{"id":1515,"date":"2011-04-07T08:52:00","date_gmt":"2011-04-07T15:52:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/somatics.com\/wordpress\/getting-to-sleep-and-out-of-the-big-squeeze-of-stress\/"},"modified":"2011-04-07T08:52:00","modified_gmt":"2011-04-07T15:52:00","slug":"getting-to-sleep-and-out-of-the-big-squeeze-of-stress","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.somatics.com\/wordpress\/getting-to-sleep-and-out-of-the-big-squeeze-of-stress\/","title":{"rendered":"Getting to Sleep and Out of The Big Squeeze of Stress"},"content":{"rendered":"<div style=\"clear: both; text-align: center;\">\n<b><\/b><\/div>\n<div style=\"margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;\">\n<a href=\"https:\/\/youtu.be\/RAmvUR4M_7k\" style=\"clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;\" target=\"_blank\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" border=\"0\" data-original-height=\"606\" data-original-width=\"1041\" height=\"186\" src=\"https:\/\/1.bp.blogspot.com\/-DaOJE5WLHrs\/Wk0zCvJn2OI\/AAAAAAAAkhE\/PtegRucc7XwteNd55B0u9zbvjc9epcm1ACLcBGAs\/s320\/Stop%2Bthe%2BInsomnia.jpg\" width=\"320\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<div style=\"font-weight: bold;\">\n<span style=\"font-size: large;\">This entry provides an alternative to sleeping pills.<\/span><\/div>\n<div style=\"font-weight: bold;\">\n<\/div>\n<div style=\"font-weight: bold;\">\n<span style=\"font-size: large;\">It&#8217;s for you if:<\/span><\/div>\n<p><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>you have insomnia &#8212; either chronic or occasional<\/li>\n<li>you&#8217;ve experienced the downside of taking a drug to get to sleep<\/li>\n<li>you want a natural alternative<\/li>\n<li>you&#8217;re able to get yourself to try something different<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><\/p>\n<div style=\"font-weight: bold;\">\n<strong><span style=\"font-size: large;\">Who I, the Author, Am<\/span><\/strong><\/div>\n<p>I&#8217;m a clinical practitioner of method of brain retraining used to dissolve stress and trauma.&nbsp; I developed this approach based on the principles of my field, a branch of mind-body training called, Clinical Somatic Education.&nbsp; I, myself, have used the method described, here, to get back to sleep, when I&#8217;ve awoken in the middle of the night and not been able to get back to sleep. It generally takes about ten minutes, once I&#8217;ve used it, to fall asleep. Based on its success with me (and with others), I published the,&nbsp;<i><a href=\"https:\/\/somatics.com\/page7-sleep.htm\" target=\"_blank\">Getting to Sleep<\/a>,<\/i>&nbsp;audio program<i>.<\/i><\/p>\n<div style=\"font-weight: bold;\">\n<strong><span style=\"font-size: large;\"><br \/><\/span><\/strong><\/div>\n<p><b><span style=\"font-size: large;\">Getting to Sleep and The Big Squeeze of Stress<\/span><\/b><br \/>\nAre you insomniac? Does sleep deprivation make your life seem stark or extreme? Are you over-sensitized? Are you exhausted?<\/p>\n<p>Here&#8217;s a way to exit the cycle of insomnia. Understand why it works.<\/p>\n<p><strong>WHY MOST INSOMNIA HAPPENS<\/strong><br \/>\nTwo great polarities exist in every life:&nbsp; activity and rest. Insomnia happens when we get <strong>stuck<\/strong> (stressed) in a state of emotional and physical activation.<\/p>\n<p>\nThat state of stress takes two familiar forms:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>&#8220;wired&#8221; mind<\/li>\n<li>relentless muscle fatigue<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>\n<strong>WIRED MIND<\/strong><br \/>\nThree kinds of &#8220;wired&#8221; mind keep us from relaxing into sleep:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>endless thinking<\/li>\n<li>troubled remembering<\/li>\n<li>fearful imagining<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>\nThose three ways of being mentally &#8220;wired&#8221; tie directly into muscular or physical tension. <\/p>\n<p>Being<br \/>\n &#8220;mentally wired&#8221; is today&#8217;s high-tech version of being &#8220;plain<br \/>\nold-fashioned wound up.