By dreading the night, it's the night that dreads you.
Chronic insomnia? Break performance anxiety and recondition your brain for sleep with a progressive breathing routine.
Problem description:
It only takes two or three consecutive difficulties falling asleep for the question to arise: "Will I be able to fall asleep tonight?" You already imagine your chaotic state the next day. This fear of not sleeping is self-fulfilling and can lead to repeated insomnia. The truth is that your body has not forgotten how to fall asleep, but simply believing that you won't manage tonight conditions you and prevents you from finding sleep.
Fear is not just a psychological phenomenon. Fear and stress activate what is called the state of alertness, a physiological mechanism characterized by hyperactivation of the autonomic nervous system. Neurotransmitters like noradrenaline are released; they help stimulate the wakefulness center and keep you awake. In prehistoric times, this physiological mechanism would have prevented you from falling asleep in a hostile environment and being attacked by a bear, but today it prevents you from sleeping even though the danger is not real.
When you become aware of this anxiety and still do not sleep, you stress even more, which only reinforces the phenomenon; it is a true vicious circle. You only fall asleep when you have given up all hope of falling asleep, and that is often far too late!
Objectives:
1. Free yourself from the goal of falling asleep which creates what is called performance anxiety (the fear of failure: in this case, not being able to fall asleep). You have probably noticed that sleep only comes when you give up the struggle.
2. Break the vicious cycle of insomnia by shifting you from a state of alertness to a state of rest.
3. Regain confidence in yourself, so that you become aware that your body always knows how to fall asleep.
How Dodow helps you:
By doing the exercise for 20 minutes, your only goal will be to breathe in rhythm with the light, thus you will stop struggling internally to sleep and free yourself from the performance anxiety that prevents you from falling asleep. In psychology, this phenomenon is called paradoxical intention.
By breathing long enough at Dodow's rhythm (6 breaths per minute), you stimulate the baroreflex, a small physiological mechanism that restores the balance of the autonomic nervous system and quickly brings you to a state of rest, the same state you are in during digestion: slightly drowsy.
Synchronizing your breathing with a light that pulses at a slow and steady rhythm has a hypnotic effect (the phenomenon is similar to watching a pendulum). Thus, after a few minutes you are able to let go and fall asleep.
You will regain confidence in yourself after a few weeks and will probably no longer need the 20-minute mode. You can then switch to the 8-minute mode and, with a bit of luck, after a few months you may be able to do without Dodow!
Discover the others
Types of insomnia:
• Stress
• Thoughts racing in your head
• Worries
