The way we think about sleep is going to change radically over the next 20 years.

 

In a hyper-busy world, it seems like sleep is a luxury at times. How many times have you heard your cubicle mate or family member complain that there just aren’t enough hours in the day? But what if the key is not in optimizing your day-to-day routine or in trying to squeeze more hours out of a day, but rather, in minimizing – or at least optimizing – your sleep time?

Here’s a review of some of the more audacious ideas for rethinking the future of sleep:

1. Dream management

It’s long been a staple plot device of science fiction films such as “Inception” for people to wake up and realize that they are living inside their dreams. Now that may be a possibility – as long as you don’t mind zapping your brain with a weak electrical current (40 hertz appears to work best) a few times a week. 

In tests performed in Germany, researchers found that delivering a low-level electrical impulse to the frontal lobe of the brain during REM sleep cycles enabled sleepers to experience “lucid dreaming” – the sensation of being an active participant in your dreams.

In a base case scenario, “lucid dreaming” would make it possible for people to manage their dreams in real-time. People experiencing nightmares – such as people suffering from PTSD – would potentially be able to alter the outcome of painful experiences. Decades from now, it may even be able to “incept” a set of dreams and trick your brain into thinking that a specific lucid dream scenario from someone else is actually happening to you.

2. The perfect sleep experience

No, this is not a tagline for the newest mattress promising a good night’s sleep. Think what would happen if your mattress were connected to the Internet, and your bedroom was hooked up to your Nest. You might be able to regulate the perfect sleep experience, right down to the temperature of the room, the rigidity of your mattress, the fluffiness of your pillows and the amount of light filtering into the room from your window. You could then optimize things further by having your bed wake you at the end of a sleep cycle.

Hotel brands are among the real-world companies that might take advantage of such technology to lure customers away from other hotel chains. In 2011, Travelodge hired the futurologist Ian Pearson to study the future of sleep for hotels and travel. By 2030, says Pearson, the future of the perfect sleep experience might be possible. Theoretically, you’d arrive at your hotel, plug in all the variables into a hotel’s sleep management database, and you’d be able to drift off into a peaceful night’s sleep wherever you are in the world.

3. Super-naps

Based on extensive studies of how humans nap, neuroscientists have already determined that unique brain activity gets activated during a typical nap cycle. At Georgetown University, researchers have found that during naps the right hemisphere of the brain (responsible for creative thinking) was extremely active and busy transmitting information to the inactive left hemisphere of the brain (responsible for analytical thinking). The initial results suggest that super-naps could make us more creative.

Imagine what’s possible when you can combine all the benefits of sleeping and dreaming into a new type of experience, available on demand. In cities such as New York and Tokyo, there have been attempts to create “nap pods” where corporate office workers can take quick 20-minute naps and re-charge. In the future, you might do more than re-charge – you might be able to take a super-nap and unlock the future of your creativity and big picture thinking skills.

4. Genetically modified sleep

As biologists map the human genome, they’re looking for genetic markers that code for certain behaviors and tendencies. One gene they hope to locate is the “sleep gene” – a hypothetical gene within the genome that codes for “light sleep.” Certain genes, such as CLOCK and BMAL1, are known to play an important role in the body’s circadian rhythm. Now researchers think that they’ve found another gene – DEC2 – that might be the secret to light sleeping. Mutations to DEC2, it appears, significantly reduce the amount of sleep time that’s required for the human body.

The military is apparently one of the major customers for such genetic technology. Imagine SEALs and Green Berets, once they’ve had some gene therapy, able to soldier on for days at a time during battle. They would be biological super-soldiers, capable of accomplishing missions without suffering the negative effects of sleep deprivation, such as drowsiness, disorientation and slower reflexes.

5. Red pills and blue pills

One of the little-told stories of neuroscience is how researchers are getting better and better at creating synthetic drugs that target specific neurotransmitters of the human brain. Researchers, for example, have found that steady dosages of a pill such as modafinil can help to cure narcolepsy. Modafinil appears to target the neurotransmitter GABA, which is the brain’s most important sleep regulator. It also appears to affect other chemicals in the brain, such as glutamate, that are responsible for creating high levels of neural activity.

There’s apparently a thriving market for these FDA-approved pills, as everyone from athletes to students show signs of willing to experiment with them. Some pharmaceutical companies are even working with DARPA on new “wakefulness” drugs. In some circles, modafinil is viewed as a “lifestyle drug.”

6. Smart pajamas

We already know that sleep has many restorative functions related to memory and aging. By monitoring sleep patterns, it might be possible to optimize these restorative functions or even diagnose some medical conditions while you sleep. The next iteration would be targeting and tweaking many of these restorative functions using the latest in wearable technology.

Imagine settling down for a brief night of sleep and donning a pair of smart pajamas that is instantly able to monitor your sleep patterns. These smart pajamas would be able to measure factors such as skin conductivity, blood pressure, heart rate and pulse – and then put all of these factors together to offer a custom medical diagnosis, all without a trip to the doctor’s office.

7. Human hibernation

We tend to think of hibernation as something that only animals do to conserve energy and get through long winters without starving. Yet, a long line of research that dates back to the early days of the space program is based around ways of inducing astronauts into a form of prolonged hibernation. To make long journeys to Mars possible, for example, NASA is experimenting with a method used for therapeutic hypothermia to cool down human body processes in order to make hyper-sleep on manned space missions possible.