&#8221; Being it&#8217;s the electronic age, we can talk<br \/>\nabout being &#8220;hard-wired&#8221; in certain ways and tie that idea of wiring to<br \/>\nthe brain&#8217;s control of our muscles &#8212; and I will, shortly. But what&#8217;s<br \/>\nwound up is still wound up:&nbsp; Our &#8220;idling speed&#8221; is too high and our air<br \/>\nmix (breathing) isn&#8217;t too good either. We may be driving with the brakes<br \/>\n on (resistance to life-developments), and what&#8217;s more, our steering may<br \/>\n be out of alignment (be misguided).<\/p>\n<p>All told, this<br \/>\n has nothing to do with body mechanics. It really has to do with our<br \/>\nprogramming &#8212; how we run our lives and how well we de-bug ourselves &#8212;<br \/>\nbecause, when we get bugged, sleep suffers.<\/p>\n<p>Sound<br \/>\nstrange? Don&#8217;t worry. I&#8217;m going to tell you about two natural ways of<br \/>\ndebugging ourselves, so that we no longer have &#8220;bedbugs&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>We&#8217;re<br \/>\n going to start with two general ways people get bugged, what the<br \/>\n&#8220;bugging&#8221; looks and feels like, and then how to debug ourselves. Onward.<\/p>\n<p><strong>TWO REFLEXES OF STRESS<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>People<br \/>\n get crazy in life in two basic ways, ways that correspond to two basic<br \/>\nreflexes of stress that get triggered in us, in life. One is a &#8220;fear or<br \/>\nurgency&#8221; form of stress and the other is an urgency or &#8220;control<br \/>\nfreak&#8221; form of craziness. Sometimes they happen together, and yes, each<br \/>\ncorresponds to a reflex pattern that involves muscular tension.<\/p>\n<p>The form of stress associated with urgency, or the drive (and felt necessity) to get things (often, too much) done, triggers the muscles in the back of the body. They get tight and they stay tight as long we we are uptight.<\/p>\n<p>There&#8217;s a healthy form of this reflex, which I am about to describe, and an unhealthy form, which I am also about to describe.<\/p>\n<p>In<br \/>\n the healthy state, this reflex starts our movement from rest or a position of repose into activity.&nbsp; It involves the muscles that stiffen the<br \/>\n flexible spine in preparation for moving from repose into the upright position of walking or other activities, when<br \/>\nspinal support is needed. It tightens the shoulders and muscles in other places. There&#8217;s a<br \/>\nname for this reflex: the Landau reaction. You can look it up. It starts<br \/>\n up as we first learn to crawl and continues at-the-ready throughout a<br \/>\nlifetime.<\/p>\n<p>The other state of stress, associated<br \/>\nwith self protection and fear, triggers a physical muscular reflex that<br \/>\ntightens the muscles in the front of the body. It causes shallow<br \/>\nbreathing, speeds up the heart rate, and makes us want to bring our head<br \/>\n down (cower) in an urge to curl up into a ball (fetal position). <\/p>\n<p>This<br \/>\n muscular action gets triggered every time we feel afraid or anxious and<br \/>\n stays triggered as long as we&#8217;re afraid or anxious. (It&#8217;s also been<br \/>\nidentified as an underlying cause of heart attacks.) There&#8217;s a name for<br \/>\nthis reflex: the Startle reflex. You may have seen video of people in<br \/>\nthis state: soldiers running in a crouched state, under fire. They have<br \/>\nbeen trained to run that way because it&#8217;s natural self-protection &#8212; as<br \/>\nnatural as Startle Reflex. In fact, they&#8217;re helped to run that way <em>by<\/em><br \/>\n Startle Reflex. Soldiers are afraid; you&#8217;d better believe it. They&#8217;ve<br \/>\njust been trained to override their fear &#8212; the way so many of us have<br \/>\nlearned to override our feelings.<\/p>\n<p>About soldiers, what do you think PTSD (Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder) is? It&#8217;s habituated, reflexive states-of-craziness anchored in troubled remembering, fearful imagining, and compulsive thinking.<\/p>\n<p>The state of overactive, out of control muscles goes exactly along with troubled<br \/>\nremembering, fearful imagining, and compulsive thinking &#8212; which all<br \/>\ntrigger the &#8220;ready responses&#8221; we&#8217;ve learned, ostensibly to handle the<br \/>\nsituations about which we are feeling urgency or fear, but which simply<br \/>\nmake us crazy and make sleep impossible. Are you an exception? Is<br \/>\ninsomnia not like that, for you? OK. I&#8217;ve got something for you, at the<br \/>\nend:&nbsp; The Gold Key Release. It&#8217;s for the exceptions to the rule. You&#8217;ll<br \/>\nlike it.