There are two things almost everybody with insomnia does at night.

Both of them feed the alarm in your brain. And both feel so automatic you might not even notice you’re doing them.

I did both of them for 5 brutal years, before I fully recovered. And once I stopped, nights stopped feeling like a test I was failing.

Habit one: checking the clock

You know how it goes. You wake up. You grab the phone. It’s 2:47. And your brain starts doing math.

“I only slept three hours. If I fall asleep in twenty minutes I can still get four more. But if I don’t…”

And now you’re wide awake.

Sometimes the clock gives you “good” news. You slept longer than you thought.

But most of the time it just hands you another wave of worry.

And every wave keeps the alarm in your brain switched on.

You’re not just checking the time. You’re grading yourself. You’re guessing how bad tomorrow will be. You’re feeding the exact thing that’s keeping you up.

So here’s what I had to do, even though it felt weird at first.

Set the alarm before bed. Then put the clock where I couldn’t see it. Phone face down. Across the room. In a drawer. Whatever worked.

With no clock, there’s nothing to figure out. You don’t know if you’ve been awake twenty minutes or two hours.

And that is actually the goal.

It takes away the numbers your brain uses to worry. You’re just lying there. And then, at some point, you’re asleep.

If you always check the clock, the first few nights without it will feel strange. You might really want to look. That’s normal.

It passes. And what you get instead is a night that feels less like a match you’re losing.

Habit two: guessing how tonight will go

Most people with insomnia guess the night before it even started.

Sometimes it’s worry. “I already know tonight will be bad.”

Sometimes it’s hope. “Last night was okay, so maybe tonight will be too.”

Either way, you’ve already decided how it ends before your head even hits the pillow.

Here’s the problem.

Guessing creates worry. And worry is fuel for the alarm in your brain. You predict a bad night, you feel anxious, and the anxiety keeps you up. It’s a trap.

“If I’m not asleep by midnight, I’ll stay wired and won’t sleep at all.”

That is not a real rule.

There is no switch in your body that flips at midnight and takes sleep away.

But if you believe it, the worry that hits at 12:01 makes it feel true.

Or maybe you’ve spotted a pattern. One good night, then two bad ones. It feels like clockwork.

So you start thinking your body is stuck in a cycle.

But here’s what’s really going on.

After a bad night, your body wants sleep more, and you expect a better night, so you worry less.

And you sleep.

After a good night, you might want to "keep up".

So you sleep worse.

These patterns go away as you worry less about sleep. In the meantime, try to keep an open mind.

“I don’t know how tonight will go, and that’s okay.”

Why these habits matter

Checking the clock and guessing the night feel like they give you some control. But they don’t.

They just give you more stuff for the alarm to react to. Neither one helps you sleep.

Letting both go might feel odd at first, because it means sitting with not knowing.

You don’t know the time. You don’t know how the night will go. You’re flying "blind". Just like you used to before insomnia.

And here’s what you get back.

You stop creating the worry that was keeping you up. And you give your body the one thing it actually needs to sleep:

A mind that is not watching itself all night.

If you want my personal help ending insomnia for life by fixing the root cause, join me and many others inside the End Insomnia Program.

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To peaceful sleep,

Ivo at End Insomnia

Why should you listen to me?

I recovered from insomnia after 5 brutal years of suffering. I've now coached 100s like you to end their insomnia for good, 100% naturally, by fixing the root cause: hyper-arousal.

Here's what I used to do at night when I had insomnia before I finally fixed it.

A book. A podcast. A show. I listened to a video. Something I like that can take my mind off of the anxiety at 2 am.

I know how that sounds.

I spent 5 brutal years doing the opposite, lying there in the dark forcing it and getting angrier by the hour. This is now the first thing I give my clients for the middle of the night.

You already know you can't force sleep. So the only question left is what you do with the time.

You can lie there thinking about how awake you are. Counting the hours until your alarm. Or you can give your mind something better to do.

Because when we feel less awful when we're awake, we worry less. And less worry is what lets sleep come back on its own.

Way one. Do it in bed.

Pick something you like and do it lying down. The goal is not to knock yourself out. It's to give your mind something to do besides worry.

Now as you're doing your thing, keep half an eye out. At some point your eyes might get heavy.

You might yawn. Your head might start to nod. When that happens, stop and close your eyes, and see if sleep is ready.