Given the lack of immediate plans for manned space exploration to Mars, the most immediate application of these “hibernation technologies” would be the ability to suspend the activity of certain physiological processes in order to help humans survive certain surgeries and traumatic events, such as battlefield injuries. Victims of gun shot wounds and others experiencing cardiac arrest can sometimes be saved by slowing down body processes, effectively giving the body time to heal physical processes. 

***

What all of these share is their common heritage in the world of science fiction. It’s almost impossible to watch a movie such as “Prometheus” without wondering at the latest sleep pod technology, or a movie such as “Total Recall” or “Inception” and not wonder about the future of dream management. So the next time you’re watching a science-fiction flick and stumble across a unique method of sleep, make a note of it. Thanks to remarkable advances in genetics, neuroscience and pharmaceuticals — in the future — no idea for the future of sleep may be too wild.

.

By Dominic Basulto / Source: Washington Post

 

Eight-hour sleep may be unnatural. – The idea that we must sleep in a consolidated block could be damaging.

 

 

We often worry about lying awake in the middle of the night – but it could be good for you. A growing body of evidence from both science and history suggests that the eight-hour sleep may be unnatural.

In the early 1990s, psychiatrist Thomas Wehr conducted an experiment in which a group of people were plunged into darkness for 14 hours every day for a month.

It took some time for their sleep to regulate but by the fourth week the subjects settled into a very distinct sleeping pattern. They slept first for four hours, then woke for one or two hours before falling into a second four-hour sleep.

Though sleep scientists were impressed by the study, among the general public the idea that we must sleep for eight consecutive hours persists.

In 2001, historian Roger Ekirch of Virginia Tech published a seminal paper, drawn from 16 years of research, revealing a wealth of historical evidence that humans used to sleep in two distinct chunks.

His book At day’s close: Night in Time Past, published four years later, unearths more than 500 references to a segmented sleeping pattern – in diaries, court records, medical books and literature, from Homer’s Odyssey to an anthropological account of modern tribes in Nigeria.

Much like the experience of Wehr’s subjects, these references describe a first sleep which began about two hours after dusk, followed by waking period of one or two hours and then a second sleep.

“It’s not just the number of references – it is the way they refer to it, as if it was common knowledge,” Ekirch says.

During this waking period people were quite active. They often got up, went to the toilet or smoked tobacco and some even visited neighbours. Most people stayed in bed, read, wrote and often prayed. Countless prayer manuals from the late 15th Century offered special prayers for the hours in between sleeps.

And these hours weren’t entirely solitary – people often chatted to bed-fellows or had sex.

A doctor’s manual from 16th Century France even advised couples that the best time to conceive was not at the end of a long day’s labour but “after the first sleep”, when “they have more enjoyment” and “do it better”.

Ekirch found that references to the first and second sleep started to disappear during the late 17th Century. This started among the urban upper classes in northern Europe and over the course of the next 200 years filtered down to the rest of Western society.

By the 1920s the idea of a first and second sleep had receded entirely from our social consciousness.

He attributes the initial shift to improvements in street lighting, domestic lighting and a surge in coffee houses – which were sometimes open all night. As the night became a place for legitimate activity and as that activity increased, the length of time people could dedicate to rest dwindled.

In his new book, Evening Empire, historian Craig Koslofsky puts forward an account of how this happened.

“Associations with night before the 17th Century were not good,” he says. The night was a place populated by people of disrepute – criminals, prostitutes and drunks.

“Even the wealthy, who could afford candlelight, had better things to spend their money on. There was no prestige or social value associated with staying up all night.”

That changed in the wake of the Reformation and the counter-Reformation. Protestants and Catholics became accustomed to holding secret services at night, during periods of persecution. If earlier the night had belonged to reprobates, now respectable people became accustomed to exploiting the hours of darkness.

This trend migrated to the social sphere too, but only for those who could afford to live by candlelight. With the advent of street lighting, however, socialising at night began to filter down through the classes.

In 1667, Paris became the first city in the world to light its streets, using wax candles in glass lamps. It was followed by Lille in the same year and Amsterdam two years later, where a much more efficient oil-powered lamp was developed.

London didn’t join their ranks until 1684 but by the end of the century, more than 50 of Europe’s major towns and cities were lit at night.

Night became fashionable and spending hours lying in bed was considered a waste of time.

A small city like Leipzig in central Germany employed 100 men to tend to 700 lamps

“People were becoming increasingly time-conscious and sensitive to efficiency, certainly before the 19th Century,” says Roger Ekirch. “But the industrial revolution intensified that attitude by leaps and bounds.”

Strong evidence of this shifting attitude is contained in a medical journal from 1829 which urged parents to force their children out of a pattern of first and second sleep.

“If no disease or accident there intervene, they will need no further repose than that obtained in their first sleep, which custom will have caused to terminate by itself just at the usual hour.

“And then, if they turn upon their ear to take a second nap, they will be taught to look upon it as an intemperance not at all redounding to their credit.”

The Roots of Insomnia

Today, most people seem to have adapted quite well to the eight-hour sleep, but Ekirch believes many sleeping problems may have roots in the human body’s natural preference for segmented sleep as well as the ubiquity of artificial light.

This could be the root of a condition called sleep maintenance insomnia, where people wake during the night and have trouble getting back to sleep, he suggests.

The condition first appears in literature at the end of the 19th Century, at the same time as accounts of segmented sleep disappear.

“For most of evolution we slept a certain way,” says sleep psychologist Gregg Jacobs. “Waking up during the night is part of normal human physiology.”