<\/p>\n<p>When you&#8217;re &#8220;crazy awake&#8221; at night, when<br \/>\nno position in bed makes a difference &#8212; and no bed makes a difference<br \/>\n&#8212; have you discovered it&#8217;s next to impossible to stop thoughts,<br \/>\nmemories and imaginings?&nbsp; Efforts to stop them reinforce them, don&#8217;t<br \/>\nthey? They leak back in. Even if you distract yourself with reading or<br \/>\ncounting sheep, do you end up thinking about what you&#8217;ve just read &#8212; or<br \/>\nabout sheep?<\/p>\n<p>I&#8217;m here to suggest to you that there is a<br \/>\n secret, &#8220;back-door&#8221; key to get thoughts, memories and imaginings &#8212; and<br \/>\n sheep &#8212; to stop taking over your mind. There&#8217;s way to release the<br \/>\nmuscular tensions that go along with them. Those muscular tensions have a<br \/>\n certain feeling that goes exactly along with your compulsive thinking,<br \/>\nmemory replays, and fearful imaginings; they <u>are<\/u> the feelings of<br \/>\nyour compulsive thinking, memory replays, and fearful imaginings. One<br \/>\ntriggers the other and back again, and around and around, we go.<\/p>\n<p>You need a way to release to get the relief. There&#8217;s a &#8220;back door&#8221; way. It works. No <span data-scayt-lang=\"en_US\" data-scayt-word=\"kiddin\">kiddin<\/span>&#8216;.<\/p>\n<p>I<br \/>\n will tell you right away that stretching is not the &#8220;back-door&#8221; key to<br \/>\nrelease. Neither are breathing exercises or yoga (neither of which go<br \/>\ndeeply enough for to reach and reprogram chronic insomnia). None of<br \/>\nthose approaches reaches the control level where the reflexes of stress,<br \/>\n Startle reflex or Landau reaction, live, which is exactly where they<br \/>\nMUST reach, for you to get to sleep. Certain kinds of meditation might<br \/>\nhelp &#8212; but you&#8217;ve got to be far enough along in your mindfulness<br \/>\npractice for it to work. Are you? (You are? Why are you reading this?)<\/p>\n<p>Neither, by the way, do &#8220;sleep number&#8221; or &#8220;<span data-scayt-lang=\"en_US\" data-scayt-word=\"Tempur-Pedic\">Tempur-Pedic<\/span><br \/>\n mattresses&#8221; change your stress level, and neither do &#8220;sleep-aid&#8221; drugs.<br \/>\n How can you reprogram your insomnia with things that have nothing to do<br \/>\n with your body&#8217;s programming?<\/p>\n<p><strong>WHAT WORKS<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>What<br \/>\n you need to do is get control of yourself. No, not that way.&nbsp; I have<br \/>\nsomething else, in mind: a way to release the muscular reflexes of<br \/>\nstress that trigger your insomnia, from inside. That means, learn to<br \/>\nrelax, to relax by <em><u>unlearning<\/u><\/em> keeping yourself wound &#8212;<br \/>\nor wired &#8212; up. You learn to relax the way you might relax a clenched<br \/>\nfist. You don&#8217;t stretch a clenched fist open; you relax it by natural,<br \/>\ninternal control. That&#8217;s the direction you go, to unwind.<\/p>\n<p>Only, you seem to have lost your way. So, you need to re-learn<br \/>\nthat kind of natural internal control that ordinarily would function,<br \/>\nnaturally. The way to that kind of control is related, actually, to<br \/>\nyawning. It has a strange name: it&#8217;s called pandiculation.<\/p>\n<p><strong>PANDICULATION: LIONS DO IT, TIGERS DO IT, BEARS DO IT, AND SO DO WE<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Pandiculation is an movement or action pattern that every<br \/>\nanimal with a backbone does, generally when arising from rest and upon<br \/>\nfinishing an activity &#8212; and also at random throughout the day. Cats do<br \/>\nit, dogs do it, even lumbering hogs do it. They do it, naturally, but<br \/>\nfor certain reasons related to &#8220;way of life&#8221;, humans have to be re-taught to do it. Pandiculation feels good. It&#8217;s good for you.<\/p>\n<p>Here&#8217;s a five minute video explaining pandiculation.