If it isn't, no big deal. Go back to what you were doing. The key here is patience.

Grabbing at sleep the second you feel a bit tired is just another way of forcing it. And that pushes sleep further away.

Way two. Get out of bed.

And no, this is not the CBT-i rule where you get up after 20 minutes and watch the clock all night. There is no timer here.

Sometimes lying in bed might stress you up even more. Your heart is going. Your body is tense. Your mind is racing.

When that happen, you can get up, leave the room and change the scene.

Then do something relaxing. Read on the couch. Watch something easy. Same idea as before, just in a different spot.

When you start to feel sleepy, head back to bed and see what happens. Still awake later? Get up again. There is no wrong move here, as long as you are not fighting for sleep.

The one thing that might backfire.

Whether you stay in bed or get up, there is one way to ruin this. Turning it into a sleep effort - doing something to make sleep happen.

The second you think "I'll read for 20 minutes and then I'll be tired enough", you have turned a nice activity into a sleep effort, or anything you do to try and MAKE sleep happen.

It adds pressure. Pressure adds worry. And worry is what keeps the alarm in your brain switched on.

So keep it easy. You are doing something you enjoy because being awake does not have to be miserable. That's it.

If sleep comes, great. If it doesn't, you spent the night doing something you like instead of something that made you feel worse.

Some nights this will feel easy and you'll fall asleep faster.

Other nights nothing will seem to "work" no matter what you try, and you might worry you have lost all your progress.

Both are normal, and neither one decides how this goes.

So pick your thing tonight. Have the book or the podcast ready before you get into bed, so you are not deciding at 2 in the morning. Then use it.

Start Your 7-Day FREE Trial on Skool

To peaceful sleep,

Ivo at End Insomnia

Why should you listen to me?

I recovered from insomnia after 5 brutal years of suffering. I've now coached 100s like you to end their insomnia for good, 100% naturally, by fixing the root cause - hyperarousal.

Here is an idea that might sound strange at first.

What if your goal at night was not to fall asleep? What if it was just to feel calm, even while you are awake?

I know that sounds odd. You are reading this because you want to sleep. But chasing sleep is part of what keeps you stuck.

Every time you try to force it, it slips further away. The truth is, you can't make yourself fall asleep on any given night.

But you can choose how you deal with being awake. And that changes a lot.

A better plan for the middle of the night

When you are awake and don't want to be, you have a choice. You can toss and turn and beg your brain to shut off.

Or you can do something that makes the moment easier. One choice is to try mindfulness in bed. Mindfulness just means paying attention to right now.

If your brain likes to race at night, mindfulness gives it somewhere calm to go.

Instead of getting pulled into worry, you put your attention on something simple. Like your breath. Or your body.

Here is the key part. You are not doing this to fall asleep. The second it becomes a tool to make sleep happen, it stops working.

You do it just because it is a better way to spend the time. And because it slowly teaches your body that being awake at night is not an emergency.

Here is the funny thing. When you do this without trying to sleep, it often calms you down anyway. But you have to let go of the goal to get there.

Try this tonight: the Body Scan

The body scan is one of the easiest things you can do in bed. Here is how it works.

Start at your toes. Put all your attention on how they feel. Do not try to change anything. Just notice. Spend about fifteen seconds there. Then move up to your feet. Then your ankles. Then keep moving up, slow and easy. Your legs. Your belly. Your chest. Your back. Your arms. Your neck. Your face. All the way to the top of your head.

When you reach the top, you can go back down again. Do it as long as you like. Go at whatever speed feels good.

A few things to know. Your mind will wander. That is normal. When you notice, just go back to where you left off.

If you can't feel much in one spot, that is fine. Notice that, and keep going. There is no wrong way to do this.

Some people find the body scan really soothing. It gives the mind something gentle to hold. Some even notice something new.

A soft sense of what it feels like to be in their own body. A calm they did not know was there.

What to expect (and what not to)

Do not expect to do one body scan and suddenly feel great about being awake. That is not how it works.

What happens is slow. Over time, you suffer less at night. You start to trust that you can get through your day no matter how you slept.

Your body learns to react less. And a body that reacts less is a body that can sleep more easily down the road.

If your mind drifts while you rest, that is fine. People who sleep just fine also lie in bed resting sometimes.

But if you catch yourself spinning into worry, come back to the body scan. It will help pull you out.

