We are finding ourselves on ‘high alert’ with our resilience being tested at every turn. World events have forced us all to change whilst managing worries for the future, immediate pressures around work, paying the bills or keeping the ones we love safe. Every day seems to bring more of the same challenges to our wellbeing and potentially new changes, which can cause many to feel like we’ve lost control. Understandably, many people are now experiencing higher levels of stress and anxiety, which can cause many to struggle to sleep.
Often, we turn to physical changes and skills to help us sleep better. For example, switching off devices long before we go to bed, eating and drinking the right things in the time preceding bed, etc. These are all great ways to ensure a good night’s sleep, although they only sometimes address our natural barrier – stress. always addressing our natural barrier – stress.
Our natural barrier to a good nights sleep
Adverse events shape our psychology, and we begin to fall into several traps that affect our resilience, stress levels, mood and sleep:
- ‘What if’ thinking
- Rumination
1. 'What if' thinking
‘What if’ thinking is what we create when trying to guess the future. We create scenarios in our heads about what might happen and what we might do about them. The thing is, though, they aren’t real.
What if I fail? What if I’m not good enough? What if someone laughs at me? What if I get ill? What if I lose my job? What if I’m a terrible parent? What if I don’t lose weight? What if I make a wrong decision? What if I don’t get that job? What if my business fails?
What if I say the wrong thing? What if I upset someone? What if we get divorced? What if I regret doing this? What if I change my mind? What if I feel differently in the future? WHAT IF…….
Suppose you don’t recognise the times when you ‘what if’ think, it can be easy to lose perspective and focus only on the worst-case scenario. It’s called catastrophic thinking. It can send your stress levels through the roof and stop you from taking action in a situation where action is required. This inaction and the subsequent worry will keep you awake at night.
2. 'What if' thinking drives rumination.
Rumination is when you replay the same thought over and over in your head and attach a negative emotion to it. It can be a bit like a stuck record. It is not necessarily thinking about the future. That could be good planning. Neither is it looking back on the past. That could be reflection. When you attach a negative emotion to it, it becomes rumination!
Rumination is common when the lights go out at night. When we’re stressed, our thoughts often start going round and round in our heads. It’s when you play THAT meeting over and over in your mind and can’t concentrate on the task at hand. It happens all the time, and it’s all our own doing!
The thing about rumination is it feels helpful. It feels like you are working things out in your head. The problem is that if there is no positive action, it just causes stress. Rumination is not always obvious. The skill lies in recognising rumination for what it is.
Next time you feel stressed, ask yourself am I ruminating? Or if you’re struggling to drift off, could it be rumination that’s stopping you? One of the prime times we all ruminate is just before we go to bed or, in some cases, in the middle of the night. For all of us, it keeps us awake.
Recognise any of these most common rumination topics?
Workload, deadlines, frustration with the working environment, lack of support from managers, rising expectations of friends and family, health, or finances.
"How can I beat 'What if' thinking and rumination?"
1 – Try a Tactical Breath, or two
Have you ever noticed how you breathe when you’re stressed? It tends to be short, sharp breaths into the top of your lungs. Contrast that with when you are calm and relaxed. When we are relaxed, our breaths are long and deep and into the pit of our stomach.
Tactical breathing is a quick and effective way to switch off your stress response by helping you breathe deep and long. It allows you to remain calm relaxed and helps you to fall asleep.
Next time you feel stressed or struggling to sleep, try:
- Breathing in through your nose for 4 seconds. Hold it for 7 seconds
- Breathe out slowly through your mouth for 8 seconds
- Repeat at least 3-4 times
The sort of deep breathing practised as part of the 4-7-8 breathing technique helps calm your body by activating your parasympathetic nervous system, which controls your body’s rest and relaxation response. This is why deep breathing is so effective at causing a relaxation response.
2. Learn to let the small things go
Holding on to the things that cause you stress can turn an OK day into a bad one. Perhaps it is a loved one eating all your favourite biscuits, a messy kitchen, or a flippant response by a colleague.
Either way, it becomes an obsession. It lingers in your mind, and it gets replayed over and over again. It probably also involves a few one-person conversations, which is likely to happen the last thing before you close your eyes.
If you find yourself in a similar situation and recognise you are ruminating, then ask yourself:
- Will it matter in a week
- A month?
- A year?
The answer is often no, and you can drop it, putting your energy into focusing on what is essential.
