Saying “Baaaa” to Counting Sheep

When sleeplessness stirs the body and the mind – what to do? When lack of sleep prompts the mind to go gather more questions, worry about more things, and feels stressful to an already overstimulated nervous system, it is a call into the inner ashram of our heart.

Sometimes we feel like there isn't even a lamp to light the way into the far reaches of our heart. Still, we wander the pathways in the dark...feeling our way. We are being called into stillness even while the body experiences restlessness, sleeplessness, or even electrical zaps and internal shaking. 

We're not crazy, we're just waking up. Out of – literally everything. Out of conditioned patterns, reactions, thoughts, questions, concerns, pain, hardship, struggle, victimhood, martyrdom, wants and desires – all of it.

When we are still and quiet, and just allow the movement of life to happen as it does around us, and within us, there is a slowing down, and a stopping. Through all the churning, the cream rises to the top. The peace that is there all along – surfaces and it feels like home. It feels expansive. It feels like a best friend who always has our best interest at heart, no matter how it may ever seem to the mind. 

Sure, we can "punch the wind" at our sleeplessness, but that just perpetuates an adversarial relationship with it. How can we befriend it, welcome it as an ally for our highest evolution, find the gift in it, and accept the invitation to fall into the arms of what seems like the opposite experience of what we truly want in that moment? Can we explore an experience of relaxation, restfulness, and nourishment in other ways? 

Can we accept the "I'm NOT sleeping," as a reminder to meditate. We can close our eyes and follow the breath in and out. We can lie on our backs with one hand on the heart, and the other on our abdomen and send I love yous while feeling the rise and fall of the belly. We can let the weight of our hands sink deeper and deeper into the body. We can feel the dissolving of our hands until it doesn't seem like there are even hands, or a body.

Whatever feels intuitively like the most friendly, loving way to be with ourselves through unexpected "wakefulness," go in that direction!

We owe it to ourselves, our spouses, friends, and wherever we are in service in the world to explore this in a more harmonious way. Life is wise. It knows just where to hide the goodies for you to discover at just the right time, and in just the right way. 

Enjoy the journey! 

You are loved, 
Julie Dittmar

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