<\/p>\n<div align=\"center\">\n<a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=IUHwNbR7qYY\" style=\"margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;\" target=\"_blank\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" border=\"0\" data-original-height=\"897\" data-original-width=\"1600\" height=\"179\" src=\"https:\/\/4.bp.blogspot.com\/-ma-lwRlidWY\/Wj1PMLDgkNI\/AAAAAAAAaqo\/nNPb93XW_Usoqa4Gsk46irwurL8GtybHwCLcBGAs\/s320\/the%2Bword.jpg\" width=\"320\" \/><\/a><\/div>\n<p>\nBut instead of <span data-scayt-lang=\"en_US\" data-scayt-word=\"pandiculating\">pandiculating<\/span>,<br \/>\n at work, to regulate their stress (which they could do, in minutes, in an office<br \/>\nchair or at a company gym or even on the carpet in a private office), people go for coffee to get &#8220;wired&#8221;. Then,<br \/>\nat home, they go for a &#8220;drink&#8221; or something related &#8212; or for a run, or<br \/>\nwatch video &#8212; to get <u>un<\/u>wired &#8212; but they don&#8217;t do the very thing that would actually get them unwind: <span data-scayt-lang=\"en_US\" data-scayt-word=\"pandiculate\">pandiculate<\/span>. So, they accumulate unmanageable stress.<\/p>\n<p>Pandiculation<br \/>\n is good to do after long periods in a particular position (such as when<br \/>\n working on the computer or during any repetitive motion activity). What<br \/>\n pandiculation does is refresh and relax us. What&#8217;s not to like?<\/p>\n<p><strong>HOW TO <span data-scayt-lang=\"en_US\" data-scayt-word=\"PANDICULATE\">PANDICULATE<\/span>, IN GENERAL<br \/>Generally we <span data-scayt-lang=\"en_US\" data-scayt-word=\"pandiculate\">pandiculate<\/span>, in private &#8230;<\/strong><br \/>\n&#8230; but you can <span data-scayt-lang=\"en_US\" data-scayt-word=\"pandiculate\">pandiculate<\/span> in public and get away with it.<\/p>\n<p>Pandiculation<br \/>\n always starts with a firm tightening of ourselves into a particular<br \/>\nmovement pattern or shape, followed by a leisurely release and movement<br \/>\ninto activity. You&#8217;ve seen it; you&#8217;ve done it. When it comes to yawning,<br \/>\n that pattern involves your face, jaws and neck, and your breathing.<br \/>\nWhat people call the morning stretch <span data-scayt-lang=\"en_US\" data-scayt-word=\"iosn't\">isn&#8217;t<\/span><br \/>\n a stretch, at all. The typical morning stretch involves yawning and the<br \/>\n muscles of the back, shoulders, arms, the hands, the buttocks, and<br \/>\nother places. It has a particular feel &#8212; a <strong>very different<\/strong> feel from that of athletic stretching: It feels <strong>good<\/strong>. It isn&#8217;t a stretch, at all. It&#8217;s a pandiculation.<\/p>\n<p>Each way of <span data-scayt-lang=\"en_US\" data-scayt-word=\"pandiculating\">pandiculating<\/span><br \/>\n works on a particular set of muscular tensions and feelings. Say,<br \/>\nyou&#8217;re stuck in urgency; it&#8217;s your back muscles and shoulders that are<br \/>\ntight. If stuck in anxiety, it&#8217;s the front and central muscles of your<br \/>\ntrunk. A particular pandiculation reaches particular muscular tensions.<br \/>\nFree the muscular tensions, and your nervous system &#8212; your mind &#8212;<br \/>\nquiets down. Emotions quiet down. Thinking quiets down. You start to<br \/>\ndrift. You forget yourself without noticing. The result: sleep.<\/p>\n<p>Soon,<br \/>\n I&#8217;m going to give you a link to a recorded somatic education program<br \/>\nthat uses pandiculation for sleep. You can use it just before going to<br \/>\nbed or if you wake up in the middle of the night. I&#8217;ll also give you a<br \/>\nway to calm the emotions down, directly, because sometimes you need both<br \/>\n approaches, if you&#8217;ve gotten particularly wired-up and stressed out.<\/p>\n<p>Before I do, since I like people to have an understanding of my advice before they take it, I&#8217;m going to talk about why those two reflexes go wrong.<\/p>\n<p><strong>HOW WE GO STRESS-CRAZY<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Two words explain it all: habit formation.<\/p>\n<p>Habits<br \/>\n form when we repeat actions frequently or sustain them at some level of<br \/>\n intensity for periods of time. Then, they start to run on automatic,<br \/>\noutside our control &#8212; including at night.