How To Fall Asleep Fast : End Over-Thinking

This talk will help you fall asleep faster by addressing the common thoughts and beliefs that prevent you from falling asleep. When we fear not sleeping, it makes us strategize how to fall asleep. The strategizing prevents us from falling asleep. This talk is meant to relax this whole pattern so it's easier to fall asleep.

Transcript

Hello, My name is Noah Elkrieff and in this video I'm going to talk about how to fall asleep fast. So normally when people talk about this, They talk about the physical reasons why we can't fall asleep. But I'm going to speak about the real core of why we aren't falling asleep if you've been struggling with it for a while. But before we do that, I guess in case you're new to trying to fall asleep, Let's just go over the main things that you can do to help you if you're not falling asleep. Most people want to make sure that it's dark, Do some physical activity during the day so your body gets tired, Perhaps have some tea before sleep without caffeine. Some people like taking a bath, Some people like reading to fall asleep, Some people like to have soothing music to fall asleep. But if you've tried these types of things and they're not working, It's because you really haven't addressed the reason why you're not falling asleep in the first place. There are two main thoughts that go on in our head, Or two main types of thoughts that go on in our head that prevent us from falling asleep. Because basically, The reason why we can't fall asleep is when our mind is busy, It's like we're moving, So our body doesn't relax enough to just fall asleep. So in order to let our body relax, We have to let our thoughts relax. And how do we let our thoughts relax? There's two main types of thoughts that we're going to look at. And one is recurring thoughts that create worries and anxiety. And the other is the thought, It would be bad if I don't fall asleep. So let's look at the first one. So for some people, They can't fall asleep because as you're going to sleep, You're thinking of your to-do list for tomorrow, Or you're thinking about the upcoming interview, Or the upcoming presentation, Or whether your partner loves you, Or whatever. So there's constantly stories going on in your head that are taking your attention. So if you want to fall asleep, You need to address those stories. You see, Most of us never allow ourselves to look at our thoughts, Never allow ourselves to be with our thoughts. We just all day long avoid our own thoughts, Right? We need to be with friends, Talking to people at work, Doing something, Listening to music, Watching TV, Eating anything to avoid being alone with our own thoughts. And when we're trying to go to sleep, We just can't avoid our thoughts sometimes. We have to look at them. We have to be with them. And since we have no practice, No experience at how to deal with our own thoughts, Because we avoid them at all costs, We don't know how to deal with them. We don't know how to handle them. We don't know what to do with them. So if your mind is really busy, And that's why you can't fall asleep, What you need to do is write down the stories that keep popping up in your head. So you might write down the stories that says, It would be bad if the presentation doesn't go well. Or it would be, Does he love me? Does he love me? I don't know. Did he do this? Did I do that? So that, You would write that down. Or maybe the story is, I'm not good enough. Whatever the story is, You need to write it down and then question whether it's true. Basically disbelieve that thought. So if the thought is, It would be bad, It's constantly thinking about an upcoming presentation or work project. The reason why you're thinking about it is because you think it would be best if you did well on the presentation and bad if you didn't. Or good on the test and bad, It would be bad if you fail. So that's anxiety and you need to question whether those thoughts are true. How do I know what would be best if I do well on the test? Maybe it's better for my life if I do bad. Maybe that will get me to change my study habits or get me to realize this isn't for me or get me, Lead me to a situation that really helps me. I don't know. So whatever it is, Identify the specific story or thoughts that are taking your attention and your energy and then question whether they're true. The way that you do that, You can use my free web app in the links in the description here called the Five Steps. It's a web app that takes you through how do I identify and disbelieve the thoughts that are taking your attention and creating your unwanted emotions. Or you could just watch one of my other videos on a topic that you keep thinking about. The second type of thought that takes your attention and prevents you from falling asleep is simply the idea it would be best for me to fall asleep now and it would be bad if I don't fall asleep. This thought usually starts coming up more and more and more as we become less and less effective at falling asleep or as that problem persists and gets stronger and stronger. And so if you have the idea it's best for me to fall asleep immediately or best for me to get eight hours of sleep or whatever, Then you automatically have the idea it's bad for me to get less sleep. It's bad for it to take a long time to fall asleep. And as soon as you believe that, You fear that outcome, Right? So you are afraid of getting less sleep because you think that's bad. And if you think that's bad, Then your mind will constantly engage in how to make sure it doesn't happen. And let me put that differently because I'm not sure if that was clear. So if I think it's best to get eight hours of sleep, Then I think it's worse to get less. And if I think it's worse to get less, Then my mind will engage in how do I get more sleep? How do I fall asleep faster? So then when you're trying to fall asleep, All mind is doing is how do I fall asleep quicker? What do I need to do? How do I get rid of this stuff? How do I calm it down? Why isn't it happening? It would be so bad if I don't fall asleep. It would be so bad if I don't get enough. And tomorrow's presentation will go so bad if it doesn't work. Whoa, Right? So in order to stop all of these new level of thoughts, This new layer of thoughts of how do I fall asleep, You need to discover that you don't