ELI5: Why is it impossible to force ourselves to fall asleep, and it’s only when we DON’T try to sleep that we end up slipping into it?
ELI5: Why is it impossible to force ourselves to fall asleep, and it’s only when we DON’T try to sleep that we end up slipping into it?
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Because ‘forcing yourself to sleep’ generally means ‘being stressed about the fact that you ‘re not sleeping and dwelling on that stress’. It’s the stress keeping you up, not the fact that you’re stressing about sleep. Not only is the emotional turmoil going to keep you more awake, but the tendency to tighten muscles when in turmoil means you’re also not relaxed.
It generally is possible to ‘trick’ yourself into going to sleep, hence all those relaxation tapes. Being in a quiet dark environment, doing deep breathing, and distracting yourself with relatively boring mental activity you can do while laying down will get most people to drift off, assuming there aren’t other issues occurring.
Side note – counting sheep is more akin to inventorying something you know well – a modern equivalent would be listing all the clothes in your closet, assuming you don’t find that stressful for some reason.
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Closing your eyes while focusing on your breathing works for me. If you can do this for ten minutes. Also no cellphones.
(Disclosure. Sleep is actually one area that we still don’t know all the ins and outs of, so really the answer is “We don’t know, but we have some theories” So take my and other answers with a grain of salt.)
Because “sleep” as we know it isn’t a single thing you just “do”, it’s a complex process involving several factors all working together to enable you to sleep. It’s not simply losing consciousness due to illness or injury.
Circadian rhythm. Melatonin levels. Core body temperature. Environment. What you ate or didn’t eat/digestion. Routine. Learned behavior. And probably way more I’m forgetting. All these things work together and have to be in just the right state for sleep to happen.
So not only can we not consciously control most of that, by trying to force or tell yourself to sleep, your brain is now adding another task or something to worry about at a time when it should be slowing down and relaxing and worrying about less. Kind of like trying to shut down your computer by opening up another running program.
I close my eyes
I fall asleep within 4-5 minutes.
Not everyone has the issue you speak of.
There is a good journal review of The process of falling asleep in the journal Sleep Medicine Reviews If you don’t have access it is available here
That said, the stage before sleep (Wake 1 & Wake 2 as defined by EEG in paper above) have a high level of Alpha waves that often indicate conscious & directed thoughts. If you are stuck here worrying about things, sleep will be slow in coming.
As you start to fall asleep, these EEG measures of Alpha waves decline (stage 3 & 4) and are replaces by other patterns. We don’t know what biological processes flip the switch fur us moving from wide awake & conscious thought to what comes next.
We know some drugs that move us to a sleep like state, but EEG patterns don’t immediately match normal sleep.
concentration and mental effort keep you awake.
Sleep is trying to reach a state where you are not thinking about things.
Which you cannot get to by thinking about it. Because sleep itself is a thing.
The only way to think about nothing is to accidentally get there by thinking about other things until your body falls into it.
Everyone should read “Why We Sleep” by Matthew Walker
It will literally change your life
Sleep is SOOOO important and most people don’t get enough of it. Hustle culture is rapidly killing us as a society.
It isn’t impossible. My friend could pretty much sleep on demand, and I don’t sleep if I don’t want to
I’m going to suggest sleep/dozing off/waking is pretty subjective.
Same reason actively trying to forget something does not work. it is a passive process that requires you to not pay attention to it.
(Disclosure. There isn’t a single correct answer but many theories based on a combination of biological processes and behavioral sciences.)
The reason you feel sleepy is a build up of “sleep pressure” chemicals (adenosine) that accumulate during your time awake. The reason you feel awake is because your body clears out that sleepiness chemical while you sleep and instead produces chemicals associated with alertness (cortisol). Your sleep timing (circadian rhythm) is generally regulated by a chemical (melatonin) that signals to your body when to produce the sleepy chemical or alert chemical.
Certain triggers can interrupt the schedule and make your body stay awake when it would normally sleep. For example, caffeine blocks adenosine, so your sleepiness is postponed until your body breaks down the caffeine. If you were sleepy and then a bear broke into your house, the threat would trigger a fight-or-flight chemical, adrenaline. Adrenaline tells your body to pump up cortisol levels for alertness, send sugar into your bloodstream to fuel your muscles, and increase your heart rate so you can fight hard or run fast from the threat.
When you feel stressed or anxious, your body is preparing to fight or run from a threat. Your body doesn’t know the difference between stress from a presentation you have to give tomorrow or stress because you heard a bear coming toward you. “Trying” to sleep is sending signals to your brain to focus, be alert, prepare for a threat, produce cortisol, suppress sleep.
The best way to relax is to focus on feeling safe. You can do that through monotony, activities that are enjoyable but not “thrilling”, or think about how safe you are from the outside elements thanks to four walls and a roof.
I have a super power…I can choose to sleep at any time basically within 1 minute. It is a power I am very grateful for.
In order to fall sleep, your mind needs to let go of awareness and drift.
When you TRY and do something, you put your mind to it and give it effort.
You need to be aware of something in order to give it effort.
Your mind cannot let go of awareness while also being aware of falling asleep.
In order to fall asleep, you must first pretend that you are sleeping.