3 – Perspective
Suppose you don’t recognise the times when you ruminate. In that case, it can be easy to lose perspective and focus only on the worst-case scenario and ‘What If’ thinking.
Although outwardly we might appear to keep it all together, inside, it feels like we are about to buckle under the pressure and allow catastrophic thinking about the worst-case scenario to cloud our thinking.
Catastrophic thinking is more common than you think:
“I got a tax bill through in the post, and it was way more than I expected. I spent the whole weekend worrying about it and ended up shouting at my partner and kids. Things escalated, and before I knew it, the whole weekend was a disaster for everyone, and I got no sleep. When I rang to query it on Monday, they apologised and told me they’d produced it in error.”
Balance your ‘what if’s and rumination with three key questions:
- What would be the worst-case scenario?
- What would be the best-case scenario?
- What is the most likely scenario?
When asking yourself these questions, really CATASTROPHISE to the extreme. Keep asking yourself, “and then? And then?” Until you get to the absolute worst case. It will sound ridiculous!
Keep asking “and then what?” until you get to the ABSOLUTE best case imaginable. Again it may sound ridiculous – the skill is to take your thinking to the extreme.
Now you’ve spent the time looking at the two extremes, look for the most likely outcome and act on it.
4 – Focus on what you can control
It’s understandable to feel a lack of control over everything happening, and it’s simply not possible to influence and control everything. Although, stressing over things beyond your control causes stress and a night of troubled night sleep.
How can you make sure you focus on what you can influence and control in your lives?
It’s a skill to put your energy into proactive and practical action, and here is how you do it.
Grab a pen and paper and create three columns:
- In the first column, list your concerns.
- In the 2nd column, write down what you can influence or control about one or all of the concerns in the first column.
- In the third column, write down one thing you will commit to doing and then do it!
This process enables you to separate your concerns from what you can influence or control, allowing you to focus on putting your energy into identifying ways to move forwards.
- Example 1: a concern might be the worldwide spread of COVID-19. We can’t influence it globally, but we can control it individually through social distancing/self-isolation. A proactive stance might be researching online delivery outlets for foodstuff and making an inventory of food as and when orders need to be made.
- Example 2: you might have concerns that your boss isn’t as supportive as possible. A way to proactively influence it might be to tell them how you are being affected and what you need.
Which circle are you currently spending the majority of time in? A reactive response focuses on concerns and may use language like “I can’t”, “if only”, and “I have to.” These phrases are shifting the responsibility to outside forces.
A proactive response identifies the things within your control. Sometimes the only thing within your control is how you respond. Other times, with some thought, you can identify other ideas.
5 – Focus on the good to remain positive
Biologically, our brains are wired for the negative.
It’s evolutionary. Back in the days when survival meant spotting the ‘sabre-toothed tiger,’ this negativity bias kept us safe.
Imagine you were out hunting, and you thought you just heard a tiger. Or was it just the wind? If you assumed it was a tiger and ran away, but in fact, it was just the wind, you’d be tired but still alive. Whereas, if you assumed it was just the wind when in fact, it was a tiger…well, that’s game over!
Unfortunately, this survival mechanism is not something you can switch off. This super sensitivity towards threat and negativity can impact all aspects of our life and switch on our stress response.
We have to work hard to beat our natural negativity bias. To beat your instinctive negativity bias, you need to grab the good.
Here’s how to do it:
Spend some time once a day, reflecting on the positive things or experiences you are grateful for.
- Write down three things you are grateful for or that have gone well today.
- Write down why you are grateful for it.
- Focus on HOW you can get more of this good stuff in your life.
Although this can be tough and feel unnatural at first, it’s worth persevering.
Three ways to use it:
After a stressful meeting or event, it’s easy to focus only on the negative aspects. To switch off the stress response, focus on three good things or outcomes because they will be there.
Bad day at work? Before you stop work, stop stress creeping into your personal life by thinking of 3 good things that have happened that day or three things you are grateful for. No matter how trivial, they will be there!
- Beat the negativity bias in others. When you ask others how their day went, how often do they respond negatively? Try asking them, “what went well for you today, what did you enjoy, how can you get more of that good thing?”
Bringing it all together
Getting a good night sleep is essential for our performance, wellbeing and mental health. If you struggle with sleep, you know it, you feel it, and it affects your everyday. Try using the skills we have suggested, and let us know how you get on. For more skills, sign up for our free programme below or read more of our blogs for more solutions to your challenges.