know whether it's better or worse for your life to get more sleep. And that may sound ridiculous right now, But let's look at that. What do you want in life more than anything else? More than anything else? To be happy, Right? You may think you want success more than anything else. We really just want success because we hope if we get success we'd be happy, Right? But even if you think you want success. So we'll look at it on two levels actually. So if you think you want success more than anything else, How do you know that sleeping less will. . . Let's say tonight. Tonight, Right now, If you sleep four hours instead of eight hours, Do you know that will be worse for your day tomorrow? Or worse for your success in the long run? Is it possible that you're really tired tomorrow? Maybe if you're really tired, You're still just as effective and productive at work. Is that true? Sometimes you got four hours of sleep and you're incredibly productive and effective. And sometimes you get eight hours of sleep and you're not productive. Maybe you have so much energy you're distracted and talking to people or whatever. Or let's say. . . So first we're looking at. . . So you might be just as productive, So it might not be bad. Or it's possible that tomorrow you're less productive because you got less sleep, Right? So if you have four hours of sleep, Maybe you're less effective most of the time. But how do you know when it's most important for you to be effective? So maybe tomorrow you're less effective because you got four hours of sleep. And the next day you're less effective because you got four hours of sleep because you're even more tired. And the next day. . . But maybe you need to get really, Really tired for you to fall asleep early. So what I'm saying there is. . . If you have a few days in a row where you're really, Really tired, Maybe the next day you fall asleep early and then the following day since you got a lot of sleep, You're really, Really effective and productive. And that's the day that you needed it most. Maybe that's the day of the presentation or that's the day of something where you needed it. How do you know? Maybe by being less effective you decrease the expectations of your boss because they recognize it takes a long time to get this work done and then you can exceed expectations sometimes. Maybe. . . I don't know. I don't know whether it's better or worse for your career, For your success, For your job to get more or less sleep. And as long as you think you know that more sleep is better for your success, Well then you're going to fear it. So you need to discover for yourself, You don't actually know what's better or worse for your success. But on top of that, And more importantly than that, You don't know what's best for your happiness. It's possible that your inability to fall asleep could lead you to become so much happier in life. One, Because it led you to this video. It led you to look at your thoughts. If you just fell asleep easy every night, Maybe you would have never looked at the thoughts that create your anxiety, Never looked at the thoughts that are constantly taking your attention. But you not being able to fall asleep acted as a catalyst to say, You know what? I need to start looking at my thoughts. I need to start understanding them. I need to see what's going on behind them. I need to question their validity. Right? You don't know. So is it possible, Or just looking at it differently, Is it possible that if you get, You're so tired all the time that you're less effective at work and then you get fired because you're so incredibly ineffective and unproductive. But maybe that leads you to a job you like more. Maybe that leads you to get rid of some of the cause of your stress, Right? Or some of the subject of the thoughts of your stress. And then you sleep more and then maybe you meet someone that changes your life. Or it forces you to learn a new skill which you really like. Or it gives you more time for a new hobby. I don't know. But you don't either. So there's two simple questions there. One is, Do you know that less sleep is worse for your success? And do you know less sleep is worse for your happiness in the long run? How could you possibly know? And if you don't know, Then what outcome is there to fear? How do you know what's better or worse for you to sleep? I know it sounds ridiculous, But isn't it true? Look. Experiment with this. Ask yourself, You know what? I don't, Just for tonight as an experiment, I'm going to say, I don't care how much sleep I get. I don't know whether it'll be better or worse for me. Let's find out and then see what happens tomorrow. Maybe you're just as effective or maybe you're just as happy or maybe you're happier or maybe not. I don't know. But look for yourself. The goal of this is for you to discover, I could be happier with less sleep. I could be more successful with less sleep. Maybe you decide you can't sleep and then you just end up being productive during that time instead of sleeping eight hours a night. You spend four hours, You only sleep four hours and you spend four hours studying, Learning, Working on your project at work or reading books that help you to address your thoughts so you can actually be happy or watching YouTube videos that do the same thing. I don't know, But you don't either. You see, It's about discovering. You don't know what's best for your life. You don't know whether it's best to sleep or not. As long as you think it's best to sleep more, You'll be afraid of sleeping less and then those thoughts will constantly go on in your head. All right? So try that and please let me know how it goes in the comments. Thanks for watching and I'll see you around. Hello again. If you found my video helpful or you enjoyed it, I welcome you to click on one of the videos below as you might find them helpful as well. Or if you want to make sure you never miss another video of mine again, You can click the subscribe button over there and if you want my free ebook, You're welcome to click the free ebook button over there. So thanks again for watching and I'll see you around. Bye.

Reviews

Very interesting and i think useful insight into dealing with a busy mind when trying to fall asleep.

Fell immediately back to sleep twice last night!

Very insightful

I don’t know what he said because I fell asleep!