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How to Reduce Racing Thoughts at Night

Ways to quiet your mind and relax so you can get to sleep

• Schedule "Worry Time"
• Address Stressors

Prepare for Sleep

• If You're Still Struggling

If your mind is racing, it may seem like you'll never fall asleep. Racing thoughts at night can be hard to "turn off," since they can only perpetuate the stress or anxiety that caused them in the first place.

Lying awake in bed is unlikely to help. In fact, it's likely to make matters worse. Managing stress , unwinding before bed, and using distraction and relaxation techniques, however, can help you slow your thoughts and get a better night's sleep.

This article walks you through these strategies for reducing racing thoughts at night.

Verywell / JR Bee

Schedule "Worry Time"

Scheduled worry time is a point in your day when you sit down and list what is causing you stress and anxiety, as well as some actions you can take to help address them.

For example:

By writing down your stressors and creating an action plan , you help yourself:

• Put a name to the sources of stress
• Release worries from your mind
• Find ways that the stress can be relieved
• Enjoy a sense of accomplishment when you tackle and review your tasks

If thoughts related to the stress present themselves at night, you can respond by simply telling yourself, " I don't need to think about this right now. Instead, I will think about it tomorrow during my scheduled worry time."

These affirming thoughts can shut down racing thoughts and allow you to get to sleep.

Address Your Stressors

Rather than being overwhelmed, break your stressors down into manageable chunks —and then get to work.

Here's an example: If you have a major project due at work in two weeks and feel overwhelmed or don’t know where to begin, identify the components causing your anxiety and make them part of the action plan. For instance:

• Review the files
• Speak with your coworker
• Schedule a meeting
• Draft the proposal
• Finalize the presentation

As you accomplish the tasks day by day, you cross them off. Eventually, you can remove the stressor itself from the list.

Spend about five minutes before bed writing a quick to-do list for your days ahead. Research suggests this may help some people fall asleep faster. Tell yourself that you wrote down your tasks and you can revisit them tomorrow.

What If I Can't Cross Off a Task?

There may be some items on the list that have no apparent resolution. This ambiguity may cause additional anxiety and zap your energy throughout the day.

If you find yourself stuck in this loop, tell yourself to let it go and come back to it tomorrow. There are other things you can focus on today.

A solution may become clearer with time. And since the item is written down, you don't have to worry that you'll forget about it.

It can be helpful to set aside intentional time to relax before bed to make the night a relaxing time. Good sleep hygiene involves stopping certain activities and establishing a familiar routine that tells your body it's time for sleep.

Your circadian rhythm is the internal clock that tells you when it's time for sleep. These internal rhythms can be thrown off by several things, including lack of sunlight and too much blue light from computer screens.

A few hours before bed, turn off screens, including:

In addition, put your work aside and disengage from social media. There will always be more to do, but you have done enough for today . Now it's time to relax and prepare for sleep.

Spend at least 30 minutes, or perhaps as long as one or two hours, unwinding, and decompressing before bedtime.

Fill this time with relaxing activities, such as:

• Listening to calming music
• Taking a shower or bath
• Meditating or praying

You may find that establishing a nighttime ritual that incorporates some of these activities sends your body signals that it's time to wind down.

Right before bed, or if you find yourself awake at night, you might try some other relaxation techniques, including:

• Breathing exercises
• Progressive muscle relaxation
• Guided imagery

These can distract you from the effort of trying to fall or stay asleep. They can also reduce racing thoughts at night.

If You're Still Struggling

If you continue to struggle with sleep, speak with your healthcare provider about additional treatment options.

For example, you might benefit from  cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia (CBTI) , medications to relieve anxiety, or sleeping pills for insomnia.

Our Doctor Discussion Guide can help you start that conversation.

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Stress and anxiety can cause racing thoughts at night that prevent you from getting the sleep you need.

By identifying your stress, scheduling time to attend to your worries, and establishing a healthy bedtime routine, you may be able to avoid racing thoughts and sleep more soundly.

Newman MG, Llera SJ. A novel theory of experiential avoidance in generalized anxiety disorder: a review and synthesis of research supporting a contrast avoidance model of worry .  Clin Psychol Rev . 2011;31(3):371–382. doi:10.1016/j.cpr.2011.01.008

Scullin MK, Krueger ML, Ballard HK, Pruett N, Bliwise DL. The effects of bedtime writing on difficulty falling asleep: A polysomnographic study comparing to-do lists and completed activity lists .  Journal of Experimental Psychology: General . 2018;147(1):139-146. doi:10.1037/xge0000374

Wahl S, Engelhardt M, Schaupp P, Lappe C, Ivanov IV. The inner clock—Blue light sets the human rhythm .  J Biophotonics . 2019;12(12). doi:10.1037/xge0000374

By Brandon Peters, MD Dr. Peters is a board-certified neurologist and sleep medicine specialist and is a fellow of the American Academy of Sleep Medicine.

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Why Am I Having Racing Thoughts at Night?

Wendy Wisner is a health and parenting writer, lactation consultant (IBCLC), and mom to two awesome sons.

Daniel B. Block, MD, is an award-winning, board-certified psychiatrist who operates a private practice in Pennsylvania.

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Why Your Thoughts Race at Night

What do racing thoughts at night feel like.

• Tips for Coping
• Treatment Options

Racing thoughts at night are often a symptom of anxiety, but anyone can experience them when they have worries on their mind. Such thoughts can be hard to control, cause you to feel overwhelmed, and make it difficult or impossible to sleep. Racing thoughts that make it so you can't sleep are often caused by stress, anxiety, other mental health conditions, medications, or excessive caffeine consumption.

For example, imagine that you’re finally settling in for the night. You’re tired and ready to get some rest. But as soon as the lights go out and your head hits the pillow, your thoughts start racing.

You begin to think about your to-do list, or the endless worries you have about the day and weeks ahead. Or maybe you begin thinking about something embarrassing or scary that happened to you years ago. You may be ruminating on a “worst case scenario” situation you imagine happening sometime in the future.

Whatever your thoughts are, you can’t stop them from coming. As the thoughts race, your heart pounds too, and it feels like you will never get to sleep. This all feels unfair! Night is supposed to be the time when you finally get to unwind and relax. Your racing thoughts make that feel impossible.

If you are experiencing racing thoughts at night, you are far from alone. Many of us experience them at one time or another, especially if we are experiencing heightened stress in our lives. Some of us may experience this chronically as part of a mental health challenge we face.

Either way, having racing thoughts at night does not have to be your fate. There are helpful and effective ways to cope with and treat racing thoughts at night.

Some people who experience racing thoughts at night also experience racing or anxious thoughts during the day. But many people also have the experience of feeling relatively calm during the day, only to find that their thoughts start to race as soon as they try falling asleep.

The reason for this is that most of us are more easily distracted from our worries and fears during the day. We are working , caring for others, indulging in screen time, and moving rapidly from one activity to another, barely aware of our interior emotional experience. But when everything goes dark and quiet at night, we find ourselves alone with our thoughts, and the darker, more difficult emotions and worries tend to present themselves.

Racing thoughts are thoughts that come on suddenly and seem to populate your mind without you being able to control them. Some common experiences include:

• A list of thoughts that stream through your mind on a loop
• The feeling that you are watching different thoughts and scenarios play themselves in your mind, as if on a movie reel
• The thoughts seem to come in quick succession, as though someone is talking too fast inside your head
• You may also be experiencing other signs of anxiety that accompany these racing thoughts, such as a racing heartbeat, sweating, or sped up breathing

What Causes Racing Thoughts at Night?

Life stressors—such as job stress, familial stress, financial stress , or experiencing a major life transition—is the most frequent cause of racing thoughts at night. This is likely the cause if the experience of racing thoughts at night is new to you, and can be traced to a new stressor or stressful event.

Racing thoughts at night can also be attributed to mental health disorders, especially anxiety disorders. Experiencing racing thoughts at night might be something experienced frequently, or intermittently by people who have mental health challenges, and can be exacerbated by difficult life circumstances.

Below are some of the most common causes of racing thoughts at night.

Life Stresses and Transitions

Experiencing a job loss, worrying about your financial future, moving, having a baby —any major life change or stressor can cause you to experience racing thoughts at night.

Anxiety and Panic Disorder

People who have anxiety tend to have more trouble sleeping and may experience racing thoughts at night. Panic disorder also makes you more likely to experience this. Sometimes racing thoughts at night resemble symptoms of a panic attack.

Racing thoughts are one of the characteristics of bipolar disorder, especially during a manic episode. However, simply having racing thoughts does not mean you have bipolar disorder. Bipolar disorder has other attributes as well, including intense mood fluctuations, engaging in risky behavior, and experiencing delusions or hallucinations. Bipolar disorder requires a proper diagnosis from a doctor or psychiatrist.

Obsessive Compulsive Disorder

People who experience obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) may have racing thoughts. Usually, nighttime isn’t the only time that people with OCD experience racing thoughts. Obsessive thoughts, compulsions, and fixations on things like order and cleanliness are other common characteristics of OCD.

Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)

Experiencing a trauma, either recently or years ago, can cause post-traumatic stress disorder. Symptoms of the disorder include racing thoughts, including at night. In this case, you may fixate on the traumatic event that happened to you, and experience flashbacks to it.

Medications

Certain prescribed medications, either for mental health or to treat a medical condition, can cause racing thoughts and insomnia . If you have recently started a new medication and have found that the racing thoughts at night correlate with this, talk to your doctor about potential side effects and alternative medications.

Recreational Drugs

Certain recreational drugs, like methamphetamine and cocaine , can cause racing thoughts. Additionally, racing thoughts and insomnia can be a symptom of withdrawal from certain medications, including opioids .

Caffeine Consumption

Consuming caffeine, especially too close to bedtime, can make it hard to fall asleep, and can cause your thoughts to race. Some people are more sensitive to the effects of caffeine than others.

Tips for Coping With Racing Thoughts at Night

For many of us, making a few life changes and adopting some healthy habits to cope with stress, can help reduce or eliminate nighttime ruminations and insomnia. Here are some tips.

Keep a “Worry Journal”

Writing down some of your thoughts and fears before you go to bed can be therapeutic and can help reduce nighttime stress. Often, our stressful thoughts boil to the surface at night, but they are still in our heads the rest of the day. Having an outlet to “let them all out” when it’s not late at night can really help:

• Get a notebook and label it “ worry journal ”
• Take 5-10 minutes a day to list your worries
• Or, spend 5-10 minutes doing some freewriting about whatever thoughts come to mind

Meditation , either right before bed, or sometime during the day, can have a strong impact on your ability to fall asleep without overwhelming thoughts.

• If this is your first time adopting a meditation practice, keep it simple.
• You can start with just a few minutes a day, and then go from there.
• If you need help, there are several apps on the market that will guide you in a meditation.
• There is no “right” way to meditate; just closing your eyes in silence for a few minutes a day is enough.
• You might find that your thoughts race while you meditate, but meditation is an opportunity to learn to watch your thoughts go by more mindfully, and learn to let them go.

Decrease Screen Time Before Bed

Many of us are addicted to our screens, and stay on them all day, through bedtime. Unfortunately, these habits have a tendency to wreak havoc on our ability to fall asleep easily and can cause us to have a racing mind at the end of the day. Additionally, too much screen time before bed, along with “blue light” emitted from screens, can cause a decrease in melatonin levels, which can make it more difficult to fall asleep.

Be Mindful of Your Evening Media Consumption

Watching scary TV or movies , or reading disturbing books right before bed, can impact our sleep, and cause racing thoughts. Many of us have become addicted to “doomscrolling,” too, feeling compelled to keep up with upsetting world events and news items.

Making a point to replace our evening media consumption with a bath, meditation session, or a heart-to-heart with a loved one, can work wonders.

Address Your Life Stressors

Some aspects of life are out of our control, and these situations can contribute to heightened stress and anxiety, along with insomnia. But sometimes, experiencing something like racing thoughts before bed can be looked at as a wake-up call to make some life changes to reduce stress.

Maybe it’s time to leave a toxic job. Maybe you need to address the dysfunction in one of your primary relationships. Feel empowered to make the changes that will allow you to live a healthier, less stressful life.

Treatment Options for Racing Thoughts at Night

If you are experiencing racing thoughts at night, and trying different coping tips don’t seem to be helping, it might be time to seek professional help. Seeking counseling or therapy is a great option for dealing with racing thoughts at night and insomnia. Talking to a doctor or psychiatrist about medical options may be a good choice for you too.

Your counselor or therapist can help you figure out what’s causing your racing nighttime thoughts, including what life stressors may be impacting you, and whether or not you have a mental health condition that may be contributing.

One of the most successful types of therapy to deal with anxiety, insomnia, and symptoms like racing thoughts is Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT). CBT helps you become more aware of your thoughts and helps you learn coping strategies for quieting them down. CBT also helps you manage your anxiety, and begin to recognize signs of it before it is able to take completely over.

If you are experiencing chronic anxiety, generalized anxiety, panic disorder, or another mental health challenge, there are medications available to help you manage your feelings. Common medications for anxiety include anti-anxiety drugs like benzodiazepines and antidepressants. These medications can also help you fall asleep more easily. Your doctor may also be able to prescribe you sleeping pills to help with racing thoughts and falling asleep.

A Word From Verywell

Having racing thoughts at night doesn’t have to be your reality forever. You might feel hopeless, as though you will never get a chance again to settle easily into sleep. If you feel basically “fine” during the day, you may think that pursuing methods for reducing your racing thoughts at night isn’t important or worth it.

But having difficulty falling asleep, experiencing heightened stress at bedtime, and not getting enough sleep , can have impacts on your overall health and mental health. There are effective solutions out there to address your racing nighttime thoughts, and you deserve a peaceful night’s sleep.

Bea A, Drerup M. When You’re Trying to Sleep But Your Mind Is Racing, Give These Tactics a Try . Cleveland Clinic. Updated May 7, 2019.

National Institute for Mental Health. Anxiety Disorders . Updated July 1, 2018.

American Psychiatric Association. What Is Bipolar Disorder? Updated January 1, 2021.

National Institute for Mental Health. Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder . Updated October 1, 2019.

National Institute for Mental Health. Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder . Updated May 1, 2019.

U.S. National Library of Medicine. Caffeine . Updated September 21, 2021.

Black D, O’Reilly G, Olmstead R, Breen E, Irwin M. Mindfulness Meditation and Improvement in Sleep Quality and Daytime Impairment Among Older Adults With Sleep Disturbances: A Randomized Clinical Trial . JAMA Internal Medicine. 2015;175(4):494–501. doi:10.1001/jamainternmed.2014.8081

By Wendy Wisner Wendy Wisner is a health and parenting writer, lactation consultant (IBCLC), and mom to two awesome sons.

How to Quiet a Racing Mind to Get Better Sleep

If you have trouble falling asleep or staying asleep, try these strategies to quiet your mind and get the rest you need.

Can’t put that racing mind to bed? Whether it’s stopping you from quickly falling asleep or staying asleep, there’s no question an unsettled mind can be a major obstacle to slumber.

“It’s one of the most common problems we hear in our sleep clinic, especially among people struggling with insomnia ,” says Lawrence Chan, DO , a professor of sleep medicine at The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center in Columbus.

The problem is more than just annoying. Racing thoughts at bedtime — even if they aren’t anxious or worried thoughts — might contribute to sleep problems in people who have insomnia, according to one study . The researchers noted that this is different from rumination, which is defined as obsessive, repetitive thinking that tends to focus on negative content.

There’s a reason many people can’t stop thinking about things before going to bed. Whether you’re exploring a new city or simply plugging away at your routine to-do list, your brain is collecting new information all day long, explains Michael Breus, PhD , a clinical psychologist in Manhattan Beach, California, who specializes in sleep disorders. He is also the author of The Power of When , a book on understanding your body clock and circadian rhythms.

“Not until you climb into bed do you have any quiet time, and all of that information, including your worries, comes flying through the door,” he says.

Anxious thoughts and rumination can also keep you awake, of course. If you tend to wake up in the middle of the night and a racing mind won’t let you get back to sleep, it may mean that something is bothering you more than you’d care to otherwise admit or address, Dr. Breus says. “It’s generally a sign that something stressful is going on in life.”

Whether you’re stressed, excited, or simply replaying your day, use these tips to help quiet your racing mind — before thinking too much at bedtime becomes a habit that’s too intense to stop on your own.

How Do Big Life Changes (Like Living Through a Global Pandemic) Affect Our Sleep?

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What to do when you can’t fall asleep, 1. ditch the devices.

Sleep doctors have been telling you for years to stop using smartphones, laptops, and tablets right before bed for good reason. Not only does the light from electronic screens mess up your melatonin production, which makes sleep physiologically harder to achieve, but smart devices can also heighten anxiety and worry if you’re reading stressful news. This habit makes the cycle of ruminating about bothersome or unpleasant news that much worse, Dr. Chan says.

Plus, the apps, websites, and news you’re reading on such devices are meant (in large part) to keep you and your brain engaged, he adds. “The internet is designed to capture attention so that you spend more eye time on screens, which can be a detriment to sleep,” says Chan.

To protect your shut-eye, switch off your devices one to two hours before bed, ideally, or at least 30 minutes if you can’t swing that.

2. Schedule Some ‘Worry Time’

Just as you schedule time to see friends or get a massage, do the same with your worries. Schedule 15 to 30 minutes a day, at least one to two hours before bed, to write down those worries. In addition, create at least one action item you can do to help deal with the issue. Thinking through those potential stressors earlier in the day should help ease how much you worry about them when your head hits the pillow, Chan says. “Ideal sleep depends on creating routines and schedules, and this is no different,” he says.

3. Create a Routine to Power Down Your Brain

Most people assume that sleep is like breathing: Your body will just do it. Not true. Modern-day living has created so much stimulation during the day that brains now operate at warp speed, and if you don’t give yours time to rest, it’ll continue going at that speed at bedtime, says David Brodner, MD , founder of and principal physician at the Center for Sinus, Allergy, and Sleep Wellness in Boynton Beach, Florida.

At least 30 minutes before you go to bed, start your preparations and then do something relaxing like listening to music or reading. Keep it consistent, and you’ll train your body to expect sleep after that relaxation period.

