Maybe you’ve spent sleepless nights wondering whether you’ll ever find the one, or just someone who makes your heart beat a little faster and with whom you can share your deepest secrets and desires, your goals and dreams and passions and meltdowns. I get it, I’ve been there. I used to have a lot of sleepless nights, and hypnosis was one of the most helpful remedies I ever found. I have a sleep meditation designed to help with that, and here are some additional tips to get you through those wee hours with firmer skin under your eyes.

1. Things are better than they seem

Whenever we’re feeling anxious and have stress chemicals in our bodies, things can seem a lot worse than they are, and once we feel more calm and relaxed, the world looks a little rosier. I have a bunch of anxiety busting techniques I teach my clients. Here is one I learned from Melissa Tiers:

Find a focal point.

Keeping your eyes on that point of focus, become aware of the space around it, above it to the ceiling, below it to the floor. Expand your peripheral vision so you’re aware of the walls on either side and almost to the very edge of your peripheral vision, as if you could reach the space behind you.

Then bring that original point back into focus.

This expands your awareness and is just very relaxing.

Here’s another one that involves progressive muscle relaxation and is used in the military to help people sleep:

Relax your entire face, including all the muscles in and around your mouth. Drop your shoulders, letting go of any tension. Take a nice deep breath in and exhale, relaxing your chest. Then relax your legs, your arms, your feet, and your hands.

Finally, imagine a relaxing scene.

2. Remember that you are loved

A lot of the work I do involves helping people feel less anxious and more secure in their relationships. Even if you’re one of those rare people who says, “I’ve never felt love in my life” — I don’t meet these folks very often but they’re out there — there was probably someone somewhere who was consistently there for you. One way to feel more secure is to put yourself into the space of when you have felt secure in the past. The anxious/ambivalent attachment system craves a feeling of consistent reliability. So imagine a person or people who have been consistent and supportive in some way. You can imagine they are there with you, and you can relax into feeling their supportive presence.

I did this once when I was camping off the grid and had an anxious moment at night. It worked extremely well.

3. Remember that you are safe

If you’re lying in bed, I assume that you’re physically safe. Sometimes people feel anxious because they don’t feel safe emotionally. If this is the case, imagine a safe comfortable place — for some people it’s in nature, for others it’s their own special sanctuary. If you already have energetic protectors or people in your life who you feel really safe around, you can bring them into the scene too, and feel that safety on a somatic/body level. Let me know if you need help with this process because it’s something I help clients with regularly.

Bonus step 4!

4. Learn self hypnosis

If you’ve tried the progressive relaxation technique and listened to my audio, you’re already well on your way. Self hypnosis is simply a way of getting yourself into a relaxed state from which you can make change — and in this case, that change would be profound relaxation that leads to sleep. I teach my clients self hypnosis to help them make positive change in their lives.

Need help with any of these? Learn more about Attachment Coaching.

Happy slumbers,

Kayli