The idea that we must sleep in a consolidated block could be damaging, he says, if it makes people who wake up at night anxious, as this anxiety can itself prohibit sleeps and is likely to seep into waking life too.

Russell Foster, a professor of circadian [body clock] neuroscience at Oxford, shares this point of view.

“Many people wake up at night and panic,” he says. “I tell them that what they are experiencing is a throwback to the bi-modal sleep pattern.”

But the majority of doctors still fail to acknowledge that a consolidated eight-hour sleep may be unnatural.

“Over 30% of the medical problems that doctors are faced with stem directly or indirectly from sleep. But sleep has been ignored in medical training and there are very few centres where sleep is studied,” he says.

Jacobs suggests that the waking period between sleeps, when people were forced into periods of rest and relaxation, could have played an important part in the human capacity to regulate stress naturally.

In many historic accounts, Ekirch found that people used the time to meditate on their dreams.

“Today we spend less time doing those things,” says Dr Jacobs. “It’s not a coincidence that, in modern life, the number of people who report anxiety, stress, depression, alcoholism and drug abuse has gone up.”

So the next time you wake up in the middle of the night, think of your pre-industrial ancestors and relax. Lying awake could be good for you.

 

By Stephanie Hegarty/ Source: BBC

 

One of the most powerful methods for quickly shutting off your mind, and drifting off to sleep.

 

 

If you often lay awake, unable to put your mind to rest while you’re tossing and turning, you’re going to love what you’re about to read, because I’m about to share with you one of the most powerful methods for quickly shutting off your mind, and drifting off to sleep.

As you may already know, your mind must be in the Alpha brain-wave stage to fall asleep. This is the stage your mind enters you’re still conscious, but your body and begin to relax. It enables your more rampant and conscious mind to turn off as you enter the realm of sleep.

We all know how it feels… when you’re lying awake in bed trying to fall asleep, it seems like your mind is running on hyper-speed. It’s almost like you’re thinking 10 times faster than when you’re just normally awake and alert. In fact, if you experience this often, I can tell you for a fact that your mind IS working harder than it is when you’re not trying to fall asleep, and there is a very good reason for it, here’s why this happens…

The law of momentum is everywhere in life, in physics, with your body, and most importantly, with your “thoughts.” You see, your thinking is very predictable, it all works on the law of focus and momentum. Your mind is like a big ball of potential thinking energy, just waiting for you to give it a direction to think wildly into…

It awaits and responds your every command. It’s an exceptional tool. Except, most of us aren’t very experienced at “controlling” this amazing tool. In fact, a lot people aren’t even aware that they can control it! And this is where sleep problems come in.

Imagine your mind like a giant overflowing lake that’s just waiting for an outlet to pour into… Slowly, when it finds an outlet, it begins with a trickle of water. That trickle turns into a stream. Then, that stream turns into a small river. Pretty soon, the small river is a giant unstoppable waterfall. Your thoughts work in the same way when you’re “trying” to fall asleep.

For example, you’re laying in bed, frustrated, forcing your mind to not think. “I just want to get some sleep! Stop thinking. Okay, starting now… I won’t think anymore. No think… nothing. My life is nothing… If only I would finally get motivated in my job maybe I would finally create the income to start traveling instead of dealing with these problems. Problems, how can I… Ahh, I’m thinking again! Stop!”

You get even more frustrated, and repeat the process over again in a few minutes. So how do you stop it? It’s easy, you see, you can easily control your thinking, except most people aren’t aware of the tools necessary! The good news is, I’m about to give you the 3 step handbook to controlling your mind. Here are the 3 universal steps that will enable you to not only stop thinking, you’ll also be able to lower your brain-waves into the alpha brain-state, which will quickly let you enter sleep…

The 3-Step Process for Controlling Your Mind

Step 1: Awareness

The first step to changing anything is becoming aware that it’s happening, especially if it’s your mind. Pretend your mind is racing, and you finally realize that you’re thinking… Most people at this stage get extremely frustrated and “try” to force the mind into submission. It doesn’t work! Why? Because, what you focus on expands. The more frustrated you get, the more you’re focusing on frustration, so you’ll get even MORE frustration, and more thinking… on and on!

So the first step, is to simply become “aware” of the fact that you’re thinking. Nothing more. When you notice that you’re thinking, smile to yourself, and say, “I just noticed myself thinking… Interesting…”

Now notice what happens inside of you when you do this… something VERY profound. If “I” just noticed “myself” thinking, perhaps there are really two completely separate identities running your life? There is the “I” and there is the “self.”

The “I”, is the real you, the higher being, the “I” behind the mind, that runs the show, the heart, the soul, the true conscious being, the choice maker.

The “self” is the mind. If left to run the show, will run in endless circles until the edge of insanity.

The moment you do this, the moment you become “Aware” – you are no longer a slave to your mind. You have won. After you become aware… do nothing, just lay there for 3 seconds and notice how it feels to be present in who you really are, not the mind, but you, the “I” – there is a great feeling of peace behind that presence in the “I.” Why? Because when you are aware like this, you’re aware of the power of your choice making. You now have the power of choice.

Step 2: Relaxed Focus

“What you focus on expands.” Now that you have become aware of your thinking. All you have to do is “direct” your mind into a place that will bring you into a deep, deep place of relaxation. Think about it, if before your mind will relentlessly race into any direction you give it, why not pick a direction that will give you peace and restful sleep?

