Not good at sleeping?

I wake up often during night.

Sometimes, I fail to sleep and stay up almost all nights.

 

I recently started learning a healing technique, and I asked my healing teacher about it.

He said to me

“You are not good at sleeping.  What made you become like that?”

 

 

That was a big surprise for me

because I never thought about my difficulty sleeping

as “I’m not good at sleeping”.

 

 

 

Because he asked me that question, I went back to my childhood memory to see

if there was any incident that made me not good at sleeping.

 

 

Then I remembered when I was younger, I tried to stay up as late as possible.

It felt like I was missing out something if I went to bed early.

 

 

I questioned my thought “I don’t want to go to bed early.”

The situation was I was in high school,

I wanted my parents to go to bed early so that I could play a video game.

 

 

How did I react when I was believing “I don’t want to go to bed early”?

In answering to that question, I realized that I was looking for a way to

retrieve my power.

 

 

When my parents were up,

I could not do anything I wanted to do.

However, once they were in bed,

it was my free time!  I could do anything!!

 

 

I decided to stay up late to feel powerful.

 

 

Now after this inquiry, I know that I don’t have to stay up late to feel powerful.

What I wanted was to feel powerful even when my parents are up.

How can I say No to them when I want to say no.

Being able to do what I want to do when everyone is asleep is not healthy.

 

 

Then I realized it was not about sleeping.

It was about respecting myself.

When people tell me to do something, can I take sometime and consider if I want to do it or not?

 

 

It is like answering to a question “How are you?”

After doing The Work, I started asking myself “how am I?” when people ask me the question.

Just like that.

When people tell me to do something, I will take time to ask myself

“Do I want to do it?”

 

 

That is my living turn around.

I think I will have a better relationship with sleeping from now on.

 

Aki

 

 

For more information about The Work, visit TheWork.com

You might want to read the Introduction of The Work of Byron Katie by Stephen Mitchell.