How to stop your head from spinning before bed time

A few months after the breathwork session. It was close to being December, just the end of November. Tommy’s workload had begun to increase as he had to finish a lot of projects before the end of the year. Not only did he have to finish the projects, but he also had to prepare for the next year. Since the breathwork session, Tommy hasn’t gone to any sessions as he forgot because he was occupied by work.

After the health event in Brussels, Tommy felt stressed from the workload and had difficulties falling asleep at night. He would be in bed trying to sleep. First, he lay on his back, but after 2 minutes, he would turn to the side and 30 seconds later, turn to his back again. He couldn’t fall asleep as his thoughts were running 100 miles per hour. After some time, when Tommy finally couldn’t stay awake any longer, he fell asleep.

The next day, he was thinking about whether the breathwork session could help him gain control over the situation. However, when he checked the website, he saw that it started at 19:00 and ended at 20:00. Tommy couldn’t see how it would help him, as his thoughts might just go berserk before he got home to sleep.

During his lunch the next day, Tommy watched a YouTube video about sleep. He found a video about setting yourself up for a good night’s sleep. Interestingly enough, the video focused very much on the issues of your thoughts spinning around in your head. The video explained that meditation helps you observe your thoughts, so by doing 10 minutes of meditation. Where the man in the video said, “You should breathe slowly through your nose and focus on the breath.” When you try to sleep you focus on your breathing in and out through your nose. The guy also underlined that counting sheeps would have a negative impact, keeping you awake for a longer time.

By the end of the day, Tommy was already feeling tired as he had barely slept last night. The last few weeks have been like this. Tommy hasn’t been able to fall asleep but will eventually be so tired that he would get a full night of sleep.

As he came home, he cooked himself a light dinner to quickly be ready to go to bed. Tommy felt super tired and was about to fall asleep while brushing his teeth.

Even though Tommy felt tired, he tried to meditate as instructed in the video earlier. He set the alarm to 5 minutes and closed his eyes. He began slowly breathing, but he already felt his speed of thoughts had slowed down.

For a moment, Tommy noticed his thoughts as his mind was filled with work-related stuff, but not long after it all went silent. Tommy felt he disappeared from time and space, probably due to the lack of sleep as he might already have started to fall asleep. And then, All of a sudden, Tommy opened his eyes in shock as he started hearing a beeping. He realized it was his alarm.

He prepared himself to fall asleep, getting under the blanket. He started the breathing technique slowly in and out through the nose, but in a split second, Tommy fell asleep.

Tommy continued to meditate and use the breathwork technique to fall asleep. The longest day it took him to fall asleep was 5 minutes.

After having done the technique for a week, Tommy felt he was sleeping better and less stressed, as his thoughts didn’t spin around like before.

Having a calmer mind helps Tommy to focus on his work and reduce the feeling of stress because he no longer jumps on every thought that comes into his head.