4. Keep a Gratitude List

Now that you’ve dumped your worries, replace the void where those negative thoughts once lived with positive ones by starting a gratitude journal, Breus suggests. The impact of those positive thoughts is greater when you write them down. So try spending a few minutes each night listing three to five things you’re grateful for.

5. Practice 4-7-8 Breathing

You’ve heard how deep breathing can help combat stress, but it can also help you fall asleep. In order to sleep, your heart rate needs to slow down, Breus says, and breathing techniques are one of the most effective ways to achieve this goal.

One of Breus’s favorites is 4-7-8 breathing: Inhale for a count of four, hold for seven, and then blow out for eight. Do this at least five to seven times to slow your heart rate.

You could also try mindfulness meditation, which helps you let go of negative and racing thoughts so you go to sleep or get back to sleep, according to the Sleep Foundation . Try apps like Calm and Headspace.

6. Do Progressive Muscle Relaxation

As you lie in bed, tense and relax all of your muscles one by one, starting at your toes and ending at your head. Not only is this incredibly relaxing, as the name implies, but it also forces you to think about the physical parts of your body, directing your attention away from whatever thoughts or stressors you’re fixating on, Breus says.

7. Maintain a Consistent Sleep Schedule

Going to bed and waking up at the same time each day is one of the pillars of sleep hygiene — those guidelines sleep docs recommend for ensuring a good night’s sleep . It helps the mind, too. “If you try to go to bed early, when your brain’s not ready to sleep, it will focus on other things,” Breus says, which keeps the brain excited and awake.

What to Do if You Wake Up in the Middle of the Night

1. get out of bed.

As counterintuitive as it may seem, climbing out of bed after about 20 minutes of worrying is the tried-and-true advice sleep doctors tell everyone they help and one of the hallmark steps of therapy for insomnia. If you spend time in bed worrying, your brain will begin to associate the two and not be able to sleep, Chan says. You’ll create a vicious cycle for yourself, whereby your bed increasingly becomes a space where it is difficult for you to sleep.

Instead, get out of bed and do something calming, such as reading a book, doing light chores, or journaling. As soon as you start getting sleepy, head to bed. “The goal is to increase your sleep efficiency, meaning that when you’re in bed, you’re sleeping,” Chan says.

2. Slow That Heart Rate

You may have used the 4-7-8 breathing technique or deep muscle relaxation before bed. Now try them again, as your goal is to not only lower that heart rate but also take your mind away from your thoughts, Breus says.

3. Write Down Your Worries

Keep a notepad and pen by your bed to scribble down worries that are at the front of your mind, Dr. Brodner says. This isn’t the same as pre-bed structured worry time, since you’re not creating solutions; you’re just getting your worries out of your head so your mind can rest.

4. Turn On the TV (and Half-Close Your Eyes)

This tip may be controversial, but a much-loved movie or TV show can take your mind off whatever is bothering you and potentially help you relax, says Breus.

Now, we know what you’re thinking: Yes, TVs emit blue light, which can mess with your melatonin production and make it harder to nod off. But unlike smartphones and tablets, which you hold close to your face, TVs are usually positioned “so far away that you’re not getting as much blue light as you think,” says Breus. Plus, most people aren’t actually watching TV as much as listening to it with their eyes closed, and blue light can’t penetrate closed eyelids.

Note, though, that most sleep guidelines recommend against TV in bed, including some experts from Sleep Foundation , so if listening to the TV isn’t helping you sleep, don’t do it.

It’s also worth stating that everyone has trouble sleeping from time to time. But if restless nights become the norm, rather than an occasional occurrence, tell your doctor. If you’re experiencing symptoms of insomnia , there are ways your doctor or a sleep specialist can help.

Editorial Sources and Fact-Checking

Everyday Health follows strict sourcing guidelines to ensure the accuracy of its content, outlined in our editorial policy . We use only trustworthy sources, including peer-reviewed studies, board-certified medical experts, patients with lived experience, and information from top institutions.

• Weiner L et al. Investigating Racing Thoughts in Insomnia: A Neglected Piece of the Mood-Sleep Puzzle? Comprehensive Psychiatry . November 2021.
• Suni E. What to Do When You Can’t Sleep: Insomnia Solutions. Sleep Foundation . October 23, 2023.
• Achauer H. Why Are We All Still Watching TV Right Before Bed? Sleep Foundation . July 8, 2022.

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10 Sleep Experts on What to Do When You Can’t Sleep at Night

Some nights, it’s like you can’t get your brain to shut up long enough for you to fall asleep . You’re mentally reviewing the day you just completed while also previewing the day ahead ; sometimes, your mind may even reach way back into the archives and pull up something embarrassing you did back in high school. So fun! Or maybe you’re dealing with your little ones’ dreaded nighttime routine and the second your head hits the pillow , you’ve already begun stressing about having to run it all back the following day. Nothing like a dose of insomnia to ease your worries.

Racing thoughts or overthinking can be a sign of a serious mental-health condition like anxiety . But these nights also happen to everyone from time to time — and once we’re too old for bedtime stories , it’s not always clear what to do. Since of course there’s no one solution that will work for everybody, we’ve rounded up suggestions from ten sleep experts to help you turn your brain off at night. At the very least, it’s something to read next time you can’t sleep.

Get a little proactive.

“When you lay down at night, you don’t have any of the distractions that surround you during the day — people talking to you, dogs barking, the temptation of your smartphone. Thus, when you go to bed and remove the distractions, simmering concerns and anxiety can rise to the top. If you are struggling with a lot of anxiety, keeping a ‘worry journal’ near your bed where you jot down concerns about 30 minutes before bedtime (or in the middle of the night if you can’t sleep) can help you with this issue. Meditation during the day can also help you deal with the ‘monkey mind.’” — Dr. Craig Canapari, associate professor at the Yale University School of Medicine and director of the Pediatric Sleep Center at Yale New Haven Hospital

Distract yourself with meaningless mental lists.

“The absolute prerequisite for sleep is a quiet mind. Think of something else, rather than what’s worrying you — something with a story to it. It can be anything of interest, but of no importance, so you can devote some brain energy to it without clashing into the real world and going straight back to your worries. I fly a lot, so I imagine I have my own private jet and how would I arrange the furniture on it. If you’re someone who likes going to music festivals, what would your lineup be?” —Neil Stanley, sleep expert

Try to stay awake instead.

“Thinking about sleep and wishing for it to happen is a recipe for staying awake. This is where paradoxical thinking comes in. If you give yourself the paradoxical instruction to stay awake instead, you’ll be more likely to fall asleep. If you can be comfortable with the idea of remaining awake, then the performance anxiety and frustration that are associated with trying to sleep have nowhere to go and your arousal level drops.” —Colin Espie, professor of sleep medicine at the University of Oxford

Or just get out of bed.

“If 20 minutes has gone by as the mind races and is unable to relax back to sleep, it’s best to get out of bed. Without looking at your phone or any other screen devices, go to another dimly lit room where you keep a notebook. Write down the thoughts that are keeping you awake. Finish with the words, ‘It can wait until tomorrow.’ Then, go back to bed, focus on the breath, and mindfully relax into those words, giving yourself permission to yield to sleep.” —Jenni June, sleep consultant

Lower your heart rate.

“First of all, racing thoughts actually make sense. Think about it: It’s literally the only time of the day that you get where someone is not asking you questions or pulling your attention elsewhere. When the lights go off, the brain unfortunately kicks into gear, and this can be an issue. What most people do not know about entering into a state of unconsciousness is that you need a heart rate of about 60 or below. When your mind is racing, your heart rate is usually much higher. These thoughts are producing anxiety, which releases cortisol and makes it even more difficult to fall asleep. So what can you do?

I teach a breathing technique that helps lower the patient’s heart rate below 60. My favorite is 4-7-7 breathing, or box breathing: in for a count of four, out for seven, hold for seven. This requires concentration, counting, and not focusing on your worries or anxieties. It also mechanically slows your heart rate and gets you into the sleep zone. Meditation can work, or playing simple mind games like reciting the alphabet, etc.” — Dr. Michael J. Breus, clinical psychologist and sleep-medicine expert at Sleep Doctor

Write down whatever’s freaking you out.

“Spend a maximum of 20 minutes just getting everything out of your head and onto paper every day. It’s a therapeutic way to see that you probably don’t have loads to worry about, rather just a few reoccurring things. You can then see which worries are hypothetical (i.e., what if I make a mistake at work and lose my job) or ‘real’ worries (e.g., I made a mistake and have lost my job). For the real worries you can then make an action plan/problem-solve and for the hypothetical ones, learn to let them go.” —Kathryn Pinkham, National Health Services insomnia specialist

Get back in bed and do some deep breathing.

“Deep breathing acts as a powerful distraction technique, particularly if paired with counting. You want to aim to breathe out for longer than you breathe in, and pause after breathing in and out; so you might choose to count for three when you breathe in, then pause and count to five when you breathe out, then pause. Really focus on your breathing and counting, and if your mind wanders off, just take note of that and return your attention to the exercise. You may need to do this for ten minutes or so.” —Christabel Majendie, sleep therapist

Try not to try so hard.

“Try not to struggle or ‘try harder’ to overcome the sleeplessness or get rid of unwanted thoughts, as this can worsen insomnia. One successful approach to overcome this negative cycle is to instead learn to observe and accept these struggles, using mindfulness strategies to help.” —Jenny Stephenson, director of HappySleepers

Or maybe plan how you’ll get some sun in the a.m.

“Getting more sun exposure in the midmorning can help readjust the brain’s internal clock and make it easier to fall asleep later that night. In my book, I write about how sun exposure is now a key part of many professional athletes’ travel schedules, and seen as a way of preventing jet lag. Non-athletes can do similar things. Someone who can’t seem to fall asleep at night may want to try getting as much exposure to natural light in the morning, essentially prepping themselves to fall asleep when they want to.” — David K. Randall, author of Dreamland: Adventures in the Strange Science of Sleep

And if all else fails …

“The great era of tinkering with sleep aids was popular in early modern Europe. Here are a few of my favorites:

• Put some blood-sucking leeches behind your ears. When they bore holes in the skin, pull them out and place a grain of opium in each hole. (From 16th-century French physician André du Laurens.)

• Kill a sheep, and then press its steaming lungs on either side of the head. Keep the lungs in place as long as they remain warm. (From 16th-century French surgeon Ambroise Paré.)

• After the evening meal, eat lettuce, drink wine, and rub an ointment made of the oil of violets or camphor on the temples. Dissolve a mixture of poppy seeds, lettuce seeds, balsam, saffron, and sugar and cook it in poppy juice. Then listen to pleasant music and lie down on a bed covered with the leaves of fresh, cool plants. (From 15th-century philosopher Marsilio Ficino.)” —Benjamin Reiss, author of Wild Nights: How Taming Sleep Created Our Restless World

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How Late Night Boredom Can Lead to Bedtime Procrastination… and Wreck Your Sleep

A 2021 study found that being bored can lead to bedtime procrastination 1 , or putting off when you actually go to bed, which can lead to poorer sleep quality overall.

• Ai Ni Teoh, PhD , senior psychology professor at James Cook University Singapore
• Angela Holliday-Bell, MD , board-certified physician, certified sleep specialist, sleep coach, and founder of The Solution is Sleep
• David Rabin, MD, PhD , board-certified psychiatrist, neuroscientist, entrepreneur, and inventor, and co-founder & chief innovation officer at Apollo Neuro
• Michael Breus, PhD , sleep expert and clinical psychologist
• Rebecca Robbins, PhD , assistant professor in medicine at Harvard Medical School and associate scientist at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital

But if you’re so bored, and it’s currently at or past your typical bedtime, why not just... go to bed? Well, it turns out being bored can make you less aware and attentive of that simple reality and more prone to the kinds of distractions that will have you wired rather than tired. Below, sleep experts explain how late night boredom can lead you to put off sleep, as well as other reasons for bedtime procrastination, plus how to overcome the habit and nix sleep disruptions.

How late night boredom causes bedtime procrastination

In the study noted above, researchers assessed levels of boredom proneness, mind wandering, and fidgeting, as well as sleep quality in 270 people, and found that higher levels of such boredom indicators were correlated with poorer sleep quality. To explain that association, the researchers also identified two meditators: inattention and bedtime procrastination.

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“Our study tested a model that drew links from boredom to inattention, and from inattention to bedtime procrastination, and subsequently sleep quality—and the results confirmed the model,” says social psychologist Ai Ni Teoh, PhD , lead author of the study. “This suggests that people who are bored find it hard to concentrate, meaning they may not pay attention to their bedtime if they’re bored at night, which could lead to delaying bedtime.” The result? Poorer sleep quality , says Dr. Teoh, which can eventually lead to mental and physical health issues.

“People who are bored find it hard to concentrate, meaning they may not pay attention to their bedtime if they’re bored at night, which could lead to delaying bedtime.” —Ai Ni Teoh, PhD, social psychologist

While Dr. Teoh says the study didn't include what the participants did when they were bored and choosing not to go to bed, she and sleep psychologist Rebecca Robbins, PhD , assistant professor at Harvard Medical School, both have a pretty good hunch: watching TV or scrolling social media. (After all, boredom proneness goes hand-in-hand with social media usage 2 .)

“At the end of the day, our willpower is depleted,” Dr. Robbins says. “We have been making decisions and processing information all day, so we are less able to self-regulate and prioritize healthy choices, like keeping our consistent bedtime routine.” Throw in late night boredom, and it’s no wonder you might grab your phone and start scrolling… and before you know it, it’s 1:00 a.m.

What is the psychology behind bedtime procrastination?

So, late night boredom can certainly lead to bedtime procrastination by essentially making you more distractible. The more bored (and less attentive) you are, the more likely you are to get caught in a doom-scroll spiral, for example, unwittingly putting off your bedtime in the process.

But another cause of bedtime procrastination happens more purposefully—by way of something called revenge bedtime procrastination . The term refers to when you “intentionally delay your bedtime to engage in activities that you deem more enjoyable,” says board-certified sleep specialist Angela Holliday-Bell, MD , sleep expert for the sleep-tech brand Helight .

The psychology behind revenge bedtime procrastination has to do with getting “revenge” for how busy you are during the day by carving out time late at night (past your optimal bedtime) to do the things you want to do. This can involve binge-watching TV shows, scrolling on social media, reading—really any form of entertainment you didn’t have time for during the day.

“At night, when we’re not at work or under the demands of others, we often feel like we can be direct agents of our time,” says neuroscientist and psychiatrist Dave Rabin, MD, PhD , co-founder of sleep-tech brand Apollo Neuro . “We use that time to feel more in control.”

The problem is, taking control over those late-night hours often means choosing to fill them with anything but sleep… even when you know that sleep is what you really need. “People get so absorbed in the activity they choose that they lose track of time, and then it’s one to two hours past their bedtime,” explains clinical psychologist and sleep specialist Michael Breus, PhD .

Who’s most affected by bedtime procrastination?

If you’re a person who needs a good deal of stimulation to feel satisfied, chances are you’ve encountered your fair share of late night boredom, perhaps leading you to seek out activities that wind up delaying your bedtime. The same goes if you’re someone whose optimal productivity happens at nighttime, says Dr. Rabin. (This means you probably have a night-owl chronotype , or circadian rhythm pattern.) Maybe that’s just when you wind up wanting to get stuff done or be creative or do something enjoyable… anything but sleep.

Those who have their entire days sucked up by work or obligations to other people are also more likely to be affected by bedtime procrastination—and that almost always includes parents, says Dr. Holliday-Bell. “That’s because after work, they tend to have a host of other childcare duties that take the remainder of their time in the evenings,” she says. “That leaves what should be their bedtime as the only time they have left to indulge in other activities.” Cue the bedtime procrastination.

What are the consequences of bedtime procrastination?

Whether it’s late night boredom or a desire to reclaim time for yourself that’s keeping you up into the wee hours of the night, bedtime procrastination can certainly affect your health.

“Most people who engage in any kind of bedtime procrastination end up getting less sleep than is required to meet their health needs,” says Dr. Holliday-Bell. “This leads to sleep deficiency , which can affect everything from your cardiovascular health to your diabetes risk.” That’s not all. Because sleep loss is connected with mental health issues , over time, sleep procrastination can also up your risk for developing depression and anxiety, she says.

“Most people who engage in any kind of bedtime procrastination end up getting less sleep than is required to meet their health needs.” —Angela Holliday-Bell, MD, board-certified sleep specialist

In the more immediate term, not getting enough sleep means “you’re not giving your body the chance to recover properly, both physically and mentally, which can increase your chances of burnout, irritability , fogginess, and fatigue,” says Dr. Rabin.

Speaking of irritability, bedtime procrastination can also affect your relationships: “People tend to have shorter fuses and become more easily frustrated when they aren’t getting enough sleep,” says Dr. Holliday-Bell. So keep that in mind the next time you stay up late scrolling, too.

How to prevent sleep procrastination

1. add more “me” time into your day.

If you’re staying up late at night in order to do things you would’ve wanted to do during the day, it’s worth considering how to fit more “me” time into your daytime schedule, says Dr. Holliday-Bell—even if that’s just five minutes here and there.

“The key is to actually schedule things you enjoy during the day so that you don’t feel like nighttime, when you should be asleep, is the only time you have to do those things,” she says. That could just mean penciling in time for a short walk or some online shopping, or listening to your favorite audiobook or playlist while cooking or eating dinner.

2. Reframe the way you think about your bedtime and sleep

While your “me” time can involve a long list of enjoyable activities, Dr. Holliday-Bell says your bedtime routine should be one of them. So, aim to create a sleep-friendly environment that’ll actually put you in the mood to sleep—versus leaving your sleep on the back burner.

“Sleep is one of the best forms of self care and should be looked at as an investment in your well-being,” says Dr. Holliday-Bell. When your bedtime routine becomes a way to indulge in that self care, it’ll become something to look forward to, rather than put off.

