Healthy sleep is what our body needs for normal functioning. But in the evening, many people have to struggle with intrusive negative thoughts. They make you relive unpleasant emotions again and again and make it impossible to restore strength. A few tips to help stop thinking about the bad before going to bed have been collected in the material.
Get ready for bed
The habit of thinking about the bad can appear due to various reasons. Therefore, to get rid of it, you need to carefully prepare for sleep. For example, ventilate the room in advance, change bedding, take a relaxing bath, and turn off all light sources.
It will not be superfluous to turn off all gadgets or put them on silent mode. Sticking to a smartphone or laptop before going to bed not only worsens the quality of sleep, but also negatively affects the psyche. In addition, scrolling through the feed and reading the news will only increase your level of anxiety.
Learn breathing practices
Practicing deep breathing before bed is one of the best ways to relax and get rid of negative intrusive thoughts. With its help, you can clear your mind and calm the nervous system. Here’s how to do it correctly:
- put one hand on the chest, and the other on the middle of the abdomen;
- make sure that when you take a deep breath, the hand on the stomach rises higher than the hand on the chest;
- after exhaling through your mouth, take a slow and deep breath through your nose and hold your breath for about five seconds;
- Exhale slowly through your mouth for a count of five and repeat the practice until you feel calm.
Switch to action
If, after the manipulations done, thoughts of the bad do not leave you, get out of bed and do something useful. For example, you can choose an image for the morning or drink a glass of green tea. If you don’t feel like walking at all, read a book, solve Sudoku, or draw something in a notebook.
Psychologists consider this method to be working, as physical activity helps to switch thoughts in a different direction and reduce the level of stress hormones in the body.
Analyze your day
If you can’t sleep because you’re worried about the failures you’ve experienced during the day, try to analyze the situation. So you give your brain the opportunity to live through what happened and get rid of stress.
For those who find it difficult to think to themselves or talk about problems out loud, psychologists recommend having a special notebook. In it, you can express your thoughts in a free form and concentrate on your feelings. Read about other situations in which a personal diary will come in handy.
Designate a special place and time for bad thoughts
Ignoring negative thoughts is unlikely to help get rid of them. Therefore, psychologists recommend legitimizing them, that is, allocating a special place and time for them.
For example, you can take 40 minutes a day to think about the bad. It is best to write them down or visualize them in some other way: draw, mold, turn into a fairy tale. The more creative your approach, the less intrusive thoughts will become over time.
Rationalize them
Another way to stop thinking about the bad is to rationalize your thoughts. To do this, you will need a notebook, a pen and a desire to deal with the problem.
First, try to clearly articulate the negative intrusive thought. Then reflect on how real and important it is to you. You should also think about how much you can influence your thoughts.
Having considered the problem from many different angles, you will give yourself the opportunity to condense it into a rigid framework, which means that in your mind it will no longer be able to expand.
Practice the “Three Baskets” exercise
If you can’t get rid of disturbing thoughts and fall asleep, try closing your eyes and imagine three baskets. One of them is for thoughts about the present, and the other two are for thoughts about the past and the future.
Then try to put all your thoughts into baskets. For example: “When will I fall asleep?” is a thought about the future. “How could I have gotten myself into this?” is a thought about the past.
This alternative to counting sheep will help you rationalize your thoughts and turn an emotionally charged process into a mechanical one.
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