keep tossing and turning all over, all through the night. What bothers us?

Tossing and turning is not a feeling of discomfort, it is actually an offshoot of our mental equilibrium that is not relaxed. Irrespective of our mind wanting us to relax, our bodies want to find a more comfortable spot on the bed, a result of misinterpretation. Relaxation has to come from within you and should be a result of your thought process.

Lying in a hammock on a hot summer day, on a Hawaiian beach would sound very relaxing. If you keep thinking about millions invested on the stock market that could take a beating, if and when it crashes, the hammock will not work wonders in relaxing you.

When you feel the urge to toss and turn on the bed, give it time, wait. It will go away faster than it came. Lie there and think about focusing your mind elsewhere more relaxing than where it was and the urge to toss and turn will be out of your system in about 15 seconds. The best part of this exercise is that you will realize that you need to relax and not try finding a comfortable place on bed.

If you start tossing and turning it becomes a never ending process for the night and will not stop till the morning.

At times when you feel that the urge to toss or turn is very high and you have to move, try it the following way:

1. Move very slowly, as though you are just getting up from sleep in the morning.
2. While moving try to smile at yourself and take a deep breath.

Tossing and turning keeps us awake because we tend to do it quickly and impulsively, the more quickly we do it, the more agitated we get. Try it in the way said above, you will feel the difference and probably get out of the habit in no time.