<\/p>\n<p><strong>When The Landau Reaction Hijacks Our Lives<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>In<br \/>\n the healthy state, Landau Reaction comes and goes according to<br \/>\ncircumstances.&nbsp; The more you need a heightened state of activity or<br \/>\nalertness, the more intensely Landau Reaction gets activated &#8212; and the<br \/>\ntighter we get.&nbsp; Our back arches, our shoulders pull back, our chest<br \/>\nlifts, and our buttocks and hamstrings get tight &#8212; we get a &#8220;swayback&#8221;,<br \/>\n where the &#8220;sway&#8221; is forward, over the fronts of our feet (giving rise<br \/>\nto the expression, &#8220;being on our toes&#8221;).&nbsp; When circumstances pass, and<br \/>\nthe need for heightened alertness passes, we return to a rest condition<br \/>\n&#8212; more or less &#8212; and the muscular side of Landau Reaction eases.&nbsp; We<br \/>\nrelax.<\/p>\n<p>However, the more time we spend in Landau<br \/>\nReaction &#8212; in traffic, at work, in our busy lives, in competitive<br \/>\nactivities &#8212; the &#8220;better&#8221; we get at going into Landau Reaction.&nbsp; Our<br \/>\nbrain, which provides and regulates the Landau Reaction, learns to be<br \/>\nmore and more ready to go <em>into<\/em> Landau Reaction.&nbsp; Eventually (and commonly) we <em>stay<\/em><br \/>\n stressed, in Landau Reaction, in perpetual readiness for action &#8212; and<br \/>\nthis state of stress in Landau Reaction is so common that, in<br \/>\ncontemporary culture, people consider the posture of Landau reaction to<br \/>\nbe, <em>good posture<\/em> or somehow attractive (e.g., &#8220;buns of steel&#8221;) It&#8217;s <em>not <\/em>good posture, it&#8217;s not attractive, it&#8217;s not even a sign of fitness (to those who understand what&#8217;s going on). It&#8217;s a state of <strong><em>maladjustment<\/em><\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p>The<br \/>\n two states &#8212; being in stress and in a state of rest &#8212; oppose each<br \/>\nother.&nbsp; Where sleep is concerned, the reflexes of stress <em>win<\/em> over sleepiness.&nbsp; Uncontrollable thinking, fearful imagining, troubled remembering, muscular tightness, and even soreness and stiffness (did you get an expensive &#8220;Sleep Number&#8221; or &#8220;<span data-scayt-lang=\"en_US\" data-scayt-word=\"Tempurpedic\">Tempurpedic<\/span>&#8221; bed?) become our nighttime experience of insomnia.<\/p>\n<p>Now,<br \/>\n it&#8217;s also true that our circumstances in life may provoke anxiety in us<br \/>\n &#8212; and anxiety shows up as Startle Reflex &#8212; and it has its place in<br \/>\nlife, and also its unhealthy form.<\/p>\n<p><strong>When Startle Reflex Clamps Down<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Startle<br \/>\n Reflex, by tightening the muscles of our abdomen, prevents deep,<br \/>\ndiaphragmatic breathing, reduces our overall mobility, and by pulling us<br \/>\n into a curled-forward shape, causes us to shrink ourselves to less than<br \/>\n our full stature.&nbsp; It&#8217;s the shape of &#8220;hiding&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>In the healthy state, Startle Reflex comes and goes according to circumstances without lasting effect.<\/p>\n<p>However, unhealthy <span data-scayt-lang=\"en_US\" data-scayt-word=\"stuckness\">stuckness<\/span> in Startle Reflex forms the same way as <span data-scayt-lang=\"en_US\" data-scayt-word=\"stuckness\">stuckness<\/span><br \/>\n in Landau Reaction &#8212; by repetition and sustained intensity. It can get<br \/>\n triggered by the news, by a stressful relationship, or by money worries<br \/>\n &#8212; fill in the answer from your own life.<\/p>\n<p>In our<br \/>\ncurrent age, we can&#8217;t get by in life by being curled up and withdrawn;<br \/>\nwe have to function, to be ready, to be active. It&#8217;s the imbalance of<br \/>\nour times, where stress and activity dominate leisure and rest. Stress<br \/>\neven invades our leisure time and vacations &#8212; and the relief of leisure<br \/>\n and vacation ends all too quickly when we get back to our day-to-day<br \/>\nlives.