3. Allow your mind to wander throughout the day

Dealing with late night boredom in particular? When you're bored, you're more easily distracted. And in that state, you're more likely to put off going to bed. But here's the thing: Dr. Robbins says it's not bad to be bored , in general. “After all, we cannot sustain a razor-sharp focus for protracted periods of time,” she says. Reducing the impact of boredom on sleep just comes down to indulging your boredom during the day rather than late at night.

That means working a few activities into your daytime schedule that can let your mind wander freely. Some examples: cooking, putting away dishes, and folding clothes.

It's also important to give yourself this type of mental break ahead of hitting the hay; otherwise, your thoughts about work or other obligations could keep you awake. “Before bed, mind wandering can help you separate from your planned, regimented, and focused day, and shift into a state of mind that’s more conducive to sleep,” says Dr. Robbins.

4. Squeeze in some exercise during the day

Daytime exercise can play a huge role in helping you wind down at night—especially if your days tend to involve a good deal of stress, or you’re also coping with insomnia. “When we don’t get [our anxiety] out, it accumulates, so when we try to fall asleep, our bodies are still feeling pent up with restlessness and energy,” says Dr. Rabin. And in that state, you’re just far more likely to put off sleep in favor of some late night scrolling (womp womp).

To move anxiety out of the body and better ensure you’re ready to sleep when the time comes, Dr. Rabin suggests getting your heart rate up each day, even for just 15 to 30 minutes.

5. Set a bedtime alarm

Newsflash: Alarms aren’t just for waking up; they can also be for going to sleep. According to Dr. Holliday-Bell, setting a bedtime alarm can be key in preventing sleep procrastination . When it goes off, it’ll be a clear reminder that it’s time to start your bedtime routine—which can keep you from going down the binge-watching or doom-scrolling rabbit hole, she says.

4 tips that will help you get enough sleep

Ready to sleep like a baby ? When you follow these expert-approved strategies for better sleep, you’ll be more likely to avoid sleep procrastination and drift off easily.

1. Wake up at the same time every day

While setting a consistent bedtime is important, one of the best strategies for better sleep is having a consistent wake-up time (yes, even on the weekends), says Dr. Holliday-Bell. “This entrains your circadian rhythm to send alerting signals at the same time each morning, which can then lead to sleepiness cues arriving around the same time each night.”

2. Develop a relaxing bedtime routine—and start it early

Is your nighttime routine pure chaos? That’ll pave the way for bedtime procrastination and poor sleep quality.

Instead, strive for consistency, says Dr. Holliday-Bell. “Not only does a consistent routine help you to transition from the stress of the day to the stillness of the night, but also, it can be protective against stress that might otherwise interfere with your ability to fall asleep.”

To develop that routine, consider how you can create a sleep-friendly environment. “For instance, light a candle, turn the lights low, take a warm shower, and download a smartphone app that can ease you to sleep with soothing activities, stories, or mindfulness exercises,” suggests Dr. Robbins. (There are plenty of free sleep apps that are audio-only—meaning, no screen use required.) You might also try walking before bed for a better night’s sleep. Bottom line: Whatever it is that helps you leave the stressors of the day behind, go for it.

Also, start this routine early—ideally, 60 minutes before your bedtime if you’re also coping with insomnia, says Dr. Robbins. Still want time to scroll social media? Cool. Just do it before your hour-long wind-down begins so that you reserve this whole time for shifting into sleep mode.

3. Skip the afternoon caffeine

Your mid-afternoon coffee might feel like a great pick-me-up, but that caffeine is only going to keep you up when you have it too late in the day. “If you find yourself having multiple cups of coffee every day…that can result in chronic sleep deprivation, which causes poor functioning,” says Dr. Rabin.

If you want to improve your sleep quality, cut down on sleep disturbances, and reduce your chances of engaging in bedtime procrastination, Dr. Breus recommends not drinking any caffeine after 12 p.m. “Caffeine has a half-life of six to eight hours and can certainly affect your sleep even past the point at which you’re feeling its effects,” he says. In the afternoon and evening, go for a rest-inducing drink instead, like chamomile tea.

4. Get rid of (most) of your devices in the bedroom

For the best sleep, you’ll want to do away with digital devices (namely your phone, laptop, and TV) at least an hour before bed, says Dr. Robbins. Doing so, she says, is the antithesis to the boredom that can lead to sleep procrastination. “If we keep our routines consistent, we fall asleep faster, into better quality sleep,” she says.

There are a few exceptions to this rule. First, the aforementioned audio-based apps can provide mindfulness exercises that put you to sleep sans screen. Second, a sunrise alarm clock (like the Hatch 2 Restore ) can act as a phone-free way to create a sleep-friendly environment (one equipped with sleep stories , relaxing sounds, and mood lighting, no less). And sleep-enhancing devices like the Apollo Neuro , which can deliver soothing low-frequency vibrations to your wrist, can help you drift off more easily.

• Teoh, Ai N. “Boredom Affects Sleep Quality: The Serial Mediation Effect of Inattention and Bedtime Procrastination.” Personality and Individual Differences , vol. 171, 2021, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2020.110460.
• Whelan, E., et al. “Is Boredom Proneness Related to Social Media Overload and Fatigue? A Stress-strain-outcome Approach.” Internet Research , 2020, https://doi.org/0.1108/intr-03-2019-0112.

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It’s normal for your mind to wander. Here’s how to maximise the benefits

Psychology researcher, Bond University

Associate Professor in Psychology, Bond University

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Have you ever found yourself thinking about loved ones during a boring meeting? Or going over the plot of a movie you recently watched during a drive to the supermarket?

This is the cognitive phenomenon known as “ mind wandering ”. Research suggests it can account for up to 50% of our waking cognition (our mental processes when awake) in both western and non-western societies .

So what can help make this time productive and beneficial?

Mind wandering is not daydreaming

Mind wandering is often used interchangeably with daydreaming. They are both considered types of inattention but are not the same thing.

Mind wandering is related to a primary task, such as reading a book, listening to a lecture, or attending a meeting. The mind withdraws from that task and focuses on internally generated, unrelated thoughts.

On the other hand, daydreaming does not involve a primary, active task. For example, daydreaming would be thinking about an ex-partner while travelling on a bus and gazing out the window. Or lying in bed and thinking about what it might be like to go on a holiday overseas.

If you were driving the bus or making the bed and your thoughts diverted from the primary task, this would be classed as mind wandering.

The benefits of mind wandering

Mind wandering is believed to play an important role in generating new ideas , conclusions or insights (also known as “aha! moments”). This is because it can give your mind a break and free it up to think more creatively.

This type of creativity does not always have to be related to creative pursuits (such as writing a song or making an artwork). It could include a new way to approach a university or school assignment or a project at work. Another benefit of mind wandering is relief from boredom, providing the opportunity to mentally retreat from a monotonous task.

For example, someone who does not enjoy washing dishes could think about their upcoming weekend plans while doing the chore. In this instance, mind wandering assists in “passing the time” during an uninteresting task.

Mind wandering also tends to be future-oriented. This can provide an opportunity to reflect upon and plan future goals, big or small. For example, what steps do I need to take to get a job after graduation? Or, what am I going to make for dinner tomorrow?

Read more: Alpha, beta, theta: what are brain states and brain waves? And can we control them?

What are the risks?

Mind wandering is not always beneficial, however. It can mean you miss out on crucial information. For example, there could be disruptions in learning if a student engages in mind wandering during a lesson that covers exam details. Or an important building block for learning.

Some tasks also require a lot of concentration in order to be safe. If you’re thinking about a recent argument with a partner while driving, you run the risk of having an accident.

That being said, it can be more difficult for some people to control their mind wandering. For example, mind wandering is more prevalent in people with ADHD.

Read more: How your brain decides what to think

What can you do to maximise the benefits?

There are several things you can do to maximise the benefits of mind wandering.

• be aware : awareness of mind wandering allows you to take note of and make use of any productive thoughts. Alternatively, if it is not a good time to mind wander it can help bring your attention back to the task at hand

context matters : try to keep mind wandering to non-demanding tasks rather than demanding tasks. Otherwise, mind wandering could be unproductive or unsafe. For example, try think about that big presentation during a car wash rather than when driving to and from the car wash

content matters : if possible, try to keep the content positive. Research has found , keeping your thoughts more positive, specific and concrete (and less about “you”), is associated with better wellbeing. For example, thinking about tasks to meet upcoming work deadlines could be more productive than ruminating about how you felt stressed or failed to meet past deadlines.

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• Daydreaming
• Concentration
• Mind wandering

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How to focus a wandering mind, new research reveals what happens in a wandering mind—and sheds light on the cognitive and emotional benefits of increased focus..

We’ve all been there. You’re slouched in a meeting or a classroom, supposedly paying attention, but your mind has long since wandered off, churning out lists of all the things you need to do—or that you could be doing if only you weren’t stuck here…

Suddenly you realize everyone is looking your way expectantly, waiting for an answer. But you’re staring blankly, grasping at straws to make a semi-coherent response. The curse of the wandering mind!

But don’t worry—you’re not alone. In fact, a recent study by Matthew Killingsworth and Daniel Gilbert sampled over 2,000 adults during their day-to-day activities and found that 47 percent of the time, their minds were not focused on what they were currently doing. Even more striking, when people’s minds were wandering, they reported being less happy.

This suggests it might be good to find ways to reduce these mental distractions and improve our ability to focus. Ironically, mind-wandering itself can help strengthen our ability to focus, if leveraged properly. This can be achieved using an age-old skill: meditation. Indeed, a new wave of research reveals what happens in our brains when our minds wander—and sheds light on the host of cognitive and emotional benefits that come with increased focus.

What happens in the wandering mind?

For something that happens so often, what do we really know about this process of mind-wandering?

For thousands of years, contemplative practices such as meditation have provided a means to look inward and investigate our mental processes. It may seem surprising, but mind-wandering is actually a central element of focused attention (FA) meditation. In this foundational style of meditation, the practitioner is instructed to keep her attention on a single object, often the physical sensations of breathing. 

Sounds simple enough, but it’s much easier said than done. Try it for a few minutes and see what happens. 

If you’re like most people, before long your attention will wander away into rumination, fantasy, analyzing, planning. At some point, you might realize that your mind is no longer focused on the breath. With this awareness, you proceed to disengage from the thought that had drawn your mind away, and steer your attention back to your breath. A few moments later, the cycle will likely repeat.

At first it might seem like the tendency toward mind-wandering would be a problem for the practice of FA meditation, continually derailing your attention from the “goal” of keeping your mind on the breath. 

However, the practice is really meant to highlight this natural trajectory of the mind, and in doing so, it trains your attention systems to become more aware of the mental landscape at any given moment, and more adept at navigating it. With repeated practice, it doesn’t take so long to notice that you’ve slipped into some kind of rumination or daydream. It also becomes easier to drop your current train of thought and return your focus to the breath. Those who practice say that thoughts start to seem less “sticky”—they don’t have such a hold on you.

As a neuroscientist and meditator, I’d long been fascinated with what might be happening in my brain when I meditate. Being familiar with both subjective, first-person meditative practice and objective, third-person scientific research, I wondered what would happen if I put these two modes of investigation together. Could I get a more fine-grained picture of how this process works in the brain by leveraging the experience of these cognitive shifts during meditation?

I started by considering the default mode network, a set of brain areas that tend to increase in activity when we’re not actively engaged in anything else—in other words, when our minds tend to wander. Maybe it was this default mode network that kept barging in during my meditation, interfering with my ability to keep my attention focused. And maybe this network was what I was learning to “tune down” by practicing over and over. I wondered if I could test this scientifically.

Supported by funding from the Mind & Life Institute , and with the help of colleagues at Emory University, I started to test which brain areas were related to meditation. We asked meditators to focus on their breath while we scanned their brains: whenever they realized their minds had been wandering, they’d press a button. Then they would return their focus to the breath as usual, and the practice would continue. As they did so, we collected MRI data showing which brain regions were active before, during, or after the button press that corresponded to various mental states.

The study, published in the journal NeuroImage , found that, indeed, during periods of mind-wandering, regions of the brain’s default mode network were activated. Then when participants became aware of this mind-wandering, brain regions related to the detection of salient or relevant events came online. After that, areas of the executive brain network took over, re-directing and maintaining attention on the chosen object. And all of this occurred within 12 seconds around those button presses.

Looking at activity in these brain networks this way suggests that when you catch your mind wandering, you are going through a process of recognizing, and shifting out of, default mode processing by engaging numerous attention networks. Understanding the way the brain alternates between focused and distracted states has implications for a wide variety of everyday tasks. For example, when your mind wandered off in that meeting, it might help to know you’re slipping into default mode—and you can deliberately bring yourself back to the moment. That’s an ability that can improve with training.

The benefits of building focus

What are other practical implications of this knowledge? Recent behavioral research shows that practicing meditation trains various aspects of attention . Studies show that meditation training not only improves working memory and fluid intelligence , but even standardized test scores . 

It’s not surprising—this kind of repeated mental exercise is like going to the gym, only you’re building your brain instead of your muscles. And mind-wandering is like the weight you add to the barbell—you need some “resistance” to the capacity you’re trying to build. Without mind-wandering to derail your attempts to remain focused, how could you train the skills of watching your mind and controlling your attention?

In our study, we also wanted to look at the effects of lifetime meditation experience on brain activity. In agreement with a growing number of studies, we found that experience mattered—those who were more experienced meditators had different levels of brain activity in the relevant networks. This suggests that their brains may have changed due to repeated practice, a process called neuroplasticity. 

One brain area stood out in this analysis: the medial prefrontal cortex, a part of the default mode network that is particularly related to self-focused thoughts , which make up a good portion of mind-wandering content. It turns out that experienced meditators deactivated this region more quickly after identifying mind-wandering than people who hadn’t meditated as much—suggesting they might be better at releasing distracting thoughts, like a re-hash of a personal To Do list or some slight they suffered at work yesterday.

In a follow-up study, we found that these same participants had greater coherence between activity in the medial prefrontal cortex and brain areas that allow you to disengage attention . This means that the brain regions for attentional disengagement have greater access to the brain regions underlying the distraction, possibly making it easier to disengage. Other findings support this idea—more experienced meditators have increased connectivity between default mode and attention brain regions, and less default mode activity while meditating.

This might explain how it feels easier to “drop” thoughts as you become more experienced in meditation—and thus better able to focus. Thoughts become less sticky because your brain gets re-wired to be better at recognizing and disengaging from mind-wandering. And if you’ve ever struggled with rumination—re-living a negative experience over and over, or stressing (unproductively) about an upcoming event—you can appreciate how being able to let go of your thoughts could be a huge benefit. 

Indeed, the Killingsworth and Gilbert study I mentioned earlier found that when people’s minds were wandering, they tended to be less happy , presumably because our thoughts often tend towards negative rumination or stress. That’s why mindfulness meditation has become an increasingly important treatment of mental health difficulties like depression , anxiety , post-traumatic stress disorder , and even sexual dysfunction .

More on Mindfulness & Mind-Wandering

Learn more about how mind-wandering can make you unhappy

How mindful are you? Take our quiz!

Watch Jon Kabat-Zinn talk about mindfulness .

Reading all this might make you think that we’d be better off if we could live our lives in a constant state of laser-like, present moment focus. But a wandering mind isn’t all bad. Not only can we leverage it to build focus using FA meditation, but the capacity to project our mental stream out of the present and imagine scenarios that aren’t actually happening is hugely evolutionarily valuable, which may explain why it’s so prominent in our mental lives. These processes allow for creativity, planning, imagination, memory—capacities that are central not only to our survival, but also to the very essence of being human.

The key, I believe, is learning to become aware of these mental tendencies and to use them purposefully, rather than letting them take over. Meditation can help with that.

So don’t beat yourself up the next time you find yourself far away from where your mind was supposed to be. It’s the nature of the mind to wander. Use it as an opportunity to become more aware of your own mental experience. But you may still want to return to the present moment—so you can come up with an answer to that question everyone is waiting for.

About the Author

Wendy hasenkamp.

Wendy Hasenkamp, Ph.D., is a neuroscientist and Senior Scientific Officer at the Mind & Life Institute.

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Why Do Our Minds Wander?

A scientist says mind-wandering or daydreaming help prepare us for the future

Tim Vernimmen, Knowable Magazine

When psychologist Jonathan Smallwood set out to study mind-wandering about 25 years ago, few of his peers thought that was a very good idea. How could one hope to investigate these spontaneous and unpredictable thoughts that crop up when people stop paying attention to their surroundings and the task at hand? Thoughts that couldn’t be linked to any measurable outward behavior?

But Smallwood, now at Queen’s University in Ontario, Canada, forged ahead. He used as his tool a downright tedious computer task that was intended to reproduce the kinds of lapses of attention that cause us to pour milk into someone’s cup when they asked for black coffee. And he started out by asking study participants a few basic questions to gain insight into when and why minds tend to wander, and what subjects they tend to wander toward. After a while, he began to scan participants’ brains as well, to catch a glimpse of what was going on in there during mind-wandering.

Smallwood learned that unhappy minds tend to wander in the past, while happy minds often ponder the future . He also became convinced that wandering among our memories is crucial to help prepare us for what is yet to come. Though some kinds of mind-wandering — such as dwelling on problems that can’t be fixed — may be associated with depression , Smallwood now believes mind-wandering is rarely a waste of time. It is merely our brain trying to get a bit of work done when it is under the impression that there isn’t much else going on.

Smallwood, who coauthored an influential 2015 overview of mind-wandering research in the Annual Review of Psychology, is the first to admit that many questions remain to be answered.

This conversation has been edited for length and clarity.

Is mind-wandering the same thing as daydreaming, or would you say those are different?

I think it’s a similar process used in a different context. When you’re on holiday, and you’ve got lots of free time, you might say you’re daydreaming about what you’d like to do next. But when you’re under pressure to perform, you’d experience the same thoughts as mind-wandering.

I think it is more helpful to talk about the underlying processes: spontaneous thought, or the decoupling of attention from perception, which is what happens when our thoughts separate from our perception of the environment. Both these processes take place during mind-wandering and daydreaming.

It often takes us a while to catch ourselves mind-wandering. How can you catch it to study it in other people?