But, most people don’t know what that direction really is. It’s really easy. If you focus on anything your body does or feels subconsciously, you will begin to become more and more realized. For example your breathing, the feeling of the pillow on your head, the sounds of nature outside (unless you live in the city), the warmth of your body. These are all things that happen, yet your conscious mind doesn’t think about them.

As you know, “What you focus on, expands”… So what would happen if you focused on something that is happening in your “subconscious”? That’s right, your conscious thinking would diminish, and your subconscious mind would begin to take over the entire process of you falling asleep! It really is that simple, and it works every-time.

The easiest one, is your breathing. And I promise you if you just try this tonight, you will be shocked when you wake up in the morning: “Wow! It worked!”

Step 3: Repetition

As I said, the easiest one to focus on is your breathing. In the beginning, you’ll find this easier said than done. Let me walk you through it.

• Begin by taking your focus onto your breathing. Take a deep breath in. Hold it for a short while, and slowly exhale…

• Count “1″

• Breathe in again… hold it shortly, exhale slowly, and count…

• “2″

Why count? Because I guarantee you, in the very beginning, you may find it challenging to hold your focus. In fact, you’ll be surprised as you may not even make it to “5″ the first time. This is because your conscious ever-thinking mind will butt in and interrupt. You may randomly go off into a barrage of thoughts again. If this happens, and it very well may, what do you do?

Simply become aware, and begin focusing on your breathing again. Guess what happens? As you become aware, 2 or 3 times… your mind will give up. I guarantee you, beyond the shadow of a doubt, when you get to “10″ or “15″ breaths you will feel a wave of relaxation in your body. This is the silent “click” as your mind shifts from the high frequency Beta brain-waves into Alpha brain-waves. Your subconscious mind will do the rest!

by By Kacper M. Postawski – Reproduced with the permission of Mind Power News

 

Free eBook — 40 Sleep Hacks: The Geek’s Guide to Optimizing Sleep

 

Source: SleepWarrior.com

 

Here’s a great free e-book if you are suffering from any type of sleep problems (or just interested in the psychology of sleep). This book has 40 interesting tips and tricks to help you get a better night’s sleep, including everything from how and when to nap, what to eat, where to sleep, and even what time to go to sleep and wake up for an optimal rest.

Other topics include the psychology of sleep and research into lucid dreaming, meditation and reviews of various technological gadgets which may help you in your quest for a proper night’s sleep. Just right-click on the book image or on the link below to download the book to your computer.

Download this Free eBook here…

 

The next time you wake up in the middle of the night, think of your pre-industrial ancestors and relax. Lying awake could be good for you.

We often worry about lying awake in the middle of the night – but it could be good for you. A growing body of evidence from both science and history suggests that the eight-hour sleep may be unnatural.

In the early 1990s, psychiatrist Thomas Wehr conducted an experiment in which a group of people were plunged into darkness for 14 hours every day for a month.

It took some time for their sleep to regulate but by the fourth week the subjects settled into a very distinct sleeping pattern. They slept first for four hours, then woke for one or two hours before falling into a second four-hour sleep.

Though sleep scientists were impressed by the study, among the general public the idea that we must sleep for eight consecutive hours persists.

In 2001, historian Roger Ekirch of Virginia Tech published a seminal paper, drawn from 16 years of research, revealing a wealth of historical evidence that humans used to sleep in two distinct chunks.

His book At Day’s Close: Night in Times Past, published four years later, unearths more than 500 references to a segmented sleeping pattern – in diaries, court records, medical books and literature, from Homer’s Odyssey to an anthropological account of modern tribes in Nigeria.

Much like the experience of Wehr’s subjects, these references describe a first sleep which began about two hours after dusk, followed by waking period of one or two hours and then a second sleep.

“It’s not just the number of references – it is the way they refer to it, as if it was common knowledge,” Ekirch says.

During this waking period people were quite active. They often got up, went to the toilet or smoked tobacco and some even visited neighbours. Most people stayed in bed, read, wrote and often prayed. Countless prayer manuals from the late 15th Century offered special prayers for the hours in between sleeps.

And these hours weren’t entirely solitary – people often chatted to bed-fellows or had sex.

A doctor’s manual from 16th Century France even advised couples that the best time to conceive was not at the end of a long day’s labour but “after the first sleep”, when “they have more enjoyment” and “do it better”.

Ekirch found that references to the first and second sleep started to disappear during the late 17th Century. This started among the urban upper classes in northern Europe and over the course of the next 200 years filtered down to the rest of Western society.

By the 1920s the idea of a first and second sleep had receded entirely from our social consciousness.

He attributes the initial shift to improvements in street lighting, domestic lighting and a surge in coffee houses – which were sometimes open all night. As the night became a place for legitimate activity and as that activity increased, the length of time people could dedicate to rest dwindled.

In his new book, Evening’s Empire, historian Craig Koslofsky puts forward an account of how this happened.

“Associations with night before the 17th Century were not good,” he says. The night was a place populated by people of disrepute – criminals, prostitutes and drunks.

“Even the wealthy, who could afford candlelight, had better things to spend their money on. There was no prestige or social value associated with staying up all night.”

That changed in the wake of the Reformation and the counter-Reformation. Protestants and Catholics became accustomed to holding secret services at night, during periods of persecution. If earlier the night had belonged to reprobates, now respectable people became accustomed to exploiting the hours of darkness.

This trend migrated to the social sphere too, but only for those who could afford to live by candlelight. With the advent of street lighting, however, socialising at night began to filter down through the classes.