<\/p>\n<p>And so, Landau Reaction (arousal state) combines<br \/>\n with Startle reflex (fear and withdrawal) in a kind of &#8220;Big Squeeze&#8221;,<br \/>\nwith one dominating the other, but both happening.<\/p>\n<p>The<br \/>\nresult:&nbsp; &#8220;stress&#8221; &#8212; a combination of readiness for action and anxiety<br \/>\n&#8212; the feeling of being trapped in life &#8212; The Big Squeeze.&nbsp; Sound<br \/>\nfamiliar?<\/p>\n<p>And so, insomnia, chronic thinking, fearful<br \/>\nimaginings and troubled memories, muscular tightness, and even soreness<br \/>\nand stiffness become our nighttime experience.<\/p>\n<p><span data-scayt-lang=\"en_US\" data-scayt-word=\"Ambien\">Ambien<\/span>, <span data-scayt-lang=\"en_US\" data-scayt-word=\"Lunesta\">Lunesta<\/span>,<br \/>\n a nighttime cocktail, or other sleep aids do nothing to quiet these<br \/>\nreflexes of stress. They just dull us and interfere with our necessary<br \/>\ndream cycle.<\/p>\n<p>What to do?&nbsp; How do we deactivate these<br \/>\nreflexes of stress, so we can sleep?&nbsp; How do we decondition ourselves<br \/>\nfrom stress, so we can rest?<\/p>\n<p>Ah!&nbsp; The Essential Question!<\/p>\n<p><strong>Getting Out of The Big Squeeze<\/strong>&nbsp;<strong>So We Can Sleep<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Let&#8217;s summarize, so our answer can be concise.<\/p>\n<p>The<br \/>\n reflexes of stress are mind-brain-body states that get stuck,<br \/>\n&#8220;on&#8221;.&nbsp;Being stuck &#8220;on&#8221; is a learned state, running &#8220;on automatic&#8221;.&nbsp; The<br \/>\nword, &#8220;learned&#8221;, is key.&nbsp; We learn our way into those states (&#8220;taught&#8221;,<br \/>\nby life); we can learn our way out of those states.<\/p>\n<p>By<br \/>\nnow, you may be feeling mystified.&nbsp; What kind of learning can teach us<br \/>\nto disarm reflexes of stress running &#8220;on automatic&#8221;? Not one limited to<br \/>\nthe mind; that&#8217;s for sure.<\/p>\n<p>Here&#8217;s the answer:<\/p>\n<p>We<br \/>\n shift the tensions of stress from &#8220;running on automatic&#8221; to &#8220;voluntary&#8221;<br \/>\n &#8212; and then turn them off.&nbsp; When something is &#8220;voluntary&#8221; it happens<br \/>\nonly when you decide to do it &#8212; and doesn&#8217;t happen <u>unless<\/u> you<br \/>\ndecide to do it. (By the way, that also means that our stressful<br \/>\nresponses are voluntary, if habitual. They may not seem that way because<br \/>\n they happen so quickly, but we never get stressed about something we<br \/>\ndon&#8217;t care about. The difference I&#8217;m talking about here is that we can<br \/>\nlearn to voluntarily relax ways in which we&#8217;ve become habitually tense.)<\/p>\n<p>How do we get from &#8220;automatic&#8221; to &#8220;voluntary&#8221;?&nbsp; <em>By cultivating &#8220;voluntary&#8221; in a unexpected way that, ordinarily, no one would think to do .<\/em><\/p>\n<p><strong>THE BACK-DOOR KEY <\/strong><br \/>\nThis<br \/>\n &#8220;back\u2013door key&#8221; is an entirely new way of thinking about and<br \/>\napproaching a situation &#8212; given our culture of &#8220;fighting&#8221; everything &#8212;<br \/>\n &#8220;Fight Breast Cancer&#8221;, &#8220;Fight Drug Abuse&#8221;, &#8220;Fight Terrorism&#8221;, &#8220;Fight<br \/>\nDomestic Violence&#8221; (!) . . . etc., etc.&nbsp; Instead, of fighting, we <u>cultivate<\/u><br \/>\n voluntary control of what we would otherwise fight; we get into it<br \/>\n(like a hand in a glove) and control it from within. Unexpected? Yes.<br \/>\nEffective? Yes, very.<\/p>\n<p>This approach works for sleep<br \/>\n(and for many other stress-related disorders, such as headaches, various<br \/>\n kinds of physical injuries and certain common breathing disorders).&nbsp; We<br \/>\n cultivate voluntary control over Landau Reaction and Startle Reflex so<br \/>\nthat, when we rest,&nbsp;<em><u>we rest<\/u><\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>When we<br \/>\ndo, a very interesting thing happens:&nbsp; our voluntary control takes over<br \/>\nfrom (overcomes and replaces) automatic habits.&nbsp;We come to rest.<\/p>\n<p>Then, when we stop doing something voluntarily, it stops happening as a constant activation habit; it happens<em> only when needed.