In the beginning, we gave people experimental tasks that were really boring, so that mind-wandering would happen a lot. We would just ask from time to time, “Are you mind-wandering?” while recording the brain’s activity in an fMRI scanner.

But what I’ve realized, after doing studies like that for a long time, is that if we want to know how thinking works in the real world, where people are doing things like watching TV or going for a run, most of the data we have are never going to tell us very much.

So we are now trying to study these situations . And instead of doing experiments where we just ask, “Are you mind-wandering?” we are now asking people a lot of different questions, like: “Are your thoughts detailed? Are they positive? Are they distracting you?”

How and why did you decide to study mind-wandering?

I started studying mind-wandering at the start of my career, when I was young and naive.

I didn’t really understand at the time why nobody was studying it. Psychology was focused on measurable, outward behavior then. I thought to myself: That’s not what I want to understand about my thoughts. What I want to know is: Why do they come, where do they come from, and why do they persist even if they interfere with attention to the here and now?

Around the same time, brain imaging techniques were developing, and they were telling neuroscientists that something happens in the brain even when it isn’t occupied with a behavioral task. Large regions of the brain, now called the default mode network , did the opposite: If you gave people a task, the activity in these areas went down.

When scientists made this link between brain activity and mind-wandering, it became fashionable. I’ve been very lucky, because I hadn’t anticipated any of that when I started my PhD, at the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow. But I’ve seen it all pan out.

Would you say, then, that mind-wandering is the default mode for our brains?

It turns out to be more complicated than that. Initially, researchers were very sure that the default mode network rarely increased its activity during tasks. But these tasks were all externally focused — they involved doing something in the outside world. When researchers later asked people to do a task that doesn’t require them to interact with their environment — like think about the future — that activated the default mode network as well.

More recently, we have identified much simpler tasks that also activate the default mode network. If you let people watch a series of shapes like triangles or squares on a screen, and every so often you surprise them and ask something — like, “In the last trial, which side was the triangle on?”— regions within the default mode network increase activity when they’re making that decision . That’s a challenging observation if you think the default mode network is just a mind-wandering system.

But what both situations have in common is the person is using information from memory. I now think the default mode network is necessary for any thinking based on information from memory — and that includes mind-wandering.

Would it be possible to demonstrate that this is indeed the case?

In a recent study, instead of asking people whether they were paying attention, we went one step further . People were in a scanner reading short factual sentences on a screen. Occasionally, we’d show them a prompt that said, “Remember,” followed by an item from a list of things from their past that they’d provided earlier. So then, instead of reading, they’d remember the thing we showed them. We could cause them to remember.

What we find is that the brain scans in this experiment look remarkably similar to mind-wandering. That is important: It gives us more control over the pattern of thinking than when it occurs spontaneously, like in naturally occurring mind-wandering. Of course, that is a weakness as well, because it’s not spontaneous. But we’ve already done lots of spontaneous studies.

When we make people remember things from the list, we recapitulate quite a lot of what we saw in spontaneous mind-wandering. This suggests that at least some of the activity we see when minds wander is indeed associated with the retrieval of memories. We now think the decoupling between attention and perception happens because people are remembering.

Have you asked people what their minds are wandering toward?

The past and future seem to really dominate people’s thinking . I think things like mind-wandering are attempts by the brain to make sense of what has happened, so that we can behave better in the future. I think this type of thinking is a really ingrained part of how our species has conquered the world. Almost nothing we’re doing at any moment in time can be pinpointed as only mattering then.

That’s a defining difference. By that, I don’t mean that other animals can’t imagine the future, but that our world is built upon our ability to do so, and to learn from the past to build a better future. I think animals that focused only on the present were outcompeted by others that remembered things from the past and could focus on future goals, for millions of years — until you got humans, a species that’s obsessed with taking things that happened and using them to gain added value for future behavior.

People are also, very often, mind-wandering about social situations . This makes sense, because we have to work with other people to achieve almost all of our goals, and other people are much more unpredictable than the Sun rising in the morning.

Though it is clearly useful, isn’t it also very depressing to keep returning to issues from the past?

It certainly can be. We have found that mind-wandering about the past tends to be associated with negative mood.

Let me give you an example of what I think may be happening. For a scientist like me, coming up with creative solutions to scientific problems through mind-wandering is very rewarding. But you can imagine that if my situation changes and I end up with a set of problems I can’t fix, the habit of going over the past may become difficult to break. My brain will keep activating the problem-solving system, even if it can’t do anything to fix the problem, because now my problems are things like getting divorced and my partner doesn’t want any more to do with me. If such a thing happens and all I’ve got is an imaginative problem-solving system, it’s not going to help me, it’s just going to be upsetting. I just have to let it go.

That’s where I think mindfulness could be useful, because the idea of mindfulness is to bring your attention to the moment. So if I’d be more mindful, I’d be going into problem-solving mode less often.

If you spend long enough practicing being in the moment, maybe that becomes a habit. It’s about being able to control your mind-wandering. Cognitive behavioral therapy for depression, which aims to help people change how they think and behave, is another way to reduce harmful mind-wandering.

Nowadays, it seems that many of the idle moments in which our minds would previously have wandered are now spent scrolling our phones. How do you think that might change how our brain functions?

The interesting thing about social media and mind-wandering, I think, is that they may have similar motivations. Mind-wandering is very social. In our studies , we’re locking people in small booths and making them do these tasks and they keep coming out and saying, “I’m thinking about my friends.” That’s telling us that keeping up with others is very important to people.

Social groups are so important to us as a species that we spend most of our time trying to anticipate what others are going to do, and I think social media is filling part of the gap that mind-wandering is trying to fill. It’s like mainlining social information: You can try to imagine what your friend is doing, or you can just find out online. Though, of course, there is an important difference: When you’re mind-wandering, you’re ordering your own thoughts. Scrolling social media is more passive.

Could there be a way for us to suppress mind-wandering in situations where it might be dangerous?

Mind-wandering can be a benefit and a curse, but I wouldn’t be confident that we know yet when it would be a good idea to stop it. In our studies at the moment, we are trying to map how people think across a range of different types of tasks. We hope this approach will help us identify when mind-wandering is likely to be useful or not — and when we should try to control it and when we shouldn’t.

For example, in our studies, people who are more intelligent don’t mind wander so often when the task is hard but can do it more when tasks are easy . It is possible that they are using the idle time when the external world is not demanding their attention to think about other important matters. This highlights the uncertainty about whether mind wandering is always a bad thing, because this sort of result implies it is likely to be useful under some circumstances.

This map — of how people think in different situations — has become very important in our research. This is the work I’m going to focus on now, probably for the rest of my career.

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How to Shut Off a "Wandering Brain" When You’re Trying to Sleep

Do you often find yourself lying in bed wide awake, unable to sleep at 3 a.m. because of a wondering brain? Research has shown that people with insomnia have difficulty shutting down mind-wandering brain regions at night, which makes it difficult, if not impossible, to fall asleep.

Racing thoughts at night not only disrupt your sleep, they also interfere with your ability to function the next day. One study found that insomniacs had to work harder at their jobs during the day than normal sleepers because they had trouble turning on brain regions necessary to perform memory tasks. [i]

Further, the people with insomnia had trouble shutting down brain regions used for daydreaming even during the day (so it’s no wonder their minds continued to wander at night, too). Dr. Sean Drummond of the University of California, who lead the study, said: [ii]

“Some aspects of insomnia are as much a daytime problem as a night-time one.”

Proper sleep isn’t only crucial for memory and focus during the day, of course. Too little sleep is linked to a shorter lifespan and chronic conditions like obesity, depression, diabetes, cancer and high blood pressure.

So if a wandering mind is preventing you from sleeping at night, taking action to quiet it could, quite literally, save your life.

Wandering Brain? 7 Ways to Get Your Sleep Back

Wouldn’t it be nice if there were an ‘off’ button for your brain? This way you could simply shut it off when racing thoughts are keeping you awake. The next best thing is to take steps to quiet your brain before bedtime and during the night, should you wake up. By using the tips that follow your brain will be just as ready for restful slumber as the rest of your body.

7. Write Your Worries on Paper

Do this well before bed by simply jotting down all those pesky worries and unfinished tasks in a notebook. This will clear them from your head and lessen the chances of waking up to ponder them. Be sure to make your worry list well before bedtime (you don’t want to write the list right before bed, as they’ll still be fresh in your mind when you want to sleep).

If you still find that you wake up with racing thoughts, keep a notepad by the side of your bed to write down thoughts in the middle of the night.

6. Deep Breathing

Quiet your mind chatter by taking slow deep breaths and purposefully focusing on each breath as you do so. Feel your lungs expand, your chest rise, the air flowing through your nose … then slowly exhale and repeat until you’re asleep.

5. Distract Your Brain

If your brain keeps wandering to anxiety-inducing thoughts, distract it by focusing on something else. Try to think of celebrity names that start with “A” or ‘sing’ your favorite song in your mind. Another trick is to put your fingers on the inside of your wrist to feel your pulse, and simply focus all of your attention on that.

4. Remove Disturbances from Your Bedroom

It’s important to minimize things that may wake you up from a sound sleep (allowing your mind to start wandering). Common sleep disturbances include pets, a snoring partner, light pollution, temperature (typically too warm) and noise. Try adding pink noise to your bedroom and using an eye mask to create a quiet, dark environment that is conducive to sound sleep.

3. Think Positive

Turn your wandering nighttime mind from stressful thoughts to positive ones. Focus on an enjoyable event in your life or imagine yourself in your favorite location, such as at the beach or hiking through a forest. Mentally transfer yourself to your happy place.

2. Get Out of Bed

If you’ve tried the above tips and still can’t sleep, don’t force yourself to lie in bed. Get up, grab a cup of chamomile tea and read something (calming). When you feel yourself nodding off, get back into bed.

1. Try GABA — a Natural Brain Quieter

Gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA) is a neurotransmitter known for its inhibitory effect on nerves, essentially helping them to calm down.

Low levels of GABA are linked to mood and anxiety disorders, which is why some anxiety medications and hypnotics like Ambien and Lunesta actually work by increasing GABA activity. These drugs are linked to serious and bizarre side effects (like sleep eating, sleep sex and sleep driving!), so I can’t recommend their use.

However, GABA in its natural form can be invaluable. When taken orally, one study found that GABA worked effectively as a natural relaxant, inducing relaxation and diminishing anxiety within one hour of taking it. [iii] When you don’t have enough GABA, you may have racing thoughts and other feelings of anxiety that make it nearly impossible to sleep. GABA is known for essentially shutting off brain activity and reducing feelings of anxiety that keep you awake.

• Magnesium citrate
• Valerian root
• Lemon balm leaf
• Hops flower
• Passion flower

Just take two capsules of Sleepzyme approximately one hour before bed each night with an 8 oz. glass of water to calm your mind chatter and get some sleep .

[i] Sleep. 2013 Sep 1;36(9):1307-16.

[ii] Daily Express August 31, 2013

[iii] Biofactors. 2006;26(3):201-8.

Jesse Cannone, CFT, CPRS, MFT

Jesse is the co-founder and visionary CEO of The Healthy Back Institute®, the world-leading source of natural back pain solutions. His mission as a former back pain sufferer is to help others live pain free without surgery and pharmaceuticals.

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4 thoughts on “How to Shut Off a "Wandering Brain" When You’re Trying to Sleep”

Hello, I am a counsellor from Canada (hence the double “L” in counsellor) and have been practicing for over 30 years, Regarding the information about the “Wandering Brain” and sleep problems; these are great tips for promoting a better sleep habit. Tip 3, 5, 6, and 7 also work for feeling “stressed and “anxious” during the day. My observation is that the underlying concept/idea behind these techniques is rarely discussed in a clear way. This is the concept of being “present to the moment”; thus, anything that promotes the application of a present focus, works to calm a “wandering mind”. I think the interesting thing about this unifying concept, is that anything you do that is present focused, helps with sleep and anxiety problems, leaving the door wide open for all sorts of “techniques” and practices, well beyond whatever is written in the literature. And if you have ever slept badly, or are anxious, various “techniques” can all work, but can also fail to work at times, so the more things/techniques you can try out the better. Does your team have any comments about this observation?

I could not agree more, and in 2014 we will be researching and seeking out “all sorts” of techniques to help individuals work toward not only optimal health but also optimal state of being…

Here’s a crazy thing that I read about–and always works for me. Focus on totally relaxing two things: yout TONGUE and the EYEBALLS. I will take ten deep breaths and just focus on one of them. Then I take another 10 deep breaths and focus on the other. If I am not asleep yet, I just do the same and focus on both. It never fails!

A combination of zinc, magnesium and calcium taken together helps induce sleep in most people in 30 to 45 minutes, with no grogginess on wake up. It is the combination that produces the effect in the brain and nervous system. You can purchase them in a combination product from several of the better vitamin suppliers or just combine 1 of each if you already have them separately in your vitamin inventory. Just normal dose for each 35-50 mg zinc, 300-500mg Mag. and 700-1000mg Calcium – and preferably not on a full stomach before bed.

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How to Stop Your Mind from Wandering

Last Updated: August 6, 2021 References

This article was co-authored by Ni-Cheng Liang, MD . Dr. Ni-Cheng Liang is a board certified Pulmonologist and the Director of Pulmonary Integrative Medicine at Coastal Pulmonary Associates affiliated with the Scripps Health Network in San Diego, California. She also serves as a Voluntary Assistant Professor of Medicine at the University of California San Diego School of Medicine while volunteering for the UCSD Medical Student-Run Free Clinic for uninsured patients. With over 15 years of experience, Dr. Liang specializes in pulmonary and respiratory medical concerns, mindfulness teaching, physician wellness, and integrative medicine. Dr. Liang received her Doctor of Medicine (MD) from the University of Maryland School of Medicine. Dr. Liang was voted as a San Diego Top Doctor in 2017 and 2019. She was also awarded the 2019 American Lung Association San Diego Lung Health Provider of the Year. There are 12 references cited in this article, which can be found at the bottom of the page. This article has been viewed 28,589 times.

It’s normal for the human mind to wander. There are so many different things filling your mind and pulling your thoughts in different directions. This isn’t always a bad thing, either. If you’re a creative person, a wandering mind can spark a new creative project. However, wandering thoughts can also prevent you from getting things done, keep you up at night, or hurt your mental health if you spend your whole day thinking anxious thoughts. Luckily, with some practice and the right techniques, you can learn to focus your mind on the present and control your thoughts to keep them from racing all over the place when you don’t want them to!

Doing Exercises and Activities

• You can also look up different breathing exercises , such as yogic breathing or deep throat breathing, and try those out to find something that works for you.

• For example, if you work in an office and you get 15 minute breaks, you could go outside and go for a 10 minute walk around the block to clear your head.
• If you work from home, you could take a 15-30 minute break and clean and organize your home office space. A clean workspace can also help you focus!

• Try combining this period of doing nothing with slow breathing or another type of breathing exercise. This can help keep your mind from wandering for these 10-15 minutes and calm your thoughts down.
• For example, if you work at home and find that you can’t concentrate, take a break and go sit on your balcony or lay down on your bed, away from your laptop and work things. Do nothing for at least 10 minutes and see how it affects your racing thoughts.

Tip : Stay off your phone and other electronics during this time. If you spend the time on social media, for example, you're not giving your mind a rest. Truly try to do nothing at all other than just sit or lay there.

• For example, if you’re feeling stressed, you could use a simple phrase like “everything is OK” or “life is beautiful.”
• Single word mantras you can try include “strong,” “calm,” and “finish.” These could work well if you’re trying to power through something like a run or a chore without getting distracted.

• You can search online for meditation techniques or download something like a mindfulness app to help you if you’re totally new to meditating. Meditation takes practice, but stick with it and you might find that you really benefit from it!
• The classic mantra for focusing on meditation is just “om.” You could try repeating this out loud or in your head while you meditate.

Controlling Anxious Thoughts

• This can also help you organize your anxious thoughts, so you can address their causes later on.
• For example, if you’re having trouble sleeping because you can’t stop thinking about everything you have to do tomorrow, try writing down a to-do list to get the thoughts out of your head and help you get to sleep.

• For example, if you are worried about turning a project in to your boss, think about ways it could help your career if your boss really loves your work.
• Say you’re studying for a test in a topic that you find difficult and you keep thinking about what will happen if you fail the test, so it’s hard to focus on studying. Instead, try thinking about how great you can do on the test and how it will boost your grade if you study hard.

• For example, you might be avoiding putting a big report together at work because it’s slow and tedious, but you find your mind wandering to this task that’s hanging over you. Set aside time in each day to work on the report, so you make progress instead of just dreading it.

• For example, if you can’t seem to focus on anything because all you’re thinking about is your ongoing divorce, maybe seeing a therapist to talk about it would help you control those thoughts.
• If your mind is wandering because you’re frustrated about something at work, maybe getting a coffee with a coworker you trust and talking to them about whatever the issue is will help calm your mind.

Tip : If you think you might have clinical-level anxiety, it’s always best to talk to a professional about it. They can provide you with a professional treatment to help you get it under control.

• For instance, say you’re having trouble focusing on being present with your family over a long weekend because you’re worried about something at work. Try to accept that in this particular moment you can’t do anything about your work tasks and focus on enjoying the family time.

• For example, if your mind is continuously thinking about what it would be like to work in a different job, it might be time to consider a career change and start looking for another position.
• If you keep thinking about a conflict with a colleague you’re having at work, it might help calm your thoughts to sit down with them and talk about it.

Focusing on Tasks

• Any activities you do throughout your day can be considered tasks. For instance, when you’re eating your lunch, try to focus just on your lunch. Don’t try to multitask and work or study while you eat.
• If you’re talking to someone, try to focus 100% on the conversation and not let yourself get distracted by noises or other people around you. After the conversation is over, move on to your next task.
• If you need to put together a presentation for a work meeting, focus on getting the presentation totally done before you move onto another task like checking your email or looking at data.

Tip : Training your brain to focus on 1 thing is just like training your body. It can be hard at first, but with practice you can learn to control your mind and focus it on the task at hand.