In 1667, Paris became the first city in the world to light its streets, using wax candles in glass lamps. It was followed by Lille in the same year and Amsterdam two years later, where a much more efficient oil-powered lamp was developed.

London didn’t join their ranks until 1684 but by the end of the century, more than 50 of Europe’s major towns and cities were lit at night.

Night became fashionable and spending hours lying in bed was considered a waste of time.

A small city like Leipzig in central Germany employed 100 men to tend to 700 lamps

“People were becoming increasingly time-conscious and sensitive to efficiency, certainly before the 19th Century,” says Roger Ekirch. “But the industrial revolution intensified that attitude by leaps and bounds.”

Strong evidence of this shifting attitude is contained in a medical journal from 1829 which urged parents to force their children out of a pattern of first and second sleep.

“If no disease or accident there intervene, they will need no further repose than that obtained in their first sleep, which custom will have caused to terminate by itself just at the usual hour.

“And then, if they turn upon their ear to take a second nap, they will be taught to look upon it as an intemperance not at all redounding to their credit.”

The Roots of Insomnia

Today, most people seem to have adapted quite well to the eight-hour sleep, but Ekirch believes many sleeping problems may have roots in the human body’s natural preference for segmented sleep as well as the ubiquity of artificial light.

This could be the root of a condition called sleep maintenance insomnia, where people wake during the night and have trouble getting back to sleep, he suggests.

The condition first appears in literature at the end of the 19th Century, at the same time as accounts of segmented sleep disappear.

“For most of evolution we slept a certain way,” says sleep psychologist Gregg Jacobs. “Waking up during the night is part of normal human physiology.”

The idea that we must sleep in a consolidated block could be damaging, he says, if it makes people who wake up at night anxious, as this anxiety can itself prohibit sleeps and is likely to seep into waking life too.

Russell Foster, a professor of circadian [body clock] neuroscience at Oxford, shares this point of view.

“Many people wake up at night and panic,” he says. “I tell them that what they are experiencing is a throwback to the bi-modal sleep pattern.”

But the majority of doctors still fail to acknowledge that a consolidated eight-hour sleep may be unnatural.

“Over 30% of the medical problems that doctors are faced with stem directly or indirectly from sleep. But sleep has been ignored in medical training and there are very few centres where sleep is studied,” he says.

Jacobs suggests that the waking period between sleeps, when people were forced into periods of rest and relaxation, could have played an important part in the human capacity to regulate stress naturally.

In many historic accounts, Ekirch found that people used the time to meditate on their dreams.

“Today we spend less time doing those things,” says Dr Jacobs. “It’s not a coincidence that, in modern life, the number of people who report anxiety, stress, depression, alcoholism and drug abuse has gone up.”

So the next time you wake up in the middle of the night, think of your pre-industrial ancestors and relax. Lying awake could be good for you.

By Stephanie Hegarty/ Source: BBC

 

I’m about to share with you one of the most powerful methods for quickly shutting off your mind, and drifting off to sleep.

If you often lay awake, unable to put your mind to rest while you’re tossing and turning, you’re going to love what you’re about to read, because I’m about to share with you one of the most powerful methods for quickly shutting off your mind, and drifting off to sleep.

As you may already know, your mind must be in the Alpha brain-wave stage to fall asleep. This is the stage your mind enters you’re still conscious, but your body and begin to relax. It enables your more rampant and conscious mind to turn off as you enter the realm of sleep.

We all know how it feels… when you’re lying awake in bed trying to fall asleep, it seems like your mind is running on hyper-speed. It’s almost like you’re thinking 10 times faster than when you’re just normally awake and alert. In fact, if you experience this often, I can tell you for a fact that your mind IS working harder than it is when you’re not trying to fall asleep, and there is a very good reason for it, here’s why this happens…

The law of momentum is everywhere in life, in physics, with your body, and most importantly, with your “thoughts.” You see, your thinking is very predictable, it all works on the law of focus and momentum. Your mind is like a big ball of potential thinking energy, just waiting for you to give it a direction to think wildly into…

It awaits and responds your every command. It’s an exceptional tool. Except, most of us aren’t very experienced at “controlling” this amazing tool. In fact, a lot people aren’t even aware that they can control it! And this is where sleep problems come in.

Imagine your mind like a giant overflowing lake that’s just waiting for an outlet to pour into… Slowly, when it finds an outlet, it begins with a trickle of water. That trickle turns into a stream. Then, that stream turns into a small river. Pretty soon, the small river is a giant unstoppable waterfall. Your thoughts work in the same way when you’re “trying” to fall asleep.

For example, you’re laying in bed, frustrated, forcing your mind to not think. “I just want to get some sleep! Stop thinking. Okay, starting now… I won’t think anymore. No think… nothing. My life is nothing… If only I would finally get motivated in my job maybe I would finally create the income to start traveling instead of dealing with these problems. Problems, how can I… Ahh, I’m thinking again! Stop!”

You get even more frustrated, and repeat the process over again in a few minutes. So how do you stop it? It’s easy, you see, you can easily control your thinking, except most people aren’t aware of the tools necessary! The good news is, I’m about to give you the 3 step handbook to controlling your mind. Here are the 3 universal steps that will enable you to not only stop thinking, you’ll also be able to lower your brain-waves into the alpha brain-state, which will quickly let you enter sleep…

The 3-Step Process for Controlling Your Mind

Step 1: Awareness

The first step to changing anything is becoming aware that it’s happening, especially if it’s your mind. Pretend your mind is racing, and you finally realize that you’re thinking… Most people at this stage get extremely frustrated and “try” to force the mind into submission. It doesn’t work! Why? Because, what you focus on expands. The more frustrated you get, the more you’re focusing on frustration, so you’ll get even MORE frustration, and more thinking… on and on!