<\/em>&nbsp;<br \/>\n With reduction of excessive stress, instead of stress dominating our<br \/>\nlives, we have more &#8220;cushion&#8221;, more tolerance for it, more grace, in<br \/>\nlife.&nbsp; Even in stressful circumstances, our stress level is less.&nbsp; Sleep<br \/>\n returns &#8212; and reduces our stress level further.<\/p>\n<p>Since<br \/>\n few people are familiar with these reflexes of stress and ways of<br \/>\nquieting them, it&#8217;s helpful to have guidance for assuming control of<br \/>\nthem.<\/p>\n<p>I have created such guidance, a&nbsp;<strong><a data-cke-saved-href=\"http:\/\/somatics.com\/page7-sleep.htm\" href=\"http:\/\/somatics.com\/page7-sleep.htm\">program<\/a><\/strong>&nbsp;to<br \/>\n quiet these reflexes of stress.&nbsp;You can get a free taste of it. Use it<br \/>\nconsistently for a week or two, upon retiring for sleep, and then (once<br \/>\nyou know the steps), as needed &#8212; such as on occasions when you awaken<br \/>\nin the middle of the night or when you are experiencing the effects of<br \/>\nheightened stress.<\/p>\n<p>Along with that, you may need a way<br \/>\nto calm automatic emotional reactions. I&#8217;ve provided a way. It&#8217;s called,<br \/>\n The Gold Key Release. It&#8217;s a way to free your mind from the grip of<br \/>\nconcerns in an entirely new way that also opens the way for inspired<br \/>\naction to handle the situation. There&#8217;s a world of difference between<br \/>\nsuppressing something and releasing it. Read more about The Gold Key<br \/>\nRelease and test it, yourself. Click the gold key, below. It&#8217;s VERY<br \/>\neffective and it&#8217;s free.<\/p>\n<div style=\"text-align: center;\">\n<a data-cke-saved-href=\"http:\/\/lawrencegoldsomatics.blogspot.com\/2013\/03\/somatology-gold-key-release-for.html\" href=\"http:\/\/lawrencegoldsomatics.blogspot.com\/2013\/03\/somatology-gold-key-release-for.html\"><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"The Gold Key\" data-cke-saved-src=\"http:\/\/somatics.com\/images\/The%20Gold%20Key%20redc.jpg\" src=\"https:\/\/somatics.com\/images\/The%20Gold%20Key%20redc.jpg\" style=\"height: 176px; width: 250px;\" \/><\/a><\/div>\n<p>\nYou don&#8217;t have to go it, alone. You can get help with The Gold Key Release, too.<\/p>\n<p>Sleep-inducing<br \/>\n drugs have side effects for some people &#8212; daytime drowsiness,<br \/>\nhallucinations, mood changes, suicidal thoughts; the drug companies say<br \/>\nso in their advertising.&nbsp; <a data-cke-saved-href=\"http:\/\/somatics.com\/page7-sleep.htm\" href=\"http:\/\/somatics.com\/page7-sleep.htm\"><strong>This approach<\/strong><\/a> <em>also<\/em> has side-effects &#8212; good ones: increased flexibility, decrease of back pain, and heightened physical energy.<\/p>\n<p><strong>WHAT TO DO<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Now,<br \/>\n you have a sense of the causes of insomnia and at least an idea of what<br \/>\n to do about them. What remains is to test my words. Take action to free<br \/>\n yourself from insomnia. Break the stress-insomnia cycle so that you can<br \/>\n actually sleep.<\/p>\n<p>The &#8216;proof&#8217; of the &#8216;pudding&#8217; is in the &#8216;eating&#8217;.&nbsp;&nbsp;<strong><a data-cke-saved-href=\"http:\/\/somatics.com\/page7-sleep.htm\" href=\"http:\/\/somatics.com\/page7-sleep.htm\">Test&nbsp;this approach<\/a>,<\/strong>&nbsp;for yourself.&nbsp; Get out of The Big Squeeze and get to sleep. <em>&#8220;Don&#8217;t let the sound of your own wheels drive you crazy.&#8221;<\/em><\/p>\n<div style=\"clear: both; text-align: center;\">\n<\/div>\n<p>\n<strong>RELATED ARTICLES&nbsp;<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a data-cke-saved-href=\"http:\/\/somatics.com\/headaches.htm\" href=\"http:\/\/somatics.com\/headaches.htm\">Headache Relief by New Somatic Techniques<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<p>Presently a resident of Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA, <strong>Lawrence Gold<\/strong> has been practicing as a clinical somatic educator since 1990, with two years of experience on staff at the <a data-cke-saved-href=\"http:\/\/www.somatics.com\/pdf\/talty.pdf\" href=\"http:\/\/www.somatics.com\/pdf\/talty.pdf\"><span data-scayt-lang=\"en_US\" data-scayt-word=\"Watsonville\">Watsonville<\/span> Community Hospital Wellness and Rehabilitation Center<\/a>,<br \/>\n in California. Clients have come to him from as far away as Mumbai,<br \/>\nIndia and Brisbane, Australia. He works with clients in person and live<br \/>\nonline. He likes to bring a sense of humor to telling the truth. You may have noticed. See more on his background, <a data-cke-saved-href=\"http:\/\/somatics.com\/gold.htm\" href=\"http:\/\/somatics.com\/gold.htm\">here<\/a>.