Paradoxical intention for chronic insomnia - improve your sleep by trying to stay awake?
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- čas přidán 5. 06. 2024
- If you struggle to fall asleep or fall back to sleep due to sleep-related worry and anxiety, paradoxical intention therapy may be helpful.
Many people with chronic insomnia struggle to sleep because of the pressure they put themselves under to sleep. Unfortunately, as soon as we try to sleep, we make sleep more difficult.
Paradoxical intention techniques can remove this performance anxiety by encouraging you to try staying awake rather than trying to fall asleep. This eliminates sleep effort and actually make sleep more likely.
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My name is Martin Reed and I am the founder of Insomnia Coach®. I offer sleep coaching services that give people with insomnia all the skills and support they need to enjoy better sleep for the rest of their lives. I also offer a free two-week sleep training course for people with insomnia at insomniacoach.com/sleep-train...
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All content found on the Insomnia Coach CZcams channel is provided for informational and educational purposes only. It is not medical advice and is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease, disorder, or medical condition. It should never replace any advice given to you by your physician or any other licensed healthcare provider. Insomnia Coach LLC offers coaching services only and does not provide therapy, counseling, medical advice, or medical treatment. All content is provided “as is” and without warranties, either express or implied.
This works well for me as my main driver for insomnia is me trying to "perform sleep". That shift of my focus to something else than falling sleep, allows my body to induce sleep when it is ready. Guy Meadows uses the following line in one of his session that helps me take pressure of myself and calm me down "Allow yourself to be awake in bed without any pressure to sleep".
As I found myself to be a rather controlling person, allowing myself to not perform is a great relief.
Absolutely! When we don't think about sleep, try to control sleep, or put any effort into sleep, that's when we clear the way for great sleep to happen!
Thanks for this wonderful technique, I learned about this in your e-mail course and started implementing. For me, it has almost 80% success rate.
I did not try this for the past two weeks, it did not absolutely revolutionise my sleep quality and I’m not deeply grateful and indebted to you!!!!
This was really well explained, thanks!!
Glad you found the video helpful, Yosef!
I tried this a few times when I was exhausted, but not sleepy and fell asleep. The roadblock I ran into was what to do when I wake up at 3 and I cannot fall back asleep to save my life. Forcing myself to stay awake after 4-5 hours of sleep tends to work, but does not score me enough sleep to do anything productive that day like work which makes me feel even worse which tends to lower the odds of restful sleep the following night. Rinse and repeat.
Thank you for sharing your experience, Jay. Since you mentioned that not doing anything that gives you a sense of being productive tends to make you feel even worse, perhaps exploring a change there might be useful?
Oh yes, it works perfectly to me in the classroom
This is a great example of how easy sleep can be when we aren't trying to sleep or putting any pressure on ourselves to sleep!
Very helpful
Thanks for letting me know, Dev!
This video was really helpful! It's quite annoying when I'm completely exhausted and as soon as I lay down in bed my mind just decides to think and think and it prevents me from falling asleep. The same happens 1-2 hours after I fall asleep, I just randomly "wake up" and can't go back to sleep. From what I've heard I'm actually dreaming of being awake or something and it is extremely annoying. Unfortunately I'm 20 years old and insomnia affected me during highschool, always felt unrested and would randomly fall asleep during classes... I'm glad I've found this channel just wish I had found it sooner
Welcome to the channel, Niko! Thanks for sharing your experience.
Thanks for making these videos! Love from India 🙏
You're welcome! Much love from Oregon!
I was reading man’s search for meaning cause I couldn’t sleep and this popped up. Awesome video😊
What a great book - and a solemn reminder that even in the most unimaginable circumstances, we can still do things that are aligned with our values and that keep us moving toward the rich and meaningful life we want to live.
It works
Happy to hear you found it helpful!
There is this one time where I gave up and I was like;Ohky! Insomnia you win! I will lay down in this bed for the rest of my life awake. Immediately my thoughts shifted to other things and I opened my eyes 5hrs later from a dream!!But it Didn't work everyday because it turned out to be an effort. The next day I expected sleep to come as I remained awake but it couldn't. I guess the whole idea is not trying to sleep but it's so hardddd to not try to sleep when you are so sleep deprived! It feels like every corner of your brain screams SLEEP SLEEP else you gonna die! Thank you coach for the good work
Thanks for sharing! It sounds as though you uncovered a big insight with your experience - that sleep happens best if we are able to move away from trying to make sleep happen!
It works for me, but I actually have to sit up and give up on sleeping altogether, because anxiety of not sleeping keeps me awake. Once I let go of feeling the need and I must sleep at a specific time, I start feeling sleepy. Staying in bed with my eyes open alone is not enough to let go of the pressure of feeling that I must sleep
What a big insight - as soon as you stop putting any pressure on yourself to sleep and/or stop putting any effort into sleep, sleep often becomes a whole lot easier! Thanks for sharing, Mille!
I have tried it, it has not Been effective in taking out the pressure, listening to the tv sometimes works better! But the pressure to go to sleep is my biggest struggle
How long did you try this technique, Patricia? One night, throughout the night or over a number of nights? I am curious to learn how people have implemented this since there isn't much direction about this in the literature.
I did it for 10 days
@@patriciagomez8728 Thanks for following-up, Patricia. On nights when you tried it, what happened? Would you be lying there, consciously trying to stay awake for the entire night for ten straight days and still not be able to sleep?
How long Is an acceptable time to practice this technique in the bed? Would it be good while practicing this to stick to the 15 to 30 minute time rule of stimulus control?
I am not sure you can practice this at the same time as stimulus control since the goal with paradoxical intention is to put effort into staying awake rather than doing something in an attempt to fight or avoid wakefulness or even to respond in any way to wakefulness.
Do I have to use this technique for whole life after CBTI ?
No! These are just a collection of techniques that help address the thoughts and behaviors that perpetuate insomnia. When those thoughts and behaviors are no longer an issue, sleep will no longer be an issue, so you won't need the techniques anymore (although they will always be with you should you need them again in the future)! Here's a video about this: czcams.com/video/ZfITOmoh4-8/video.html
I try this method and have a question:
“Give up any effort to fall asleep”.
What should I when I become sleepy?
According to this technique, if you feel sleepy then you don't do anything differently because your only goal is to remain awake!
This is a technique from Viktor E. Frankl
Thanks for sharing, Enes!
Lol 69th like 😂
Watching at 3am for some reason
Glad you found the video helpful - and thanks for the like!
wu wei insomnia
Abandoning effort to control that which cannot be controlled (for example, sleep and our thoughts/emotions!) is definitely aligned with the concept of Wu Wei!