• For example, if you work in an office with a bunch of other people around, it can be tempting to look around the room to find the culprit any time someone coughs or sneezes. Don’t let yourself do this!
• If you have to sit next to a window and there is something going on outside that distracts you, such as a building under construction, practice not looking out the window every time a crane moves.
• You can also try removing distractions in settings like classrooms and offices by closing drapes or blinds to block your view or putting in headphones to block out noise.

• For example, you could give yourself a free thinking period from 5:30-6:00 every day. During this time, don’t try to work, study, or get any other tasks done. For these 30 minutes, let yourself think about any worries you have or do any planning you need to do.
• Say you keep thinking about an upcoming vacation and all the things you still need to do to get ready. Instead of letting your mind wander to it all day, designate a time block during which you can do things like making a packing list or researching sites you want to visit, then refocus on your other tasks.

Expert Q&A

• Mini-interactions with nature can help you feel more calm and focus on the present. For example, if you go for a walk to try and calm your thoughts, try walking barefoot across some grass or touching some trees and leaves in a park. [19] X Research source Thanks Helpful 2 Not Helpful 0
• Everyone has days during which their mind wanders more than normal and it feels impossible to get things done. It’s OK to take a day off work and stay home to help relieve stress, calm your mind, and stay healthy mentally. Thanks Helpful 2 Not Helpful 2

• Persistent anxious thoughts can be a sign of a bigger mental disorder. If you can’t get your anxiety under control on your own, see a licensed therapist who can help you develop a treatment plan. [20] X Research source Thanks Helpful 1 Not Helpful 1

You Might Also Like

• ↑ Ni-Cheng Liang, MD. Board Certified Pulmonologist. Expert Interview. 18 June 2021.
• ↑ https://ggia.berkeley.edu/practice/mindful_breathing
• ↑ https://rachelfintzy.com/20-tips-to-stop-your-mind-from-wandering-and-overthinking/
• ↑ https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/women-s-mental-health-matters/201604/5-ways-stop-your-racing-thoughts
• ↑ https://greatergood.berkeley.edu/article/item/how_to_focus_a_wandering_mind
• ↑ https://www.fastcompany.com/90300162/ask-yourself-these-four-questions-when-your-mind-starts-to-wander
• ↑ https://www.mind.org.uk/information-support/types-of-mental-health-problems/anxiety-and-panic-attacks/self-care/
• ↑ https://adaa.org/tips
• ↑ https://www.successconsciousness.com/blog/concentration-mind-power/how-to-keep-your-mind-from-wandering/
• ↑ https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/your-brain-work/200910/easily-distracted
• ↑ https://www.k-state.edu/counseling/topics/career/concentr.html
• ↑ https://www.forbes.com/sites/alicegwalton/2017/11/08/7-ways-to-pull-your-wandering-mind-back-into-the-present-moment/#785965da3314

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Mind Racing Before Sleep? Here Are Strategies to Fall Sleep Peacefully

Published on June 30, 2020 Reading Time: 3 minutes Dr. Carl Rosenberg

“I just can’t turn my brain off at night.” This is one common complaint among those who struggle with insomnia and others who have difficulty falling asleep. Worrying about daily stressors, like work and finances, counting the minutes that go by, and imagining how tired you will be in the morning…it can be an irritating problem.

If your thoughts are keeping you up at night, the trick is to change the unhealthy pattern. We have provided some information on the cause of this problem and strategies to help you find relief from a racing mind at night.

Racing Mind and Anxiety

Rapid thoughts are often a symptom associated with anxiety. They can make people feel out of control or as if they are going crazy.

When it comes to sleep, this effect of anxiety is a cyclical problem. Because your brain struggles to focus when it is tired, it often leads to racing thoughts. Anxiety and racing thoughts then keep you awake, a lack of sleep is bothersome, and sleep deprivation continues to contribute to anxiety. So, how can we break this cycle of anxiety and sleeplessness?

Find out more about symptoms of insomnia and CBTi – an Effective, Drug-Free Treatment for Insomnia .

This infographic provides some advice for calming your brain and getting to sleep faster.

How to Get to Sleep when Your Mind Is Racing

If you are frustrated and tired, try these cognitive behavioral therapy techniques. You may discover a more relaxing and effective way to get the sleep you need.

Don’t Lie Awake in Bed

This can be a very frustrating problem that seems to become worse the more you think about it. It’s imperative that you break this vicious cycle of poor sleep and worry about not sleeping. For this reason, we recommend avoiding lying awake in bed. If you haven’t nodded off within 20 minutes of putting your head on the pillow, get up. Go back to your relaxing activity – journaling, reading, meditation, listening to music…Then, when you begin to feel sleepy, try to go back to bed.

This CBTi technique is called stimulus control . It may sound counter-productive, but many people find that engaging in a relaxing activity outside of bed helps occupy the brain in a positive way. This works to break the negative association that insomniacs and restless sleepers often develop in relation to bedtime.

Calm Your Mind

Relaxation training is what many commonly associate with calming exercises. Though these methods may feel silly at first, guided imagery, medication, and mindfulness are all beneficial for a racing mind. More specifically, you can focus on slowing your breath and using progressive muscle relaxation to take your mind off stressors.

Free Your Thoughts

It’s difficult to fall asleep when you are making lists of things to do and worrying about family, work, money, and other challenges. Rather than trying to simply ignore these thoughts, try to eliminate them from your thought patterns before bed. In the evening, you should get in the habit of identifying stressors by journaling and writing down lists for yourself. Once the ideas are on paper, you may find that you’ve freed up your mind.

Keep It Positive

To break the cycle of racing thoughts and worrying about lack of sleep , highlight the positive aspects of your life. Keeping a gratitude journal can help disrupt the negative mindset. Making this type of journaling a habit, gives you the opportunity to emphasize the good relationships and features that you are thankful for in your life.

Focus on Your Senses

To take the focus away from stressful thoughts, create a wind-down routine around sensorial experience. Lower the lights and consider a relaxing way to stimulate each of the five senses to find a method that works well for you. Here are some ideas.

• Sight – guided imagery, coloring mandalas , pictures of a peaceful place
• Smell – scented candle, aromatherapy
• Touch – warm bath, weighted blanket , self-massage, light yoga
• Taste – sleep-friendly snack , chamomile tea
• Hear – sound machine, white noise, instrumental music

Make the Bedroom Your Haven for Sleep

It’s important to reserve the bedroom for sleep and make it a relaxing space. This means keeping it neat and furnishing it with colors and textures that you find soothing, rather than stimulating. Keep work materials, computers, and screens out of the bedroom.

Good sleep hygiene includes turning the temperature down in the bedroom and using shades or curtains to make it dark and help induce sleep. To avoid counting minutes and worrying about not having enough time to get the rest you need, keep alarms and clocks away from the bed.

Want more advice? Check out these 10 Tips for Falling Asleep Faster .

Always Feeling Tired? Find the Solution

Contact Sleep Health Solutions of Ohio for a full sleep evaluation and begin the journey to a more rested life.

Written by Dr. Carl Rosenberg

Dr. Rosenberg is specialized in sleep medicine and neurology. He is also certified by the American Board of Sleep Disorders Medicine and the American Board of Psychology and Neurology. Patients with a wide range of issues are referred for sleep studies and he works together with them to find effective solutions that fit their lifestyle.

Dr. Carl Rosenberg frequently blogs for Sleep Health Solutions Read other articles written by Dr. Carl Rosenberg

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Why your brain may be "sleeping" when your eyes are wide open

A new understanding of sleep may explain why the mind wanders.

The classical idea of sleep is that it's an all-or-nothing phenomenon. If someone is responsive, they are awake. If they are not awake, they are in snooze-town.

This concept is bolstered by what we observe in the brain. Tests that detect electrical activity show this activity looks different during wakefulness and sleep, and especially during deep sleep. Slow wave activity is most common during our deepest moments of slumber, a beating rhythm of neurons linked to memory and learning consolidation.

But this view of one of, if not the most , quintessential parts of life is changing. Recent research suggests various parts of the brain can be in different sleep states, regardless of whether a person is, from a behavioral perspective, awake or asleep.

This idea lends itself to an emerging concept — the phenomenon of “local sleep,” explored by Thomas Andrillon and colleagues in a study recently published in the journal Nature Communications .

During local sleep, brains can show signs of the slow waves seen in deep sleep despite the person whose cranium holds that brain being awake. This study suggests slow waves during waking hours may predict when the mind wanders or when it goes blank.

It also means the relationship between sleep and consciousness is more tangled than previously realized.

“Sleep, from a brain perspective, is a complex, multifaceted phenomenon,” Andrillon, a research fellow at the Paris Brain Institute and Monash University, tells me.

“In particular, sometimes, different parts of the brain can be in different wake or sleep states. The boundary between wake and sleep is therefore far more fluid than previously thought.”

Searching for slow waves

When your mind goes blank, it means you’re awake but feel empty of mind; your stream of consciousness has come to a halt. Mind-wandering, meanwhile, is when your focus drifts to thoughts unrelated to the task at hand — like when you’re thinking about what you should have said during an argument earlier in the day while you’re answering emails at night.

“Why do we spend so much time not paying attention to our environment?”

Daydreaming, Andrillon says, is a form of mind-wandering, but it is also “fundamentally different.” Daydreaming is more elaborate than most mind-wandering, and its neural mechanisms could be quite distinct, too. He should know: “I am a frequent, and perhaps too frequent, daydreamer.”

Andrillon’s academic interest in both daydreaming and mind-wandering is rooted in longstanding questions like: Why do we spend so much time not paying attention to our environment? What happens in the brain during these moments?

To determine the answers to these questions and more, Andrillon and colleagues recruited 26 people and recorded their whole brain electrical activity while they completed a boring task for almost two hours. Every 30 to 70 seconds, the researchers interrupted the participants and asked them whether their mental state was mind-wandering, mind-blanking, or task-focused — as well as how tired they were.

The idea here, Andrillon explains, is that mind-wandering, for example, “could be associated with parts of the brain sleeping while the rest is awake,” Andrillon says.

Mind-wandering “could be associated with parts of the brain sleeping while the rest is awake.”

Subsequent analysis revealed that before their minds started to wander, slow waves started emerging in frontal brain areas. Meanwhile, if slow waves appeared in rear regions of the brain, such as the parietal lobe, they tended to be followed by mind blanking.

When these shifts happen in the brain, past research suggests they occur spontaneously — without the knowledge or will of the person.

The study team proposes these states of mind may be explained by “sleep-like, low-frequency, high-amplitude waves” and the occurrence of slow waves predicted the time of attentional lapse.

Local sleep, a concept to explore

There’s a reason Andrillion hedges the findings’ implications. Because of the non-invasive nature of the study, the researchers don’t have complete access to the neural activity of individual brain regions. This makes it difficult to tell if specific regions were actually sleeping and which ones were not.

“What we have is something that looks like sleep, which is an important distinction,” he says.

Andrillion hypothesizes local sleep is a function of saving up energy. It could be “the equivalent of a ‘battery saver,’” he says, something that allows you to “switch off parts of your brain so that you can slow down the accumulation of fatigue and save up your resources for later.”

In a way, this is why his team is interested in examining the brain activity during sleep and wakefulness in individuals with ADHD . Attentional issues often go hand-in-hand with sleep problems if you have ADHD. It’s possible local sleep could help explain why.

The researchers also want to learn if the mechanisms that drive slow waves during wakefulness are the same as the ones produced during sleep — and they want to build ways of predicting these transitions.

“It would be great to see if we could use slow waves to detect mind-wandering and lapses of attention in real-time and in real-life settings,” Andrillion says.

This article was originally published on July 11, 2021

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Mind wandering and stress: When you don’t like the present moment

Alexandra d. crosswell.

1 Department of Psychiatry, University of California, San Francisco

Michael Coccia

Elissa epel, associated data.

Buddhist philosophy and existing empirical evidence suggest that being engaged in – and accepting – the present moment is associated with greater well-being. However, engaging with the present moment experience and ignoring unwanted thoughts is difficult given the nature of our minds and the competing demands for our attention. This may be especially true when experiencing stress, during which acceptance may be particularly difficult. This study examines inter- and intra-individual variability in how psychological stress influences daily mind states, and how mind states are related to affect. For 21 days, women (n=183; half chronically stressed, half low-stress controls) reported levels of mind wandering, engagement with and rejection of their current moment experience, positive and negative affect, and quality of connection to their spouse. Women under chronic stress reported more evening mind wandering, less engagement, and more rejection of the moment, compared to low stress controls. These mind states were in turn associated with worse evening mood. Daily contextual factors, specifically, objectively coded daily stress exposure and quality of connection with spouse (a known stress buffer), influenced evening mind states. Results provide evidence that psychological stress interferes with daily attention while positive social connection enhances attentional quality.

1. Introduction

The importance of the quality of daily consciousness for psychological well-being is a foundational component of many contemplative traditions and practices. One such quality that has received increased attention in academic research has been mindfulness. Mindfulness is commonly defined as the state of being acutely attentive to and aware of what is taking place in the current moment, and experiencing clarity and vividness in that moment ( Brown & Ryan, 2003 ). Dispositional mindfulness is thought to vary between people, and also within people at the daily level ( Brown & Ryan, 2003 ).

Empirical research supports an association between higher self-reported dispositional mindfulness and many facets of well-being. Greater dispositional mindfulness is associated with lower rates of many major psychological disorders ( Keng, Smoski, & Robins, 2011 ), higher levels of subjective well-being (i.e. higher positive affect and satisfaction with life; Brown & Ryan, 2003 ; Mrazek, Smallwood, & Schooler, 2012 ), and better physical health (e.g. Loucks et al., 2015 , 2016 ). A stress-buffering hypothesis may explain some of the benefits of trait mindfulness, such that being more mindful mitigates stress appraisals, reduces stress-reactivity, and speeds recovery from stress arousal ( Creswell & Lindsay, 2014 ; Crosswell et al., 2017 ). Benefits of mindfulness may also operate by improving social relationships. For example, higher levels of dispositional mindfulness, as well as participating in mindfulness-based trainings, is beneficial for romantic relationship functioning ( Barnes, Brown, Krusemark, Campbell, & Rogge, 2007 ).

Beyond the influence of trait level mindfulness, being in a mindful state more frequently in daily life is assumed to be associated with greater subjective well-being. However, this assumption has infrequently been tested, likely because it requires intensive daily level data collection. Variation in daily mind states – states such as mindfulness, focused attention, and an opposing construct, mind wandering can be captured through daily diary or ecological momentary assessment to examine how such states influence well-being. As an example of this methodology, when workers were paged multiple times throughout a working day and asked where their attention was, reporting active engagement in the present moment was associated with feeling more creative, free, active, alert and satisfied. This was even true if their current task was something they would not do if they had a choice ( Csikszentmihalyi, 2014 p. 10). Felsman et al. (2017) also demonstrated the association between present moment engagement and increased daily well-being. In a study of undergraduates who reported on their mind states five times a day, being in a better mood at one assessment predicted more present focused attention at the next assessment. There have only been a handful of studies linking daily engagement in the moment and daily well-being indices, though a larger body of literature has examined the role of mind wandering on daily affect.

In a now classic study of daily mind wandering and mood, Killingsworth & Gilbert (2010) found that when participants were asked at random times throughout the day what they were thinking about in that moment, participants reported mind wandering nearly 50 percent of the time. When they were mind wandering, they reported greater negative affect, and lagged analyses showed that mind wandering prospectively predicted negative mood, while negative mood did not predict mind wandering. A series of studies have followed from this initial finding to explore the nuanced relationship between mind states and mood. One key finding from these additional studies is that the impact of mind wandering on mood depends on the content of the thoughts. For example, a 7-day daily diary study in a healthy community sample found that mind wandering predicted negative mood only when the content of the mind wandering was reported as ‘sad’ or ‘anxious’ mind wandering, but not for ‘happy’ or ‘calm’ mind wandering ( Poerio, Totterdell, & Miles, 2013 ). Similarly, Ruby et al. (2013) found that mind wandering about past and other-oriented thoughts was associated with negative mood while mind wandering about future and self-oriented thoughts was associated with positive mood. This parralels a large body of acute stress research which demonstrates that ruminating about past experiences prolongs stress-related affective and physiological activation ( Brosschot, Gerin, & Thayer, 2006 ), while thinking about the future may speed recovery from acute stress ( Engert, Smallwood, & Singer, 2014 ). Further, future thinking may help facilitate the development of concrete personal goals ( Medea et al., 2018 ). These results suggest that influence of specific mind states are more complex than a simple dichotomy between being actively engaged in the moment and having thoughts unrelated to the current moment experience (mind wandering). Examining how daily mind states influences psychological well-being requires more nuanced measurement of these mind states, as we seek to do in the current study.

One understudied daily mind state we explore in the current study is rejecting the present moment . Within Buddhist philosophy, being dissatisfied with what is, in other words, wanting things to be other than the way they are, is the source of suffering in life ( Ekman, Davidson, Ricard, & Alan Wallace, 2005 ). This mind state of rejecting the moment is similar to the clinical construct of experiential avoidance ( Hayes, Wilson, & Gifford, 1996 ). Experiential avoidance is the tendency to withdraw from uncomfortable inner experiences (e.g. thoughts, memories, bodily sensations) and takes steps to alter those experiences, regardless of whether those steps lead to better or worse outcomes. Experiential avoidance is associated with a wide range of clinical problems and lower quality of life ( Hayes et al., 2004 ). Rejecting the present moment is the opposite of accepting and engaging with the present moment non-judgmentally (mindful state), and has yet to be explored empirically. In the current study we explore how rejecting the present may be associated with an unpleasant mood or other daily well-being indices.

What mind states are experienced and at what frequency in daily life is likely dependent on the context of one’s life, though studies of mind wandering have tended to ignore how individual-level contextual factors influence daily mind states. One important contextual factor influencing daily mind sates may be perception of daily demands. At the trait level, high subjective perceived stress (when environmental demands outweigh one’s resources to cope adequately; Lazarus & Folkman, 1984 ) is associated with lower trait mindfulness ( Bränström, Duncan, & Moskowitz, 2011 ) and higher trait mind-wandering ( Mrazek, Phillips, Franklin, Broadway, & Schooler, 2013 ). Furthermore, decades of research from lab-based studies suggest that inducing states of acute stress immediately alters thoughts and emotions. For example, before an acute stress task (e.g. giving an impromptu speech), cognitions change to anticipatory thoughts (worries about the upcoming task), and after the task, they switch to ruminations about performance. Smallwood et al. (2009) has also shown that inducing negative mood states increases mind wandering. Despite evidence from observational and lab studies linking acute stress and alterations in thought patterns, it is unknown how being under chronic stress, or experiencing a daily stressor, alters daily mind states.

