Soothe Your Anxiety At Night
By Understanding And Healing The Cause

Authored by William G. DeFoore, Ph.D.

Anxiety at night is a real pain. It interferes with sleep, and is totally uncomfortable. The good news is, medication is not the answer (long-term), and you have the answers right there with you.

Your anxiety is there for a reason, and you're going to find out what it is, which is the first step to solving your problem.

Overcome Anxiety At Night By Nurturing Your Inner Child

Nobody ever decides to be anxious. It is always a subconscious process, and the best doorway to the subcoscious mind is through imagery and affirmations with your inner child.

It is totally natural for children to be scared. They are vulnerable beings in an uncertain world, and so fears are going to show up in even the best of childhoods.

You may not remember any trauma from your childhood, or you might remember a lot. Either way, some of the memories, or at least the emotions, are buried in your subconscious mind...buried, but not gone.

Why Do I Have Anxiety At Night?

Of course, a lot of people have anxiety during the day, in a wide variety of situations. But our focus here is specifically on anxiety that occurs at night, when you're trying to go to sleep, or in the middle of the night when you'd really rather be sleeping.

Some people, and this may include you, only experience anxiety around bedtime, or it wakes them up and makes it hard to go back to sleep.

Let's look at some reasons this happens:

"Your brain gets busy doing housekeeping tasks while you're asleep, and the messier your "house" (mind) is, the harder your brain has to work. So, when you do your own housekeeping ahead of time, your mind will be able to rest more peacefully."

William DeFoore

At night, when you're ready to go to sleep, your tasks and distractions of the day are gone. This frees your mind up to wander in the direction of your fears and insecurities...which you've kept at bay all day by focusing on other things.

As you drift off to sleep, your conscious mind disengages, which allows your subconscious mind to take over and do its thing. The subconsious part of your mind doesn't know how to keep you calm, because that's not its job...its job is to sort through the thoughts, actions and feelings of your day, organize data and store memories.

Your coping skills and defense mechanisms are also disengaged, leaving you vulnerable to any emotions that have been running in the background.

So as you can see, it's not really that surprising that a lot of folks end up feeling anxious when they're trying to sleep.

Now you know something about why it happens, so let's figure out what you can do about it so that you can get that deep, restful sleep you want.

How Do I Get Rid Of Anxiety At Night?

That's the real question. Hopefully, the above information helps you relax a little, knowing that it's pretty normal to have a lot of mental (and sometimes emotional) activity at night, especially during sleep.

Speaking of relaxation, that is what you're going for. You can't be relaxed and anxious at the same time, so you might say that relaxation is the antidote to anxiety. So, anything that helps you relax (without harming you) is good for helping you sleep anxiety-free.

Here are some other approaches to consider:

All the usual health recommendations apply...regular (smart) exercise, no caffeine after noon, moderate alcohol use, and finish eating by 7-7:30pm.

Avoid watching upsetting TV/videos right before bed. Watching violence or intense drama before bed will cause your subconscious mind to have more housekeeping to do. A light-hearted sitcom to end your evening (if you watch TV at all...) is a good way to ease yourself into a good anxiety-free night's sleep.

Do your emotional housekeeping while you're awake, so that your mind doesn't have to work so hard while you're sleeping. I can't emphasize this enough...being emotionally at ease is key to solving your problems with anxiety at night.

Gratitude journaling has been found through indepth research to improve both sleep quality and sleep duration.

You can definitely do this. Even though you may not realize it, you had a hand in creating your anxiety in the first place, which means it's potentially under your control now.

NURTURING YOUR INNER CHILD
Affirmations & Visualizations For Self Love & Healing

Get this revised and updated version of Dr. DeFoore's classic CD/audio download program! Using a combination of visualization and affirmations, he will guide you on a journey of emotional healing that will lead to greater self esteem and self love. Don't miss this opportunity to connect with the tremendous value of your true, original nature and begin your journey to a joyful, fulfilling life.

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