Using the Power of Now to Get a Good Night's Sleep

© Copyright 2010 Patrice Walker All rights reserved

Yes, I know, it sounds weird, but it works. What exactly do I mean, in this instance, by “the power of now”? I’m sure a lot of you are familiar with this phrase as it is the title of a book written by the renowned spiritual teacher, Eckhart Tolle.

Briefly, the power of now, as I’m using it in this hub, is about the incredible healing capacity of the present moment when one’s attention is focused on it, instead of being caught up in thoughts about the past or the future. In this hub, I’m going to talk about two methods I’ve used to be in the present moment that help me get a good night’s sleep.

I’ve already described one of these techniques in another hub, but I want to discuss it again in the context of getting to sleep at night.

Anxiety often keeps me awake at night.  A feeling of general unease or even dread often settles in my solar plexus and/or chest; it's my body’s reaction to “worry” thoughts about the “awful” things I think might happen in the future based on whatever circumstances I’m currently experiencing that I’ve judged as bad and resist (i.e., try to get rid of or try to avoid). But sometimes, it seems to come out of nowhere, although, in these instances, I think it’s just that the negative thoughts arise so quickly that I don’t notice them, just the feelings they produce.

In the past, I would let these feelings take me over; I’d get lost in them and they would grow stronger and more powerful until I was completely overwhelmed by them. And night time has been a perfect time for them to show up since I’m no longer active and doing stuff during the day that keeps my mind off the anxiety-producing thoughts.

Dissipating The Pain Body

Then I read The Power of Now and learned that I was being taken over by my “pain body,” a semi-autonomous energy field consisting of all of the negative emotional reactions that I experienced in the past and never let go of that is now a part of my total energy field. The pain body has dormant and active stages; it rises up to feed on negative emotion and when it’s “full” it subsides and becomes dormant until the next time it’s ready to feed.

One way to keep the pain body in check, to begin dissipating its energy, is to simply observe the feeling wherever it occurs in your body. You simply notice it, observe it, become aware of it, but without judging it or analyzing it or resisting it in any way. You’d think that this observing would make the feeling even stronger, but just the opposite happens. As you continue to observe the feeling, it soon dissipates and you realize that you don’t feel it anymore.

Who You Really Are

Why does this happen? Tolle says that by observing the pain, you are no longer unconsciously identified with it. It isn’t “you” anymore. That simple act of becoming aware of it disidentifies you from it. Instead, you are the observer of the pain, that is, Awareness, Consciousness, Presence, Being, the formless field out of which all external reality emerges, who you really are. And because the feeling is no longer there, I am usually asleep in minutes.

If anxiety keeps you awake at night, try this simple technique. You’re awake anyway, right? Why not use the time to practice observing these feelings neutrally. In the beginning, your mind will probably go back and forth between unconscious identification and conscious observation, but that’s ok. Don’t let this frustrate you.  With practice, it will get easier.

The second technique is one I learned from a book called, The Secret of Instant Healing by Frank Kinslow. Kinslow has taken the concepts and principles upon which Tolle bases much of his philosophy, in addition to what quantum physics is telling us about the nature of reality, and created a healing method called Quantum Entrainment.

It requires that you get out of or go beyond your thinking mind to experience the state that he calls “pure awareness,” a state that, again, has tremendous healing power, and, again, is who you really are.

Observation and a Simple Question Is All It Takes

To do this, you simply notice your thoughts for a bit, in the same way that you noticed your anxious feelings. No judgment, no analysis, no trying to make them stop; just pure observation. After you’ve done this for a bit, ask yourself, “Where will my next thought come from?” and then pause. During that pause, you’ll experience a gap, perhaps very brief at first, in which there is no thought at all, just a silent "no-thingness." Then your thoughts will probably start up again. That’s ok, too. Just continue to observe them. After about 15 or 20 seconds of observation, ask yourself the question again, pause, and notice the silent gap.

As you continue doing this for several minutes, you’ll soon notice that your thought activity has decreased tremendously, and a state of silent awareness has taken its place. What's been happening to me as I do this is that, in the middle of this exercise, I fall asleep. And it doesn’t take long. One moment I’m observing my thoughts and asking the question, and the next moment, I’m waking up after having slept for several hours.

Why does this work? Again, the mind is not identified with thoughts of past or future; all of its attention is given to observing mind activity non-judgmentally NOW, in the present moment. This simple act of observation quiets my mind enough to get me to sleep quickly.

The "One-Two Punch"

I find that I often have to focus on the anxious feelings first because they are so “in my face.” Once the anxiety dissipates, I will either fall asleep or, if I’m still awake, I’ll move on to observing my thoughts and asking the question, which usually does the trick. And it doesn’t take long for this to work, usually less than five minutes. If you’ve never done any of this before, it may take you a bit longer, but with practice, you’ll be falling asleep in no time.

Give it a try, and let me know if it works for you. And, of course, check with your health care practitioner if anxiety and insomnia are serious problems for you.