Because of the limited research examining the daily-level cognitive consequences of naturalistic stress states, the goal of the current study is to examine how chronic stress, daily stressors, and daily connection to one’s partner (a stress buffer) influence daily mind states. The mind states we focus on are engagement in and rejection of the present moment, as well as experiences of mind wandering about neutral, pleasant, and unpleasant topics. We examine mind states in the context of the chronic stress of caregiving as a way to deconstruct how long term states of distress alter consciousness at the daily level. Examination of daily level data enables us to examine how fluctuations in day-to-day experiences within individuals (i.e. person-level daily fluctuation in level of stress and social connection) influence mind states that evening, independent of trait-level effects (i.e. controlling for the person’s average across all days). Thus, we are more accurately able to capture the lived experienced of the interplay between the social world and our mind states.

This study examines the daily life of 183 mid-life women who were recruited as either high or low in chronic stress. Chronically stressed women were mothers of a child diagnosed with an autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and who reported above average levels of perceived psychological stress at the baseline assessment; low stress women were mothers of neurotypical children and who reported below average levels of perceived stress. Participants completed 21 days of daily reports (completed once a day, in the evening) on mind states, mood, stressful events, and connection with their spouse. Using this methodology, we are able to test (1) the between-person impact of chronic stress on evening mind states, (2) the within-person fluctuation of evening mind states on evening mood controlling for the person’s average mind state, and (3) the within-person fluctuation of daily stress exposure and daily social connection on that evening’s mind states.

We had three hypotheses. First, we expected that women under chronic stress (caregivers) would report lower levels of engagement in the moment, greater rejection of the moment, more mind wandering, as well as a greater number of high stressor days than women in the control group. Second, hypothesized that daily fluctuation in mind states from one’s typical or average mind state would be associated with changes in that evening’s mood, such that an increase in engagement, and decrease in rejection and mind wandering would be associated with more positive and less negative evening mood. Third, we tested whether the context of the day predicted mind states that night. We hypothesized that daily stressors and quality of daily connection with their partner would influence mind states that evening. Specifically, on days when participants reported experiencing an objectively coded stressful event (“stress days”), we expected participants to report less engagement, more rejection, and more mind wandering that evening; and, on days when participants reported more positive social connection with their partner, we expected participants to report greater engagement, less rejection, and less mind wandering.

2.1. Participants

Participants were 183 mothers from a prospective study that examined the impact of chronic caregiving stress on cellular aging. Ninety-two participants were mothers of children with autism spectrum disorder and 91 were age-matched low stress mothers of neurotypical children. These two groups were recruited to maximize differences in chronic stress. Eligibility included: a) age 20 to 50 years, b) at least one child between the ages of 2 and 16 years old, c) no current psychiatric conditions (including depression for the mothers of neurotypical children), and d) nonsmoker. For chronically stressed mothers, additional inclusion criteria were: caring for a child diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder, and Perceived Stress Scale ( Cohen, Kamarck, & Mermelstein, 1983 ) score ≥ 13. For control participants, additional inclusion criteria were: caring for a neurologically typical child, and Perceived Stress Scale score ≤ 19. Recruitment took place in the San Francisco Bay Area, through mass mailings and advertisements in schools, local parenting publications, and direct recruitment in the University of California San Francisco (UCSF) Autism Clinic.

2.2. Procedures

Participants came in to the research lab for a baseline assessment during which they completed demographic and psychosocial questionnaires, computer-based cognitive tasks, and blood draws. In addition, participants completed online daily reports in the morning and evening for 7 days. Evening reports included whether there was a stressful event that day, self-reported quality of their interactions with their partner, and mood and mind states within the last 30 minutes. This protocol was repeated 9, 18, and 24 months later. Because there was an intervention between the 18 and 24 month time point, analyses presented here do not include 24 month assessment data. For the daily level analyses, participants have up to 21 days of data (7 days of reporting over 3 data collection bursts). The UCSF institutional review board approved this research. Informed consent was obtained from all participants.

2.3. Measures

2.3.1. mind states., engagement in and rejection of the moment..

Engagement in the moment was captured with the item: “How often in the in the last 30 minutes have you felt totally focused and engaged in doing what you were doing at the moment?” Rejection of the moment was captured with the item: “How often in the last 30 minutes have you felt you didn’t want to be where you were or doing what you were doing at the moment?” The scale was a slider scale including anchors of not at all, somewhat, and a lot with scores ranging from 0 – 100. This variable was rescaled 0 – 5 to match the response scale of the mood outcome measure more closely.

Mind wandering.

Frequency and emotional valence of wandering thoughts were captured in the evening with three items that asked about thoughts and attention within the last 30 minutes. Items were: “How often in the last 30 minutes, instead of thinking about what you were doing at that moment were you thinking about something else that was: a) pleasant, b) unpleasant, and c) neutral?” These items were adapted from a previous study on mind wandering ( Killingsworth & Gilbert, 2010 ). The scale was a slider scale including anchors of not at all, somewhat, and a lot with scores ranging from 0 – 100, and was also rescaled 0–5.

2.3.2. Evening mood.

In the evening log, participants were asked to rate how much they felt a range of emotions that evening on a scale from 0 (not at all) to 4 (extremely; Fredrickson, Tugade, & Waugh, 2003 ). Twelve positive items (e.g. “I felt awe, wonder, amazement”) and twelve negative items (e.g. “I felt angry, irritated, frustrated”) were averaged in to positive and negative affect subscales. Alphas for these subscales were .87 for negative mood and .94 for positive mood.

2.3.3. Psychological stress.

Daily stress..

In each evening log, participants wrote in detail about the event that caused them the most stress that day. Objective coders then reviewed the written text and assigned a severity score based on standard scoring ( Almeida, Wethington, & Kessler, 2002 ). Rating categories were: 0 (no stressor occurred), 1 (low severity event), 2 (medium severity event), 3 (high severity event), and 4 (extreme severity event). Across the 21 days of data collection, participants reported experiencing low severity events just over half of the days (55% of the time) and medium severity events on one-third of the days (34% of the time). Days with no stress and severe stress were rare (2.5% and .8% respectively). A dichotomous variable was created by categorizing codes 0 and 1 as ‘no stress’ days, and codes 2, 3, and 4 as ‘stress days.’

Perceived stress.

General perceptions of stress were assessed with the 10-item Perceived Stress Scale ( Cohen et al., 1983 ) completed at baseline, 9, and 18 months. Participants used a 5-point scale ranging from 0 (not at all) to 4 (almost all the time) to rate items such as “How often have you felt unable to control the important things in your life?” “How often have you felt nervous or stressed?” and “How often have you felt confident about your ability to handle personal problems?” (reverse coded).

2.3.4. Daily quality of social connection with marital partner.

In the evening log, participants reported on their sense of closeness with their marital partner that day. Three items captured positive aspects of interactions with the partner that day: “To what extend did you feel respected by your partner today?” “To what extent were you satisfied with your partner today?” “To what extent did you talk to your partner to get comfort, emotional support, or help with something that upset you?” The scale was a slider scale including anchors of not at all, somewhat, and a lot with scores ranging from 0 – 100, and was also rescaled 0 – 5. The three items were averaged within each day to create a daily ‘social connection’ score. The alpha for this scale was .65.

2.4. Analytic Method

Twenty-one days of daily diary data were captured in three 7-day increments during the baseline, 9 month, and 18 month study assessment points. The average number of days of diary reports completed was 18 (SD=5, range 1–21), meaning that the analysis dataset consisted of 183 (subjects) × 18 (days) = 3,294 evening reports.

We analyzed our data using a multilevel model that specified a within-subject process of daily variation in mood, mind states, and partner social connection following Bolger & Laurenceau (2013) . Our predictor variables (i.e. engagement, rejection, daily stress, and daily positive partner connection) were decomposed into their within-subject state and between-subject trait components. Within-subject state variables were computed by subtracting each participant’s individual 21 day average from each of their daily scores. Between-subject trait variables were computed by subtracting the overall sample average from each participant’s individual 21 day average. Both the within-subject state and between-subject trait variables were included in the models, with the within-subject variables at Level 1 and the between-subject trait variables at Level 2. In this way we are able to test how daily fluctuation in our predictors, in relation to the person’s general level of that predictor (as captured with weekly average), are associated with our outcomes. The model equation is provided in the Online Supplemental Material .

To confirm there was enough within-subject daily variation in each variable to run these models, we ran empty models for each outcome and found that the estimates of the intercept was substantially larger that its standard error, indicating that there appears to be significant variation in the daily level outcomes. Approximately 43–51% of the variance in all our predictor and outcome variables was within-subject, indicating that while there was (as expected), between-subject variation in amount of daily mind wandering, social connection, and mood, much of the daily variation took place within individuals. Our analyses primarily focused on understanding these intra-individual daily variations in order to test our hypotheses about the relationship daily mind states and daily well-being indices.

We chose to use 21 days of data when the data was collected in three distinct collection bursts (at baseline, 9 months, and 18 months) for several reasons. Twenty-one days of data captures a more reliable average of the person’s normal functioning than one week of data, and provides enough opportunity for variation in our variables of interest (e.g. stress day) in order to test our hypotheses. To account for the fact that the data was collected at different time points, we included a time point indicator to control for assessment week in our models. We are also modeling the time-dependence (adjacent observations are more similar than distant ones) via autocorrelations of our residuals.

2.5. Hypothesis Testing

To describe our sample and test our first hypothesis, we compared mothers under chronic stress to low stress mothers on average psychosocial characteristics, including weekly averages of our daily level predictors and outcomes, using t -tests. Pearson correlations were used to examine associations between weekly average mind states, mind wandering, and global perceived stress across the sample as a whole. To test our second hypothesis, we examined how daily fluctuation in mind states influenced evening positive and negative mood using multilevel models as described above. To test our third hypothesis, we examined how fluctuation in daily stress and daily social connection influenced daily mind states using multilevel models.

3.1. Participant Characteristics

Participants (n=183) were on average 44 years old, Caucasian (77.5%), married (86%), and had a household income above $100,000 (76.4%) 1 . By design, mothers of a child with an autism spectrum disorder reported significantly higher levels of global perceived stress at baseline (mean=21.9, SD=4.7) than low stress mothers (mean=15.7, SD=4.4), p <.001.

3.2. Chronic Stress and Daily Life

Chronic stress was associated with differences in daily mind states and mind wandering. As presented in Table 1 , across the 21 days of daily data, chronically stressed mothers reported lower levels of engagement, greater rejection, and more unpleasant and neutral mind wandering. The two groups did not differ significantly in the amount of pleasant mind wandering or in daily social connection with partner. The mothers under chronic stress also reported a greater proportion of stress days compared to no-stress days.

Daily averages of key variables across 21-days of data by chronic stress group

Greater global perceived stress averaged across all assessment time points was negatively correlated with engagement in the present moment ( r =−.45), and positively correlated with rejection of the present moment ( r= .48), unpleasant mind wandering ( r= .23), and neutral mind wandering ( r= .57). Perceived stress was not associated with pleasant mind wandering ( r =.01). Figure 1 demonstrates the robust association between global perceived stress and neutral mind wandering.

Correlation between neutral mind wandering and perceived stress, by chronic stress group.

3.3. Mind States and Mood

When examining frequency of evening mind wandering and mind states across the sample as a whole averaged across the 21 days of data collection, participants reported being present and engaged in the moment more often than (mean = 3.2, SD=.7) they reported rejecting the moment (mean=1.4, SD=.8) or mind wandering (pleasant mean=1.8, SD=.8; unpleasant mean=2.0, SD=.9; neutral mean=1.5, SD=.8).

On evenings when engagement in the present moment was higher than the person’s average daily engagement score, they reported greater positive mood (B=.158, SE=.01, p <.001) and lower negative mood (B=−.086, SE=.01, p <.001). Conversely, on evenings when participants’ reported rejecting the moment more than their own daily average, they also reported lower positive mood (B=−.149, SE=.01, p <.001) and greater negative mood (B=.091, SE=.01, p <.001).

For mind wandering, an increase in pleasant mind wandering was associated with higher positive mood (B=.099, SE=.01, p <.001) and lower negative mood (B=−.042, SE=.01, p <.001). An increase in neutral mind wandering was associated with lower positive mood (B=−.17, SE=.01, p <.001) and higher negative mood (B=.142, SE=.01, p <.001). An increases in unpleasant mind wandering was marginally associated with lower evening positive mood, p =.057, and not associated with evening negative mood, p= .451. However, as expected, greater levels of trait (21 day average) unpleasant mind wandering was associated with lower positive ( p =.028) and greater negative mood each evening ( p =.009). This means that the inter-individual variability in unpleasant mind wandering was related to evening mood, but intra-individual changes were not.

3.4. Daily Stress Exposure and Mind States

Across the 21 days of data collection, participants reported an average of 10 days during which a moderate stressor happened (‘stress days’; SD=5, range=0–21; 48% of days). Chronically stressed mothers reported a greater proportion of stress days vs non-stress days compared to the low stress mothers (proportion for chronic stress group=.51, SD=.23 versus the low stress group=.42, SD=.19; t (181)=2.74, p< .007; which equates to 11 stress days out of 21 total days in the chronically stressed group and 9 stress days in the low stress group).

There was a main effect (across the sample as a whole) of daily stress on engagement and rejection of the moment. On stress days, participants reported being less engaged in the moment (B=−.192, SE=.04, p <.001), rejecting the moment more (B=.23, SE=.05, p <.001), and doing less pleasant mind wandering (B=−.129, SE=.04, p =.003) and more neutral mind wandering (B=.33, SE=.04, p <.001) than they did on non-stress days. Stress day did not impact amount of unpleasant mind wandering ( p =.196). These results are illustrated in Figure 2 .

Average mind state scores across the sample on no stress day vs. stress day.

3.5. Daily Connection with Partner and Mind States

The intra-individual variability in daily connection with marital partner was also associated with mind states. Specifically, on days when a participant felt more connected to their partner than their daily average, participants also reported greater engagement in the moment (B=.155, SE=.03, p< .001), lower rejection of the moment (B=−.137, SE=.03, p <.001), more pleasant mind wandering (B=.12, SE=.03, p< .001), and less neutral mind wandering (B=−.087, SE=.03, p= 003). Daily fluctuations in partner social connection was not associated with amount of unpleasant mind wandering ( p =.388).

We also tested whether these effects was moderated by chronic stress status and found a marginally significant (B=.12, SE=.06, p =.061) interaction of caregiver group and daily partner social connection for pleasant mind wandering, such that for caregivers, there was a stronger association between daily social connection and pleasant mind wandering. Caregiver group did not moderate the effect of daily social connection on other mind states.

4. Discussion

Mind wandering vs. engagement in the moment are frequent states of mind that may offer important clues or even serve as determinants of one’s daily mental health and happiness. The findings presented here provide the first empirical evidence that experiencing psychological stress shapes these mind states at the daily level. We found that being under chronic stress was associated with more daily mind wandering and importantly, less engagement in – and more rejection of – the present moment. Greater evening mind wandering and less presence in turn, was associated with lower positive and higher negative evening mood. Furthermore, the context of the day influenced one’s mind states; experiencing a moderately stressful event earlier in the day made it less likely for someone to feel engaged in their present experience that evening. Conversely, an increase in perceived partner social connection during the day (an increase from one’s average sense of social connection) made it more likely that the person would report being present that evening. While being under chronic stress is associated with more daily stressful events, and lower social connection on average, the daily changes in these factors predict changes in mind states for our whole sample, regardless of chronic stress status (whether they are a caregiver or not).

Our results support our first hypothesis; women under chronic stress reported lower average levels of engagement and higher levels of rejecting the moment in comparison to an age-matched control group over a 21 day period of evening reporting. These results add to our group’s previous finding that trait-level reports of engagement and rejection were associated with depressive symptoms, perceived stress, rumination, life satisfaction, and the stress-related biomarker of aging, telomere length ( Epel et al., 2013 ). The current study looked at these constructs in a more granular way by asking participants to report on their mind states in the past 30 minutes, compared to the previous study in which participants reported at a single time point. Further, we demonstrated that these mind states differ by chronic stress status. Taken with our previous results, this work suggests that mind states offer a window in to the inner workings of those under chronic stress.

We also found that women under chronic stress experience more evening neutral and unpleasant mind wandering compare to age-matched controls. This is in line with evidence from Jha et al. (2015) demonstrating that a time-limited chronic stressor (8 weeks pre-deployment for military personnel) was associated with a deterioration in attention and increases in mind wandering measured by a laboratory cognitive task. Our study adds to this research by comparing daily mind wandering reports in a sample specifically recruited because of their levels of perceived stress in addition to objective stressor exposure. Being under chronic stress may lead to increases in mind wandering because the demands of the chronic stressor depletes psychological and physiological resources that are needed to regulate attention.

The increase in neutral mind wandering for those under chronic stress is interesting since it is unclear why it is more frequent, and what those mind wandering thoughts are about. It could indicate that those under chronic stress use mind wandering as a tool to take them out of the present moment, to ‘zone out’ and not engage with a difficult reality or emotion in the moment. Indeed, across the sample as a whole, neutral mind wandering was strongly correlated with global subjective stress (assessed with the PSS, r= .57). Neutral mind wandering may also be indicative of more time spent future planning, as many self-generated thoughts during mind wandering are future oriented ( Smallwood & Schooler, 2015 ), and mothers of children with an autism spectrum disorder may need to do more planning to coordinate caregiving activities compared to control mothers. Interestingly, neutral mind wandering did not appear benign, as it was associated with higher evening negative mood, as described next.