So the first step, is to simply become “aware” of the fact that you’re thinking. Nothing more. When you notice that you’re thinking, smile to yourself, and say, “I just noticed myself thinking… Interesting…”

Now notice what happens inside of you when you do this… something VERY profound. If “I” just noticed “myself” thinking, perhaps there are really two completely separate identities running your life? There is the “I” and there is the “self.”

The “I”, is the real you, the higher being, the “I” behind the mind, that runs the show, the heart, the soul, the true conscious being, the choice maker.

The “self” is the mind. If left to run the show, will run in endless circles until the edge of insanity.

The moment you do this, the moment you become “Aware” – you are no longer a slave to your mind. You have won. After you become aware… do nothing, just lay there for 3 seconds and notice how it feels to be present in who you really are, not the mind, but you, the “I” – there is a great feeling of peace behind that presence in the “I.” Why? Because when you are aware like this, you’re aware of the power of your choice making. You now have the power of choice.

Step 2: Relaxed Focus

“What you focus on expands.” Now that you have become aware of your thinking. All you have to do is “direct” your mind into a place that will bring you into a deep, deep place of relaxation. Think about it, if before your mind will relentlessly race into any direction you give it, why not pick a direction that will give you peace and restful sleep?

But, most people don’t know what that direction really is. It’s really easy. If you focus on anything your body does or feels subconsciously, you will begin to become more and more realized. For example your breathing, the feeling of the pillow on your head, the sounds of nature outside (unless you live in the city), the warmth of your body. These are all things that happen, yet your conscious mind doesn’t think about them.

As you know, “What you focus on, expands”… So what would happen if you focused on something that is happening in your “subconscious”? That’s right, your conscious thinking would diminish, and your subconscious mind would begin to take over the entire process of you falling asleep! It really is that simple, and it works every-time.

The easiest one, is your breathing. And I promise you if you just try this tonight, you will be shocked when you wake up in the morning: “Wow! It worked!”

Step 3: Repetition

As I said, the easiest one to focus on is your breathing. In the beginning, you’ll find this easier said than done. Let me walk you through it.

• Begin by taking your focus onto your breathing. Take a deep breath in. Hold it for a short while, and slowly exhale…

• Count “1”

• Breathe in again… hold it shortly, exhale slowly, and count…

• “2”

Why count? Because I guarantee you, in the very beginning, you may find it challenging to hold your focus. In fact, you’ll be surprised as you may not even make it to “5” the first time. This is because your conscious ever-thinking mind will butt in and interrupt. You may randomly go off into a barrage of thoughts again. If this happens, and it very well may, what do you do?

Simply become aware, and begin focusing on your breathing again. Guess what happens? As you become aware, 2 or 3 times… your mind will give up. I guarantee you, beyond the shadow of a doubt, when you get to “10” or “15” breaths you will feel a wave of relaxation in your body. This is the silent “click” as your mind shifts from the high frequency Beta brain-waves into Alpha brain-waves. Your subconscious mind will do the rest!

by By Kacper M. Postawski – Reproduced with the permission of Mind Power News

 

I’m about to share with you one of the most powerful methods for quickly shutting off your mind, and drifting off to sleep.

 

If you often lay awake, unable to put your mind to rest while you’re tossing and turning, you’re going to love what you’re about to read, because I’m about to share with you one of the most powerful methods for quickly shutting off your mind, and drifting off to sleep.

As you may already know, your mind must be in the Alpha brain-wave stage to fall asleep. This is the stage your mind enters you’re still conscious, but your body and begin to relax. It enables your more rampant and conscious mind to turn off as you enter the realm of sleep.

We all know how it feels… when you’re lying awake in bed trying to fall asleep, it seems like your mind is running on hyper-speed. It’s almost like you’re thinking 10 times faster than when you’re just normally awake and alert. In fact, if you experience this often, I can tell you for a fact that your mind IS working harder than it is when you’re not trying to fall asleep, and there is a very good reason for it, here’s why this happens…

The law of momentum is everywhere in life, in physics, with your body, and most importantly, with your “thoughts.” You see, your thinking is very predictable, it all works on the law of focus and momentum. Your mind is like a big ball of potential thinking energy, just waiting for you to give it a direction to think wildly into…

It awaits and responds your every command. It’s an exceptional tool. Except, most of us aren’t very experienced at “controlling” this amazing tool. In fact, a lot people aren’t even aware that they can control it! And this is where sleep problems come in.

Imagine your mind like a giant overflowing lake that’s just waiting for an outlet to pour into… Slowly, when it finds an outlet, it begins with a trickle of water. That trickle turns into a stream. Then, that stream turns into a small river. Pretty soon, the small river is a giant unstoppable waterfall. Your thoughts work in the same way when you’re “trying” to fall asleep.

For example, you’re laying in bed, frustrated, forcing your mind to not think. “I just want to get some sleep! Stop thinking. Okay, starting now… I won’t think anymore. No think… nothing. My life is nothing… If only I would finally get motivated in my job maybe I would finally create the income to start traveling instead of dealing with these problems. Problems, how can I… Ahh, I’m thinking again! Stop!”

