Another busy day. I confess that I spent a bit of it configuring my iPhone and grabbing some of the music from my sweetie’s computer.
I’m still having trouble getting back to sleep when I wake up at about three o’clock. I’m not sure what to do about that. On days that I don’t go into the office I grab catnaps during the day, and that helps. I’ll grab a quick nap in the morning tomorrow, before my company comes.
I went into the office for a few hours. I wanted to organize some work stuff that I’ve been putting off, and when I went back to it I discovered that I’d actually made a very reasonable start at the organization already. That was good to see. And it was made all the more pleasant by the Bach that accompanied it. (I must do something about those earbuds, though. They aren’t working well for me at all.)
I have middle of the night insomnia sometimes. Wake up, brain clicks in, and I’ve had it. Might as well get up no matter whether it’s 3 am or whatever. What works for me is turning on a podcast. I have several that I love, very low-key, non-irritating, interesting. The irony is the more interesting a podcast is, the faster it puts me back to sleep. I think the reason it works that way is that, yeah, in fact, I am in need of sleep, but the thing that keeps me awake is fret and worry. If a podcast absorbs me, the brain relaxes and the fret and worry goes away, and I drift off. Of course, I have to go back and pick up what I missed because I fell asleep, but that’s a pretty small price to pay for being able to go back to sleep.
http://store.apple.com/us/product/MA850G/B?fnode=MTY1NDA1MA
There are better ones out there, at a higher price. Maybe not any even as good at this price, because of the amazing material the cord’s made out of. I’m happy with mine, and I really hate the standard earbuds.
I, too, share the wide-eyed-worry syndrome in the wee hours. I have two ways to deal with it. First is to keep a pad and pencil on nightstand. There I jot down all the to-dos and random thoughts that are “twirling around in my head.” (Thank you, Herman Cain.) Once I know I won’t lose them, I can relax and usually fall back asleep. It can be a challenge reading my notes in the morning, since I always scribble with the light off. The other thing I do is to go through my mental check list of all the things I’m thankful for, and requests for help for those with problems greater than mine. I think of it more as meditation than praying. Since the list is fairly constant, the entire “prayer” becomes almost a mantra. That usually helps me fall asleep before I’ve covered my entire mental list.
I have very small ears and have never been able to wear regular earbuds. They are fairly expensive, but I can highly recommend Etymotic earphones. The are all “in-ear” which some people don’t like, but these are very well made which I think makes the difference. Because they are in-ear, they do some noise cancelling and so you can keep your mp3 player turned down lower which is better for your hearing. Here is their website: http://www.etymotic.com/