A more nuanced examination of the content of mind wandering thoughts in chronically stressed samples would shed further light onto this initial finding. In addition to valence and time-orientation (future versus past) of mind wandering thoughts, other aspects of mind wandering that may be important to capture include the cognitive orientation (i.e. self-related or goal-directed; Baird, Smallwood, & Schooler, 2011 ) and intentionality of the thought ( Seli, Risko, Smilek, & Schacter, 2016 ). The consequences of mind wandering likely depend on these aspects of the self-generated thoughts since the differences in cognitive architecture create differences in experience they create ( Smallwood & Andrews-Hanna, 2013 ; Wang et al., 2018 ). Future research should continue to explore these various aspects of mind states in chronically stressed samples (and on high stress days) to continue to understand the daily cognitive consequences of stress states, including whether there are types of mind states that support resilience to stress states.

The second aim of the study was to examine whether daily fluctuations in mind states are associated with fluctuations in mood on the same evening, controlling for the individual’s average level of that mind state. We found that on evenings when women reported being more engaged in the moment (an increase from their daily average), or doing more pleasant mind wandering, they also reported being in a better mood. Conversely, on evenings when women reported rejecting the moment more and doing more neutral mind wandering, they also reported being in a worse mood. This aligns with previous work by Killingsworth & Gilbert (2010) in a community sample showing that mind wandering episodes prospectively predicted worse mood, using multiple reports over the course of a single day. Participants in their study completed an average of 8 in-the-moment-reports of mood and/or mind wandering across several days of data collection. Our study does not allow for temporal inferences because participants only completed the assessments once a day, but our participants provided nearly twice as many samples over a greater period of their life—three data collection bursts of seven days over 18 months, leading to an average of 18 evening reports per person. A greater number of days of data for each participant enhances the statistical power to detect an effect. However, our study does not allow for temporal inferences since the predictors and outcomes we focused on were captured at the same time, eliminating the ability to test causality. Our study is also limited in that participants only reported on their mind states in the evenings, and thus our results are constrained to inferences about relationships between evening mind states and mood.

Our study also extends previous work by examining how daily fluctuations in the affective valence of the mind wandering – whether it was pleasant, unpleasant, or neutral to the participant – are related to daily social and emotional states. Previous research has demonstrated that whether mind wandering is harmful or helpful for well-being likely depends on the content of thoughts during the mind wandering episode (e.g. Franklin et al., 2013 ; Poerio et al., 2013 ; Ruby et al., 2013 ; Wang et al., 2018 ). This idea helps clarify the seemingly contradictory literature which shows that mind wandering episodes are associated with negative cognitive outcomes such as cognitive tasks performance deficits, and also positive cognitive outcomes such as creative problem solving and future planning ( Mooneyham & Schooler, 2013 ). It may be that pleasant wandering thoughts are associated with positive well-being outcomes while unpleasant wandering thoughts are associated with worse well-being. Indeed, our analyses of daily-level mind wandering valence data show that mind wandering labeled by the participant as pleasant was associated with greater positive mood that same evening, whereas neutral mind wandering was associated with lower levels of positive mood that evening. This suggests that mind wandering about something pleasant (or that gives one a pleasant feeling) may be beneficial for that evening’s mood. Future studies should capture more information about the mind wandering thoughts in order to fully explore when mind wandering leads to increases in subjective well-being, versus decreases.

The third aim was to contribute to our understanding of the environmental conditions that influence evening mind states by testing the influence of two daily contextual factors: moderate stress exposure and perceived quality of connection with partner. As hypothesized, we found that on days when a moderate stressor occurred, participants were less present that evening. On ‘stress days’ participants reported less engagement and more rejection of the moment, and less pleasant and more neutral mind wandering. Surprisingly, participants did not report more unpleasant mind wandering on stress days. Daily fluctuation in unpleasant mind wandering may be influenced by daily contextual factors not examined here such as physiological states of sleep deprivation or hunger, or personality traits such as neuroticism. Since we know from previous research that the majority of wandering thoughts are focused on the past or future, these unpleasant thoughts might not be resulting from that day’s events but rather the common perseverative cognition characterized by rumination over past events and worry about events that have not happened. It is also possible that positive and neutral mind wandering are more influenced by the current day’s events.

We also found that naturally occurring daily fluctuations in connection with partner influenced evening mind states. On evenings that participants reported feeling positively connected to their partner (controlling for average level of partner connection), participants also reported greater engagement in the moment and less mind wandering. This is the first study to our knowledge to look at how daily changes in quality of partner connection influences engagement with the present moment. Previous studies have demonstrated a positive association between stable indices of partner connection such as relationship satisfaction and dispositional mindfulness ( Barnes et al., 2007 ). Our results suggest that small daily changes in relationship quality are associated with a present oriented focus that evening. This is an important finding as positive interactions and connection with marital partner is something that can be prioritized and fostered each day. Interestingly, a study by Poerio et al. (2016) suggests that social connectedness can be fostered through social daydreaming exercises, and that this exercise may be beneficial when experiencing distressing feelings like loneliness.

The tendency to mind wander and to experience different states of consciousness exists both as a trait tendency, and as a myriad of fluctuations in a person’s day that is influenced by contextual factors. We know little about the factors that predict greater mind wandering in naturalistic settings. We do know from both daily diary and experimental studies that negative moods lead to greater mind wandering ( Killingsworth & Gilbert, 2010 ; Smallwood, Fitzgerald, Miles, & Phillips, 2009 ), that older adults tend to report less mind wandering than do younger adults ( Jackson & Balota, 2012 ), and people tend to mind wander more during an easy than a difficult task ( Forster & Lavie, 2009 ). Our results identify new contextual factors, namely chronic stress, exposure to daily stressful events, and daily quality of partner connection, that also influence one’s ability to engage with the present moment, and frequency of mind wandering.

There are several strengths and limitations of this study. Using nightly reports on consecutive days, and stretching these sampling periods out into three intervals over one and a half years, offers a more stable way to assess intra-individual differences in daily experience, regardless of the changes in life circumstances that occur over time. However, because mind state data was only collected in the evenings, and both mood and unwanted thoughts are influenced by time of day ( May & Hasher, 1998 ; Stone, Smyth, Pickering, & Schwartz, 1996 ), the inferences made about mind state findings are constrained to evenings only. Sampling at multiple unpredictable times throughout the day would improve the ability to examine temporal sequence. Each evening, participants reported earlier daytime stressful experiences and their perceived partner connection across that entire day. These reports are likely influenced by their current mood, and the relationships between them are bi-directional (e.g. Poerio et al., 2013 ). Further, the measures of mind states, while they preceded the measures of nightly mood, were taken during the same reporting session. Therefore, they are correlational and it is difficult to infer if mind states more influenced mood or whether mood was influencing mind states. Indeed, lab-based mood induction studies have demonstrated that inducing an unpleasant mood can lead to mind wandering about past events ( Smallwood & O’Connor, 2011 ). Future studies will need to sample mood and mind states more frequently during the day to examine temporal effects. There are many remaining questions about psychological stress and mind states for future studies to examine. For example, it is unknown whether chronic and/or acute stress interferes with one’s ability to notice mind wandering episodes (meta-awareness), how the contents of the self-generated thoughts during mind wandering differs under states of stress, and whether mind wandering is used as a regulatory tool to decrease stress-related emotional or physiologic arousal.

Among the limitations is that the chronic stress group all had children with autism, leaving open the possibility of genetic differences between the mothers. While some of the genetics in autism are due to de novo mutations, not passed on by the parents ( Sanders et al., 2012 ), and there is a large heterogeneity among the condition, there is also evidence of heritability found in both population-based and twin studies ( Colvert et al., 2015 ; Sandin et al., 2014 ). Studies examining autism-related symptoms in parents are mixed, with some studies finding statistically worse functioning on social communication in parents ( Bishop et al., 2004 ; Bora, Aydın, Saraç, Kadak, & Köse, 2017 ), which may or may not be due to genetic risk. In the current study, it is possible but unlikely that the stress related differences in caregiver mind states are due to small differences in social communication skills. It will be important to replicate these findings in other chronically stressed groups like parental caregivers of other conditions that are not neurodevelopmental or psychiatric.

Our results replicate previous evidence linking daily mind wandering about neutral topics and worse mood, and extend this work to include other states of consciousness, and by demonstrating that chronic stress and daily contextual factors (stress exposure and partner connection) influence mind states. We did not replicate previous findings (e.g. Killingsworth & Gilbert, 2010 ) that link both pleasant and unpleasant mind wandering to worse mood. In fact, our results demonstrated that pleasant mind wandering was associated with better mood, as was engagement in the present moment. Further, our results provide evidence that the relationship between mind states and mood shift within people based on their daily experiences. The specific mind states studied here – and rejection of the moment in particular, which is understudied – may serve as targets for well-being interventions, especially in high stress groups. These targets may be particularly affected by psychological and/or contemplative interventions such as ones that incorporate acceptance-based strategies of accepting one’s current psychological experiences, including unwanted or negative emotions.

5. Conclusion

A fundamental Buddhist principle is that acceptance of the current moment experience without rejecting the reality of the situation is essential to happiness and to avoiding suffering. Rejecting the present moment may be at the core of what is experienced by those under chronic, ongoing stress. And, regardless of experiencing chronic stress, exposure to daily stressors leads us to mind states associated with decreases in well-being. Using contemplative traditions to inform research about how different types of life challenges, chronic and acute, influence well-being can help us understand what is toxic about stress, and may provide specific psychological constructs to target with intervention. Furthermore, contemplative practices may be used to inform the refinement of existing psychological interventions to target these specific mechanisms. The integration of wisdom traditions with contemporary psychology, and the utilization of newer data collection and statistical techniques, provides an opportunity for a deeper understanding of a well-lived life, at the daily level.

Supplementary Material

Research reported in this publication was supported by the National Institute on Aging of the National Institutes of Health; K01AG057859; R01AG030424, R24AG048024). The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the National Institutes of Health.

1 This is not a particularly high household income for San Francisco, where the 2016 median household income was $84,160.

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How to Stop Your Mind From Wandering During Meditation

Active meditation can prevent intrusive thoughts from sabotaging your practice..

Posted March 27, 2018 | Reviewed by Jessica Schrader

The virtues of meditation and mindfulness are being extolled almost everywhere. Research has shown the practice of meditation can have positive benefits on emotional well-being and physical health and has been indicated for managing serious conditions such as depression , anxiety , heart disease, high blood pressure, sleep problems, and chronic pain . Getting people to try meditation, however, can sometimes be a challenge, particularly for people who have very active minds. They will often say things like: I just can’t sit still. Meditating makes me anxious. I can’t turn off my brain. I’m just bad at it.

Most meditation teachers will tell you that having your mind wander during meditation is perfectly normal and that bringing your attention back to your meditation every time you notice it wandering is simply part of the process. While mind-wandering is indeed quite normal for beginning meditators and even some experienced ones, it can be very frustrating and can result in people giving up before they get to experience the benefits of meditation that they are seeking. There are also times when stopping certain thoughts is the goal of the practice itself. This is particularly true if you are caught up in a spiral of negative thinking and would like to use meditation to alleviate the ruminative process. When you stop flooding your brain with fear and worry about the future or resentments from the past, this has a profoundly positive effect of resetting your emotional state to calm and peaceful. Luckily, there is something you can do to substantially reduce your mind from wandering. It’s called active meditation or focused meditation.

The brain has a limited attentional capacity. This means that you can only think about a certain number of things at any one given time. One of the challenges with meditation is that as you are clearing your mind, you are creating an open space that wants to be filled. Sometimes when people are coping with stressful events, they turn to meditation to calm their mind and find that their mind floods with even more thoughts of what they are trying not to think about. Active meditation helps this problem by giving you a task to do that takes up all of your attention and occupies its working capacity, so that there is much less room for other thoughts to creep in.

Here is an example of an active meditation:

• Pick one word from the list below that describes an emotion you would like to feel more of: Joy, Love, Happy, Peace, Calm, Hope .
• Close your eyes and visualize the word in your head.
• Pick a color that goes with the word and visualize the word in that color.
• Fill the background with another color.
• Now, with your eyes closed and writing in your head, write the word one letter at a time.
• As you are writing the word, say the letters quietly to yourself in your head.
• Write the colored word on the colored background over and over in your head while you say the letters quietly to yourself.
• Set a timer for 10 minutes and keep doing the exercise until the timer goes off.

If you find it challenging to do all the steps at once, do as many as possible to take up all of your focus. Most people report the activity fills their mind so that they have few intrusive thoughts, but if your mind does wander, don’t judge yourself or label yourself as doing it wrong, simply go back to the activity and focus on the vividness of the colors and seeing the word in your head. You can also add in more steps if you need to occupy more of your attention. For example, you can add the step of trying to feel the emotion of the word as you are writing it in your head.

Once you have done an active meditation a few times, you may find it easier to try a more traditional mind-clearing meditation. There are wonderful benefits to both, though in order to experience the benefits you must practice on a regular basis. Once a week won’t get you there, but 10 minutes a day is enough to start to feel the benefit in a matter of a few days. You should subtly start to notice you feel calmer and less stressed; within a week or two things that used to upset you may not bother you so much anymore. You will feel greater clarity in your thinking and ability to focus.

To add a meditation practice into your routine, it is best to set aside a regular time to do it every day. First thing in the morning is a great way to start your day off on a positive note; however, for some, mid-day is a time that offers a needed break, and right before bed can have a calming effect. You can also break it up into small brief meditations throughout the day, three to four minutes in the morning, three to four minutes mid-day, and three to four minutes in the evening can really add up. What is most important to know is that there isn’t a wrong way to meditate, it’s a matter of finding what works best for you.

Jennice Vilhauer, Ph.D. , is the Director of Emory University’s Adult Outpatient Psychotherapy Program in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Science in the School of Medicine.

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5 key signs you're sleep deprived and how to fix it — advice from an insomnia expert

Tired during the day yet struggle to fall asleep at night? You're probably sleep deprived

Wondering if you have all the symptoms of sleep deprivation? One bad night might be easy enough to shake-off, but when you're regularly missing out on sleep, you might start to feel like you'll never be fully rested. Frequently getting less high-quality sleep than your body needs is referred to as sleep deprivation, and it can impact your physical and mental health.

Sleep deprivation is generally treatable, but long-term sleep deprivation needs more than just one good nap to get your slumber back on track. For advice on recognizing the signs and symptoms of sleep deprivation and how to manage it, we spoke to Dr Lindsay Browning, la eading sleep therapist, neuroscientist, chartered psychologist, author and CBT-i practitioner at Trouble Sleeping . Here's what Dr Browning told us...

What is sleep deprivation?

Sleep deprivation occurs when a person doesn't get the amount of rest that their body needs. "Sleep deprivation can have a significant impact on both physical health and mental wellbeing," explains Dr Browning. An adult requires roughly eight hours sleep a night and during this time the body refreshes and restores itself. When you lack quality sleep, your body misses out on this important downtime. 

There are two different types of sleep deprivation: short-term and long-term. Dr Browning explains that short-term sleep deprivation happens when you experience a limited period of sleep loss "such as when you spend an uncomfortable night on an overnight flight and don’t sleep on the plane."

But long-term sleep deprivation is a cumulative effect, and as Dr Browning explains, it can happen when you go through "weeks or years of regularly not getting sufficient sleep." Those suffering with long-term sleep deprivation might not even realize they're missing sleep, as they start to consider being tired their new normal.

5 signs that you're sleep deprived: Key symptoms to look for

"Short-term sleep loss may be easier to spot compared to that caused by frequent nights of insufficient sleep, since people who regularly don’t get enough sleep may get used to feeling tired and not realize the health implications of sleep deprivation and how much better they might feel if they got enough sleep," explains Dr Browning. Here are some key signs of sleep deprivation to watch out for...

1. You feel fatigued (even after sleeping well)

One of the clearest signs of sleep deprivation is that you're feeling tired during the day even after sleeping well the night before. "If you have been getting too little sleep regularly, then one night of the recommended seven to nine hours' sleep will not be enough to make up for the long term sleep deprivation," says Dr Browning.

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"You may be feeling sluggish and tired during the day, even if you got enough sleep the night before. You may feel mentally tired, physically tired, or both." So while you might expect to feel tired on Monday morning, you're also sleepy after that Sunday lie-in.

2. You nod off during the day (microsleeping)

Ever been sitting in a meeting and you suddenly realize you don't remember what just happened? You might have been experience a microsleep; a short period of drifting off that many people don't notice happening until they can't recall the last few seconds. Microsleeps are a common sign of sleep deprivation and, as Dr Browning explains, they're more than just a harmless nap at your desk...

"People who are sleep deprived can experience nodding off while sitting, or feeling their eyes close and having a microsleep while doing something like driving a car," says Dr Browning. "Microsleeps and sleepiness during the day can be extreme dangerous since a lack of sleep has been associated with an increase in car accidents due to people falling asleep at the wheel or due to reduced reaction times."

3. You can't concentrate

A groggy Monday morning is something most of us are familiar with, but if that feeling lasts throughout the week, it could be a sign of sleep deprivation. "People who are sleep deprived tend to struggle to focus on tasks, experience memory lapses, and have reduced cognitive abilities," explains Dr Browning.

And it's more than just a tendency to daydream that you might be experiencing. "One study found that one night of sleep deprivation was equivalent to having a blood alcohol concentration of 0.05% – the equivalent of having two standard alcoholic drinks."

4. You're eating and snacking more

In the same way we tend to choose ice cream over iceberg lettuce when feeling sad, a lack of sleep typically has us reaching for fatty foods. "This is due to disrupted hunger hormones (ghrelin and leptin) which are regulated during sleep," explains Dr Browning. 

A study found that people who are lacking sleep eat on average 385 calories more during the day than those who slept well. When you aren't sleeping, your body misses out on a crucial period for hormone regulation – and you'll see the effects  of that in your behavior the next day. As in, a tendency to reach for the cookie jar.

5. You're more susceptible to illness

Getting enough sleep is important to maintaining good mental and physical health, so it follows that sleep deprivation has a negative effect on your overall wellbeing, as Dr Browning explains. 