You get even more frustrated, and repeat the process over again in a few minutes. So how do you stop it? It’s easy, you see, you can easily control your thinking, except most people aren’t aware of the tools necessary! The good news is, I’m about to give you the 3 step handbook to controlling your mind. Here are the 3 universal steps that will enable you to not only stop thinking, you’ll also be able to lower your brain-waves into the alpha brain-state, which will quickly let you enter sleep…

The 3-Step Process for Controlling Your Mind

 

Step 1: Awareness

The first step to changing anything is becoming aware that it’s happening, especially if it’s your mind. Pretend your mind is racing, and you finally realize that you’re thinking… Most people at this stage get extremely frustrated and “try” to force the mind into submission. It doesn’t work! Why? Because, what you focus on expands. The more frustrated you get, the more you’re focusing on frustration, so you’ll get even MORE frustration, and more thinking… on and on!

So the first step, is to simply become “aware” of the fact that you’re thinking. Nothing more. When you notice that you’re thinking, smile to yourself, and say, “I just noticed myself thinking… Interesting…”

Now notice what happens inside of you when you do this… something VERY profound. If “I” just noticed “myself” thinking, perhaps there are really two completely separate identities running your life? There is the “I” and there is the “self.”

The “I”, is the real you, the higher being, the “I” behind the mind, that runs the show, the heart, the soul, the true conscious being, the choice maker.

The “self” is the mind. If left to run the show, will run in endless circles until the edge of insanity.

The moment you do this, the moment you become “Aware” – you are no longer a slave to your mind. You have won. After you become aware… do nothing, just lay there for 3 seconds and notice how it feels to be present in who you really are, not the mind, but you, the “I” – there is a great feeling of peace behind that presence in the “I.” Why? Because when you are aware like this, you’re aware of the power of your choice making. You now have the power of choice.

Step 2: Relaxed Focus

“What you focus on expands.” Now that you have become aware of your thinking. All you have to do is “direct” your mind into a place that will bring you into a deep, deep place of relaxation. Think about it, if before your mind will relentlessly race into any direction you give it, why not pick a direction that will give you peace and restful sleep?

But, most people don’t know what that direction really is. It’s really easy. If you focus on anything your body does or feels subconsciously, you will begin to become more and more realized. For example your breathing, the feeling of the pillow on your head, the sounds of nature outside (unless you live in the city), the warmth of your body. These are all things that happen, yet your conscious mind doesn’t think about them.

As you know, “What you focus on, expands”… So what would happen if you focused on something that is happening in your “subconscious”? That’s right, your conscious thinking would diminish, and your subconscious mind would begin to take over the entire process of you falling asleep! It really is that simple, and it works every-time.

The easiest one, is your breathing. And I promise you if you just try this tonight, you will be shocked when you wake up in the morning: “Wow! It worked!”

Step 3: Repetition

As I said, the easiest one to focus on is your breathing. In the beginning, you’ll find this easier said than done. Let me walk you through it.

• Begin by taking your focus onto your breathing. Take a deep breath in. Hold it for a short while, and slowly exhale…

• Count “1”

• Breathe in again… hold it shortly, exhale slowly, and count…

• “2”

 

Why count? Because I guarantee you, in the very beginning, you may find it challenging to hold your focus. In fact, you’ll be surprised as you may not even make it to “5” the first time. This is because your conscious ever-thinking mind will butt in and interrupt. You may randomly go off into a barrage of thoughts again. If this happens, and it very well may, what do you do?

Simply become aware, and begin focusing on your breathing again. Guess what happens? As you become aware, 2 or 3 times… your mind will give up. I guarantee you, beyond the shadow of a doubt, when you get to “10” or “15” breaths you will feel a wave of relaxation in your body. This is the silent “click” as your mind shifts from the high frequency Beta brain-waves into Alpha brain-waves. Your subconscious mind will do the rest!

by By Kacper M. Postawski – Reproduced with the permission of Mind Power News

 

 

Man Makes Art In His Sleep, Sells It For Up To Six Figures

Lee Hadwin is a 37-year-old nurse who draws and paints in his sleep.

Hadwin got started sleep drawing at the young age of 4, when he scribbled on walls and furniture and even carved into an heirloom piece of furniture. According to The Week Hadwin never studied art, and is “lousy” at drawing when awake but one of his sleep works have sold for up to six figures.

 

Experts at the Edinburgh Sleep Center can not determine what stage of sleep Hadwin is in when he draws. Hadwin admits that an evening of drinking can often trigger a night of sleep-drawing. According to Metro.co.uk sleep scientists say the behavior could have been brought on by a trauma when Hadwin lost five friends at an early age.

Read more: Man Makes Art In His Sleep, Sells It For Up To Six Figures http://womc.radio.com/2011/09/01/man-slee-draws-paints-art-lee-hadwin-video/#ixzz1XHXGfSd9

 

Your mind is like a big ball of potential thinking energy, just waiting for you to give it a direction to think.

