What to do when you can't sleep?

[Intro] Hello and welcome to my podcast, Empowered to Thrive. I'm your host, Corinne Powell. I'm an intuitive guide and I absolutely love helping people to heal from within so that they can create a life that they love, a life that they enjoy.

We weren't meant to just tolerate and get through life. We were meant to thrive and enjoy the life we're living. Of course, we will have seasons and moments that are difficult and challenging.

And the beauty of it is that we can be supported in those moments. I am here to be an aid and a guide to support you. And I hope that you will enjoy not only today's episode, but some of the past episodes if you haven't heard them yet.

On this podcast, I talk about all things inner wellness. We also sprinkle in some spirituality and parenting because as a mom to three kids, parenting is a big part of my life. I hope that you enjoy the episode and that there's at least one thing you'll pull from it and start to implement into your own life.

If you want to follow me in other ways, you can find me on Instagram, @corinne_changeradically or on Facebook Change Radically. Would you do me a favor and share this podcast with your friends if you hear an episode that resonates with you? And would you also go ahead and give me a rating and review my podcast? It would mean so much to me and I would appreciate it. I hope that you enjoy the episode and that we connect.

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Okay, so let's continue the conversation on a lifestyle of rest. And let's get to the practicals of actually being able to sleep when you want to and being able to slow down your mind and allow your body to rest because it can be really hard to do that. And it's going to be a practice.

It's going to be something you learn to do. Now, if you're really just looking for practicals on how to get better sleep, there is a podcast episode I recorded with Kylie Nelson, and I'll leave that in the show notes because I'm not sure which episode number it is, but it's very good about giving you practicals on how to improve sleep, what you can do to help yourself out in that regard. But say you're already doing the practicals of, you know, not looking at a screen right before bed or letting yourself process what happened in the day a few hours before bedtime, moving your body and exercising, all of those things will improve your sleep.

But sometimes it's when you lay down that the thoughts start racing through your mind. And I'm always going to encourage you to look and let those thoughts surface and look at them. But it's better to do that at a time when you're not sleeping.

Once you're laying down to rest, the way that I rest is by allowing my mind to basically not entertain those thoughts. If they want to come to my mind, I'm going to put them aside for a later time. I personally like to listen to music when I'm trying to rest, but I don't need to do that in order to sleep.

But sometimes it does help me to rest. And especially if I'm at home and my family's there, it kind of acts as a noisemaker to block some of the sound out. For some people, you know, they need quiet to sleep.

So but for me, whether I put on music or not, I am laying there shutting my eyes, even if I can't fall asleep, I'm going to lay there and shut my eyes because it's going to allow me to rest. And that is productive. If you can't sleep, at least allow yourself to lie there and close your eyes and rest.

Like I said, I don't allow the thoughts that want to if they want to creep into my mind, like that's not the time I'm going to entertain them. And thankfully, like I don't have a lot of struggles with my mind racing and with intrusive thoughts coming to me when I lay down. But sometimes they do, you know, so I'm processing what's happening in my days and in my weeks very regularly.

So as I talk about it with you, it could be that that's part of the reason I'm not I'm giving myself space to entertain those thoughts at other times in my day. So it's not like when the noise settles at time to sleep that all those thoughts pop up. I've let those thoughts pop up at different times.

I've actually allowed myself quietness and other and space to think at other points in my day. So I say that as it is an encouragement to you that it is necessary to entertain the thoughts at some point. But when you're going to lay down, it's not the best time.

So find pockets of time or create pockets of time. We must create what we cannot find. And you may have a busy day.

You may be in the thick of parenting or in a busy work life or in a tough time within your relationships. But we can all create pockets of time if we want to. And if you're not sure how to create the pockets of time, reach out to me.

We can figure out a way. It doesn't need to be 30 minutes. It can be 10 minutes.

It could be five minutes. If we create multiple five minutes pockets of time in a day, that'll do it. Don't strive for something huge and figure since you can't reach that, then you can't reach it at all. No, no. Let's create another another way of reaching it. 

So then I lay down. And if I wake up, whether it's because there was noise or I need to go to the bathroom or who knows what woke me up, then I allow myself to close my eyes again and drift back off to sleep. And until I need to get up, I'm going to do that consistently. Even if I get woken repeatedly, I'm going to close my eyes. I'm going to let myself drift back off to sleep. And so sometimes, you know, I'll look at the time, but if I don't need to know the time, I'm not going to do that. I'm certainly not going to look at text messages if I want to fall back asleep, because that's going to take me out of rest.

I'm not going to look at social media apps on my phone if I woke up in the middle of sleep, because that's not going to help me fall back asleep. So I'm being intentional to do what I can to let my body kind of come out of sleep and go back into sleep. And this is something, like I said, that you might have to practice, especially the lifestyle of rest, simplifying your schedule, taking things off your calendar, restructuring the way you do your days, like I mentioned in last week's episode, that is all going to be a practice you need to walk out on your own. You need to figure out, I mean, I'm here to support you. 

You know, I'm not saying on your own as in isolated without support, but you're the only one who can change your patterns. You're the only one who can create a new lifestyle for yourself. And it is doable, friend. I have done it. This is not the way I always lived.

By no means is this the way I always used to live. My family even created a full on lifestyle shift. We shifted our entire lifestyle when my husband stopped working his full time job a few years ago.

And actually didn't even go into his own, creating his own business immediately. He did that down the road, but initially he basically just did odd jobs here and there and was primarily helping out with our kids and homeschooling and helping me to get a break. Because I had come to that point where my body was physically shutting down, not able to function the way that I had always pushed it to function.

I had been go, go, go. I was a parentified child filling in the role for my mother when I was only a kid. And that just continued.

I was living codependent, as many of you know, if you've been listening to my past episodes. So I was helping other people and doing, doing, doing, but not taking good care of myself. So these are patterns that were conditioned in and were modeled to us perhaps.

And we must change our way of living if we want different results. So I hope that the few things I have said in last week's episode and today are helpful to you. But you know the drill.

And if you don't know the drill, I'm going to share it with you. Send me an email, corinne@changeradically.com. Find me on social media. You can find me @corinne_changeradically⁠ on Instagram or on Facebook, the page is ⁠Change Radically. 

Reach out to me, send me an email, book a session, do whatever you need so that you and I can talk about your specific situation. And I can come alongside and support you because where I am is possible for any of you to get to.

I am going to often go back to sharing my experiences, my healing and where I'm at, because I want you to know not only is it possible, but it's available for you. And I am here to support you in getting there. I'm rooting for you. I'm super proud of you. And let's do this together. Let's get you where you want to go.

[Ending] We've come to the end. What did you think about what you heard? I hope that there's something you pull from today's episode and start implementing it into your life. Create the change that you want to see, the change that you hear about.

You have the opportunity to transform your life. And I'm ready to link arms with you and to help and guide you to the life that you want to live. If you resonated with what you heard today and it touched you, would you share it with your friends? Would you also go ahead and rate my podcast and write a written review? It would mean so much to me.

I hope that we'll connect, whether it's for a session or just to connect, because I enjoy meeting new people. You can find me on Instagram, @corinne_changeradically⁠, or on Facebook, Change Radically. You can also always email me, corinne@changeradically.com. If you have thoughts, questions or anything that you just want to talk about, send me an email. 

I hope that you have a wonderful week. But no matter what your week is like, in the moments that are quiet, maybe it's when you pillow your head at night or when you're driving in the car or taking a walk, or maybe it's going to be in the midst of the chaos with your children or the craziness of work. I hope that you'll remember how significant you are, that there is meaning and value to your life, and that I, for one, am so glad that you're alive. 

Catch you again next week.