<\/div>\n<div style=\"margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;\">\n<\/div>\n<div style=\"clear: both; text-align: center;\">\n<\/div>\n<div align=\"center\" style=\"margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in; text-align: center;\">\n<\/div>\n<p><b><span style=\"font-size: x-small;\">OTHER ARTICLES&nbsp;<\/span><\/b> <\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/somatics.com\/headaches.htm\">Headache Relief by New Somatic Techniques<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/somatics.com\/page4.htm\">for people solving a health problem<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/somatics.com\/page5.htm\">for allied health professionals<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>\n<b><span style=\"font-size: x-small;\">OTHER PROGRAMS FOR STRESS-RELATED DISORDERS<\/span><\/b><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/somatics.com\/page7-back_pain.htm\">Quick Help for Back Pain<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/somatics.com\/page7-TMJ.htm\">Five Movement Exercises to End TMJ Syndrome in About Two Weeks<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<div style=\"text-align: center;\">\n<\/div>\n<div style=\"text-align: center;\">\ncopyright 2015 Lawrence Gold<\/div>\n<div style=\"text-align: center;\">\n<b>http:\/\/tinyurl.com\/Get-To-Sleep-Somatics<\/b><\/div>\n<p><\/p>\n<div>\n<\/div>\n<p><\/p>\n<div>\n<\/div>\n<p><\/p>\n<div>\n<\/div>\n<p><\/p>\n<div>\n<\/div>\n<div>Add your comment &#8212; what you would like to ask or tell.<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>This entry provides an alternative to sleeping pills. It&#8217;s for you if: you have insomnia &#8212; either chronic or occasional you&#8217;ve experienced the downside of taking a drug to get to sleep you want a natural alternative you&#8217;re able to get yourself to try something different Who I, the Author, Am I&#8217;m a clinical practitioner &hellip; <\/p>\n<p class=\"link-more\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.somatics.com\/wordpress\/getting-to-sleep-and-out-of-the-big-squeeze-of-stress\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Getting to Sleep and Out of The Big Squeeze of Stress&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":418,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[947,942,941,943,946,945,944],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1515","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-best-natural-cure-for-insomnia","category-cures-for-insomnia","category-cures-for-insomnia-home-remedies","category-holistic-cures-for-insomnia","category-insomnia-how-to-cure","category-sleep-insomnia-cure","category-what-to-do-if-you-can-t-sleep"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.somatics.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1515","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.somatics.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.somatics.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.somatics.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/418"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.somatics.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1515"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.somatics.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1515\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.somatics.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1515"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.somatics.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1515"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.somatics.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1515"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}