 

If you often lay awake, unable to put your mind to rest while you’re tossing and turning, you’re going to love what you’re about to read, because I’m about to share with you one of the most powerful methods for quickly shutting off your mind, and drifting off to sleep.
As you may already know, your mind must be in the Alpha brain-wave stage to fall asleep. This is the stage your mind enters you’re still conscious, but your body and begin to relax. It enables your more rampant and conscious mind to turn off as you enter the realm of sleep.
We all know how it feels… when you’re lying awake in bed trying to fall asleep, it seems like your mind is running on hyper-speed. It’s almost like you’re thinking 10 times faster than when you’re just normally awake and alert. In fact, if you experience this often, I can tell you for a fact that your mind IS working harder than it is when you’re not trying to fall asleep, and there is a very good reason for it, here’s why this happens…

The law of momentum is everywhere in life, in physics, with your body, and most importantly, with your “thoughts.” You see, your thinking is very predictable, it all works on the law of focus and momentum. Your mind is like a big ball of potential thinking energy, just waiting for you to give it a direction to think wildly into…
It awaits and responds your every command. It’s an exceptional tool. Except, most of us aren’t very experienced at “controlling” this amazing tool. In fact, a lot people aren’t even aware that they can control it! And this is where sleep problems come in.
Imagine your mind like a giant overflowing lake that’s just waiting for an outlet to pour into… Slowly, when it finds an outlet, it begins with a trickle of water. That trickle turns into a stream. Then, that stream turns into a small river. Pretty soon, the small river is a giant unstoppable waterfall. Your thoughts work in the same way when you’re “trying” to fall asleep.
For example, you’re laying in bed, frustrated, forcing your mind to not think. “I just want to get some sleep! Stop thinking. Okay, starting now… I won’t think anymore. No think… nothing. My life is nothing… If only I would finally get motivated in my job maybe I would finally create the income to start traveling instead of dealing with these problems. Problems, how can I… Ahh, I’m thinking again! Stop!”
You get even more frustrated, and repeat the process over again in a few minutes. So how do you stop it? It’s easy, you see, you can easily control your thinking, except most people aren’t aware of the tools necessary! The good news is, I’m about to give you the 3 step handbook to controlling your mind. Here are the 3 universal steps that will enable you to not only stop thinking, you’ll also be able to lower your brain-waves into the alpha brain-state, which will quickly let you enter sleep…

The 3-Step Process for Controlling Your Mind

Step 1: Awareness

The first step to changing anything is becoming aware that it’s happening, especially if it’s your mind. Pretend your mind is racing, and you finally realize that you’re thinking… Most people at this stage get extremely frustrated and “try” to force the mind into submission. It doesn’t work! Why? Because, what you focus on expands. The more frustrated you get, the more you’re focusing on frustration, so you’ll get even MORE frustration, and more thinking… on and on!
So the first step, is to simply become “aware” of the fact that you’re thinking. Nothing more. When you notice that you’re thinking, smile to yourself, and say, “I just noticed myself thinking… Interesting…”
Now notice what happens inside of you when you do this… something VERY profound. If “I” just noticed “myself” thinking, perhaps there are really two completely separate identities running your life? There is the “I” and there is the “self.”
The “I”, is the real you, the higher being, the “I” behind the mind, that runs the show, the heart, the soul, the true conscious being, the choice maker.
The “self” is the mind. If left to run the show, will run in endless circles until the edge of insanity.
The moment you do this, the moment you become “Aware” – you are no longer a slave to your mind. You have won. After you become aware… do nothing, just lay there for 3 seconds and notice how it feels to be present in who you really are, not the mind, but you, the “I” – there is a great feeling of peace behind that presence in the “I.” Why? Because when you are aware like this, you’re aware of the power of your choice making. You now have the power of choice.
Step 2: Relaxed Focus

“What you focus on expands.” Now that you have become aware of your thinking. All you have to do is “direct” your mind into a place that will bring you into a deep, deep place of relaxation. Think about it, if before your mind will relentlessly race into any direction you give it, why not pick a direction that will give you peace and restful sleep?
But, most people don’t know what that direction really is. It’s really easy. If you focus on anything your body does or feels subconsciously, you will begin to become more and more realized. For example your breathing, the feeling of the pillow on your head, the sounds of nature outside (unless you live in the city), the warmth of your body. These are all things that happen, yet your conscious mind doesn’t think about them.
As you know, “What you focus on, expands”… So what would happen if you focused on something that is happening in your “subconscious”? That’s right, your conscious thinking would diminish, and your subconscious mind would begin to take over the entire process of you falling asleep! It really is that simple, and it works every-time.
The easiest one, is your breathing. And I promise you if you just try this tonight, you will be shocked when you wake up in the morning: “Wow! It worked!”
Step 3: Repetition

As I said, the easiest one to focus on is your breathing. In the beginning, you’ll find this easier said than done. Let me walk you through it.

• Begin by taking your focus onto your breathing. Take a deep breath in. Hold it for a short while, and slowly exhale…
•  
• Count “1”
•  
• Breathe in again… hold it shortly, exhale slowly, and count…
•  
• “2”

 

Why count? Because I guarantee you, in the very beginning, you may find it challenging to hold your focus. In fact, you’ll be surprised as you may not even make it to “5” the first time. This is because your conscious ever-thinking mind will butt in and interrupt. You may randomly go off into a barrage of thoughts again. If this happens, and it very well may, what do you do?
Simply become aware, and begin focusing on your breathing again. Guess what happens? As you become aware, 2 or 3 times… your mind will give up. I guarantee you, beyond the shadow of a doubt, when you get to “10” or “15” breaths you will feel a wave of relaxation in your body. This is the silent “click” as your mind shifts from the high frequency Beta brain-waves into Alpha brain-waves. Your subconscious mind will do the rest!

by By Kacper M. Postawski – Reproduced with the permission of Mind Power News