" Sleep deprivation can be associated with increased headaches, muscle aches, and also a weakened immune system leading to more frequent illnesses." For those with long-term sleep deprivation, feeling less than your best might not seem like anything new – but it could be a crucial signal you're lacking rest.

Can you fix sleep deprivation?

It is possible to fix sleep deprivation – even long-term sleep deprivation – although one good night's rest isn't enough to solve the problem. To overcome sleep deprivation, Dr Browning recommends focusing on improving your sleep hygiene: creating a bedtime routine, sticking to consistent sleep and wake-up times, and optimizing your bedroom for relaxation.

However, if you've cleaned up your sleep hygiene and you're still struggling to achieve quality sleep, Dr Browning advises seeking medical advice. "If you have tried improving your sleep hygiene, but still feel sleep deprived, then you should speak to your doctor in case there is something else is causing your fatigue.

"Most common causes of this are sleep apnea which can disturb the quality of your sleep, or an iron deficiency or a thyroid issue which can cause tiredness even if you think you have had enough sleep."

How to fix sleep deprivation

To fix sleep deprivation, it's important to create habits that will result in consistent and long-term better sleep. Below are the steps recommended by Dr Browning if sleep deprivation is affecting your health and wellbeing...

1. Stick to a consistent sleep schedule

Humans are creatures of habit and our circadian rhythms love the routine of going to bed and waking up at the same time every day of the week. This teaches the body when to feel sleepy, which in turn helps you to drift off.

"Set a regular bedtime and wake time, seven days per week, to help regulate your internal clock," advises Dr Browning. And that includes weekends and holidays. "Sleep deprivation may be caused by not getting enough sleep during the week and thinking you can catch up at the weekend, but it’s much better for your health and sleep to get enough sleep every day – seven days a week – as long as your life so circumstances allow."

As well as establishing long-term good habits, keeping an early wake-up time can be one of the best ways to fix your sleep schedule after a late night . By waking up early you're more likely to feel tired early, getting your circadian rhythm back on track.

2. Cut out caffeine in the afternoon

If you're worried about sleep deprivation then you probably aren't reaching for a pre-bed cappuccino – but you might be relying on a coffee fix to get you through a drowsy afternoon. However, your lunchtime latte might be the reason you're struggling to sleep in the evening, as caffeine can remain in the body for many hours after consumption. 

The 10-3-2-1-0 sleep method advises cutting out caffeine 10 hours before bed, but Dr Browning has a slightly more achievable suggestion. "As a general rule, avoid caffeine at least six hours before bedtime. Caffeine is a stimulant and can interfere with falling asleep as well as disrupting sleep quality." 

3. Engage in a relaxing nighttime routine

Going to bed early doesn't necessarily mean getting more sleep, especially if you spend a long time staring at the ceiling waiting to drift off. However, implementing a relaxing nighttime routine can prepare the mind and body for sleep, meaning when you do crawl beneath the covers, you're likely to drop off quickly.  

"Spend 30 minutes to an hour before bed doing something calm and relaxing such as read a good book, do some meditation, have a warm bath or do some gentle stretching or yoga," advises Dr Browning. "This helps signal to your body that it's time to calm down and get ready for sleep."

Dr Browning also recommends putting screens away at least an hour before bed, to limit the disrupting effects of bright lights. But if you absolutely can't stay away from your phone, she has a tip: "Ensure night mode is activated to reduce the brightness and reduce the blue light frequency which is especially damaging to sleep."

4. Get active outside during the day

It isn't just what you do at night that affects how well you sleep. Your daytime activities can also contribute to sleep deprivation, as Dr Browning explains.

" Exercise during the day is good for your physical health and mental health as well as helping boost your alertness during the day and potentially helping you sleep better at night. However, avoid vigorous exercise close to bedtime ."

In addition to staying active, try to get outside during the day. "Natural daylight can help you feel more alert and awake during the daytime, and also help you produce melatonin and sleep better at night," advises Dr Browning.

5. Use naps and lie-ins wisely

"There are some circumstances when you simply can’t get enough sleep at night. In which case, let yourself have a lie-in at the weekend to catch up on some missed sleep." But try not to make this a regular habit, as you might find yourself suffering from social jet lag – when your weekday body clock and weekend body clock are out of sync. 

Naps can also be used to boost energy levels if sleep deprivation is making it hard to get through the day. "Try taking a short (20 minute) nap just after lunch to top up your sleep," advises Dr Browning. "It is best to avoid napping after about two o’clock as even short evening naps can make it harder to fall asleep when you go to bed." 

6. Create a relaxing bedroom environment

"Ensure your bedroom is conducive to sleep by keeping it dark, quiet, and at a comfortable temperature," says Dr Browning. Blackout curtains can be used to prevent disruptive light from getting into your room, while the perfect bedroom temperature is around 68 and 77 degrees Fahrenheit.  

Your bed should be providing you with support and pressure relief, so your sleep isn't disrupted by aches and pains. Our best mattress guide and best pillow guide can help you find the best bed for your sleep style and body type.

"If your mattress is more than 8 years old, it may need replacing , since mattresses have a finite lifespan and need to be supportive enough for your spine to help you sleep comfortably," advises Dr Browning. "You should also wash and replace your pillows regularly as they can absorb sweat and dead skin cells which can cause allergies and an uncomfortable pillow"

Upgrading your bed can have a big impact on how well you sleep, and with our Memorial Day mattress sales hub, you can find the best deals on mattresses right now.

Ruth Jones has recently joined the Tom's Guide team as a sleep staff writer, covering all things mattresses and sleep. Ruth previously worked as a sleep and mattress writer for our sister website TechRadar, and has a deep interest in sleep and how it affects our day to day wellbeing. Ruth is a self-confessed stomach sleeper with a penchant for medium-firm mattresses, and also loves a good eye mask for helping her to fall asleep easier at night. 

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My insomnia hell: sleeplessness is a curse – but I think I finally have the answer

Pills, meditation, yoga, sleep restriction ... I have tried absolutely everything to get some proper rest. Is the solution actually surprisingly simple?

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I am standing in my bedroom in my boxers and a T-shirt, while a man I have just met fiddles with my legs. His name is Parthasarathi, and he’s here with his boss Julius, who has come to set me up for a polysomnogram – AKA a sleep study. Once they have glued electrodes all over my legs, chest and head, and stuck a cannula into my nostrils, and clipped a monitor to one of my fingers, and strapped more electronics to my chest and waist, and trained an infra-red camera on my bed, and given the Guardian’s photographer a good laugh, they’ll be leaving me for the night. Then all this kit will track how long and deeply I am sleeping, how much I am snoring, how twitchy my legs are, how often I get out of bed, whether I talk, walk or … I don’t know, juggle in my sleep, what’s happening to my blood oxygen levels, what my heart’s doing and, crucially, how well I’m breathing.

The answer to that last one turns out to be: not very well. I later learn that I stopped breathing for at least 10 seconds that night – not once, not twice, but 60 times. That’s an average of almost 10 times an hour. What the hell? I think.

At the same time, I’m comforted. Maybe I’m getting closer to fixing my insomnia. It’s been a problem for at least half my life, and now I’ve decided to live to 100, I don’t want it screwing up my final 40 years. It increases the risk of heart disease, stroke, diabetes and depression, as well as accidents like crashing your car or walking in front of a bus.

How bad is mine? Most nights I don’t get much more than five hours’ sleep. I wake at least once in the small hours, often twice or more, and if I wake up any time after 4am there’s a good chance I won’t fall asleep again.

I think you’d call me a high-functioning insomniac. I don’t feel terrible most days – just a little tired. It hasn’t stopped me holding down a good job, getting married, having a family. And the fatigue is mainly mental. I can usually manage a run, or an exercise class, or some yoga, as well as a full day’s work. A woman recently wrote to the Guardian asking if I had servants . How else could I fit everything in? It’s simple, madam: I rarely get more than 20 winks.

But I wish I did. There are moments when I’m drifting off, almost always when I’m lying on my back, when I feel something I can only describe as bliss. I bathe in that warm ooze of wellbeing, a smile in my heart – until my wife, Hannah, pokes me to complain I’m snoring.

There are certainly times that euphoria would come in handy. I’ve had two brief episodes of depression and anxiety, both bad enough to need medication. Both times I was sleeping particularly poorly. I don’t think that’s the only reason I became ill – but it felt as if the misery and the insomnia were feeding each other.

Maybe I just need to improve my “sleep hygiene”? Don’t you start. This is all you ever hear about if you’re struggling to sleep, from every expert, book, website, app, audiobook or well-meaning stranger. If you’re lucky enough never to have encountered the concept, it simply means doing everything you can to encourage sleep while stopping everything that may undermine it.

Entirely off the top of my head, I can tell you that this includes: 1) making sure your bedroom is dark and quiet; 2) getting plenty of daylight first thing, maybe with a long walk; 3) getting plenty of exercise generally, though not too late in the day; 4) avoiding blue light from screens in the evening; 5) not sleeping next to your phone; 6) turning down the lights as you approach bedtime; 7) avoiding social media and other rage-inducing stimuli late at night; 8) going to bed and rising at about the same time, even when you really, really fancy a lie-in; 9) keeping the lights off if you must get up to use the toilet; 10) keeping caffeine to a minimum, avoiding it completely in the evening; 11) ditto booze; 12) leaving at least a few hours between your last meal and bedtime, so you’re not still working hard to digest it; 13) not eating too much for dinner, for the same reason; 14) using your bed only for sex and sleep; 15) getting out of bed if you’ve been awake for more than 20-30 minutes, then moving to another room, where you should do something soporific; 16) trying not to check the time when you’re in bed; and 17) clearing your mind before bed by making a to-do or to-worry-about list. I could go on.

You know what? Following these rules almost certainly will help you sleep better.

The same goes for meditation/mindfulness, breathing exercises, yoga and tai chi, all of which I have tried and enjoyed, and all of which have helped a little. They all relax you (in the jargon, “engage your parasympathetic nervous system”) and some you can practise while lying unhappily in bed.

Experts quite rightly try to give sufferers the confidence they will one day overcome their problems, not least because worrying only makes it harder to sleep. But the truth is, none of this is guaranteed to get you all the way. Not even the treatment often described as the gold standard: sleep restriction, which is usually combined with most of those rules in a programme of cognitive behavioural therapy for insomnia, or CBTi. The aim is to create a strong association between your bed and sleep (as opposed to reading, working, watching TV, etc – and especially tossing and turning).

I recently endured almost six months of this – during two of which I had weekly phone calls with my local NHS CBTi service. Approaches vary a little, but the basic principle of sleep restriction is to work out how much shut-eye you are getting in your horrible, underslept state (five hours, for instance). Add another 30 minutes and then allow yourself only that long in bed for night after night until exhaustion has bludgeoned you into sleeping solidly for at least a week, at which point you get an extra 15 or 20 minutes. Once you’ve proved you can make the most of this, you get another 15 or 20 minutes, and so on until you can’t improve any more. Well done, you!

Even before you start all this, it’s clear it’s going to be an enormous pain in the balls. You’re warned that you will be even more tired than usual, and more irritable, and find it harder to focus, and that you should tell your family, friends and workmates so they can make allowances. All of that is true; none of it quite captures the grim tedium of staying up past midnight for seven, 14, 21, 28 nights in a row, exhaustedly observing those loathsome rules. Imagine sitting droopy-eyed in a darkened room, long after everyone else has gone to bed, listening to an audiobook that won’t overstimulate you, and trying your damnedest to stay awake because – let’s call this rule number 18 – it’s not a great idea to nap, and if you do, it shouldn’t be for long, and definitely not in the evening.

It’s not quite hell, but it’s definitely purgatory.

What you will learn en route is that it is remarkably difficult to be sure how much you are sleeping. We routinely wake up in the night and forget about it by the morning, or even think we have been awake when we have actually been sleeping. This is known in extreme cases as paradoxical insomnia. And remember rule number 16: you must not check the time during the night. As for wearables such as the Apple Watch, the Oura smart ring or the Whoop tracker band (all of which aim to chart not just your hours asleep, but the amount you spent in light sleep, deep sleep and REM sleep), I’ve tried them all and I wouldn’t rate them any more than seven out of 10. They are particularly erratic when it comes to distinguishing between sleep and lying really still. Like when you’re awake and trying not to be.

Does sleep restriction work? I’m sure it does for most people. I began to sleep a little longer and with a little less disruption – but I still wasn’t sleeping well . I began to wonder if I ever would.

Have I tried pills? Of course, and I’d probably have used them more if I could get the good stuff. Lormetazepam, which I was prescribed when living in France, is rarely dispensed in Britain, partly because of fears of addiction and partly because of other possible side-effects. It worked well for me, and I could genuinely take it or leave it, but the problem with that argument is that the more you repeat it to your doctor, the less convincing it sounds.

Amitriptyline, which is readily available, left me muzzy; I binned it completely after one horrible morning of irritable, spaced-out jitters. I have just been prescribed zopiclone, which a friend tells me is wonderful. But this is another drug that GPs are wary of, and I’ve only got seven pills, so I’m keeping them for emergencies. And in any case, pills rarely give you proper, restful sleep. Sometimes a few hours of unconsciousness is all you need to stop spiralling, but it’s not a long-term solution.

As for the over-the-counter, non-prescription sleep aids, I have spent a fortune on Nytol, valerian, magnesium, 5HTP, lavender, and black cherry gummies. Nytol One-a-Night (the hardcore version with antihistamines) did some good; the rest were as useless as they were expensive, though the gummies were tasty. And what about the holy grail for self-medicating insomniacs: the hormone melatonin, widely recommended for jet lag and other sleep problems? It’s available over the counter in the US and many other parts of the world, but only on prescription in the UK. I tried it for months, in every dose from 1.9mg to 10mg, in quick-acting and timed-release forms. When it had any effect, which wasn’t always, I reckon it made me sleep a little more soundly and just a little longer. Helpful, maybe. Magic bullet? Not for me.

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A few weeks ago, I spoke to a doctor who had done a lot of work with sleep . He said I shouldn’t write off the progress I had made with the hygiene and the CBTi and the sleep restriction: these things take time, and was I familiar with the Japanese concept of kaizen , or continuous improvement? You create something, then you add a bell to make it a little better, then a whistle, then another bell … That was a helpful way to think about my achievements, such as they were.

Then he told me about a new type of sleeping pill called an orexin receptor antagonist.

“How do you spell that?” I asked.

Anyway, when I arranged to spend a night decked out like a Christmas tree, it wasn’t because I thought a polysomnogram would help me. Dr Sundeep Chohan’s kaizen seemed like my best – probably only – hope of success. But after being so frustrated by my attempts to measure my sleep, I was interested in the proper way to do it – the test that doctors rely on. Enter a company called Independent Physiological Diagnostics (IPD), which brings polysomnography to your home rather than making you check into a sleep clinic.

In between fitting me with all those electrodes and cannulas and so on, Julius Patrick, a clinical physiologist as well as IPD’s managing director, checks my throat and asks me questions designed to help with the analysis. Do I ever wake up gasping for air (no, thank God, and don’t you think I’d have mentioned it?), do I have headaches in the morning (nope), do I get brain fog (sorry, what was the question?), how often do I pee in the night (too often), do I ever have nightmares or night terrors (again, no) and do I dream? Surprisingly rarely, I tell him.

Oh, everyone does, he says, but not everyone remembers it. And you know what? No sooner do I fall asleep than I jerk awake and tell Hannah I’ve been trying to catch a spider in a glass. It’s so huge that its legs stick out and it just scuttles away, taking the tumbler with it. Then I’m out cold again.

That’s not the real surprise, though. A few days later Dr Oliver Bernath, the neurologist who reviews my test results, announces that I have “moderate obstructive sleep apnoea”. I’d heard about apnoea before, but always associated it with bigger bodies, daytime sleepiness and dramatic symptoms like the aforementioned gasping for air. It turns out to be far more widespread and often less spectacular; according to the Sleep Apnoea Trust, it affects up to 10 million people in the UK , 4 million of them moderately or severely. The vast majority of cases go undetected, so that people like me who have what Patrick describes as “regular arousal from sleep” end up focusing on other causes. That’s not to say you can’t have more than one reason for terrible sleep – hence the term Comisa, or co-morbid insomnia with sleep apnoea.

Bernath recommends I get treatment “to reduce the long-term risk of cardiovascular complications”. This “may also improve the subjective experience of sleep quality”.

This is, despite the muted language, a gamechanger. I finally have an explanation for my problems – and a way to tackle them. If the worst comes to the worst, I might need a continuous positive airway pressure (Cpap) machine, to feed me air during the night. I admit, my heart sinks at the thought of wearing a mask to sleep, and not just because it feels like a memento mori. As my wife likes to remind me, at 50 she is “considerably” younger than me and I’d rather not give her another excuse to tease me.

Then there’s Stevie, our sweet but nervous rescue dog, who usually spends the night under our bed. He already freaks out when one of the kids turns up in a new hat or a novelty wig. He will quite possibly wet himself if he sees me attached to a Cpap machine.

But there’s a good chance it won’t come to that. The apnoea only occurs when I’m “supine” – that is, on my back – so I may be able to avoid it just by sleeping on my side. The thought makes me a little sad given how much I enjoy a supine snooze. But it’s clearly going to have to stop.

To make that a reality, my options seem to be good old willpower, the sort of V-shaped pillow that’s popular with pregnant women, or a device that will stop me rolling on to my back. This could be one of the traditional anti-snoring hacks – like a tennis ball sewn into the back of a pyjama top – a special backpack, or something electronic that will prod me if I deviate from the correct position.

I immediately go online and order the pregnancy pillow, then add a belt that will give me a little electric shock every time I go astray.

It’s early days but I’ve been trying a combination of pillow and willpower for the last week, and so far the signs are good. I’m sleeping better than I have for ages – on my side, obviously – and waking up more refreshed. If I start backsliding, I’ll move on to the belt, and then the Cpap machine. My ego, Stevie and Hannah will all just have to suck it up. Sorry, Stevie! Sorry, Hannah!

After decades slugging it out with insomnia, I think I’ve got it on the ropes. I’m actually looking forward to the next 14,000 nights.

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