And if mindfulness in bed just does not click for you? That is okay too. It is only one choice. The real point is to stop fighting the night. And start making peace with it.

If you want to end insomnia for good and want me to keep you personally accountable until you do, start your 7-day FREE trial of the End Insomnia Program here👇

Start Your 7-Day FREE Trial on Skool

To peaceful sleep,

Ivo at End Insomnia

Why should you listen to me?

I recovered from insomnia after 5 brutal years of suffering. I've now coached 100s like you to end their insomnia for good, 100% naturally, by fixing the root cause - hyperarousal.

Try this. Set a timer for five minutes. Sit still. Just watch what your brain does.

You might start by noticing something in the room. That reminds you of yesterday. That reminds you of an errand you need to run. That reminds you of a call you keep putting off. Then a sound pulls you somewhere else. Now you are thinking about dinner.

Five minutes. Dozens of thoughts. Not one of them stayed.

That is how thoughts work. They come and they go. They change all the time, often without you even noticing. Even the ones that feel huge and permanent are already on their way out.

Why this matters at night

When you are awake at 2 a.m. thinking "I can't do this one more night," that thought feels like the truth.

It feels solid. Real. Like this is just how life is now, and how it always will be.

But it is not. It is a thought. And like every thought you have ever had, it will pass.

The same problem that feels huge at night often looks totally different in the morning. Nothing about the facts changed.

Your thoughts about the facts changed. Once you start trusting that, it gets easier to hold those dark-hour thoughts loosely.

That does not mean worried thoughts stop showing up. In a rough stretch, the same worry can come back over and over. That is normal.

But each visit is still short. You can notice it, let it be there, and turn your attention back to what you were doing. It will move on, even if it comes back later.

You can even say to yourself, "I'm letting this thought be here." Not because you like it. Because giving it room takes away its power over you.

A silly trick that really works

This next one sounds ridiculous. That is the whole point.

Take a thought that has been eating at you. Something like "If I don't take something to sleep, I'll never get through tonight."

Now sing it. To the tune of Jingle Bells.

Go ahead. Try it, even just in your head.

Feels different, right?

When you sing a scary thought, or say it in a goofy voice, something loosens. The thought loses its power.

It is hard to take it seriously when it is set to Mary Had a Little Lamb. You get a little space between you and the thought.

To be clear, this is not making fun of yourself. The fear behind that thought may be very real.

But this helps you see that the thought is just words your brain put together. Not a life sentence. And once you see that, you can make a calmer choice about what to do next.

Here is an example.

Say you have been working on getting through hard nights without a sleeping pill. One night, the urge feels huge.

Singing that desperate thought gives you just enough room to think: yes, I am scared. And I am still going to stick with my plan, because that is what helps me long term.

Putting it all together

None of this is about having a quiet mind. That is not the goal, and it is not realistic.

The goal is to stop getting pushed around by every thought that floats by.

You do that by holding on to two simple things. Your thoughts are input, not orders. And they do not last, even when they feel like they will.

When you hold your thoughts loosely instead of gripping them, you free up a lot of energy.

Energy you were spending on a fight inside your own head. And that energy is much better spent living your life and letting sleep come on its own.

If you want to end insomnia for good and want me to keep you personally accountable until you do, start your 7-day FREE trial of the End Insomnia Program here👇

Start Your 7-Day FREE Trial on Skool

To peaceful sleep,

Ivo at End Insomnia

Why should you listen to me?

I recovered from insomnia after 5 brutal years of suffering. I've now coached 100s like you to end their insomnia for good, 100% naturally, by fixing the root cause - hyperarousal.

Here is something that sounds simple but is hard to live by. Just because you think something does not make it true.

We treat our thoughts like they are facts. A thought shows up.

"I will never sleep normally again."

And we react like a judge just made a ruling. We feel it in our chest. We plan our whole day around it. We let it boss us around.

But what if your thoughts are not facts? What if they are just ideas your brain hands you all day long, whether you asked for them or not?

Stepping back from your thoughts

There is a skill for this. It means the opposite of being stuck to your thoughts. Stuck means caught up in them. Feeling like you are your thoughts.

Stepping back is different. It is not about arguing with a thought or swapping it for a better one.

It means noticing that you are thinking, then taking one small step back. You become the person watching the thought. Not the person being the thought.

When you are stuck to a scary thought, it runs the show. When you step back from it, you can see it clearly, say "okay, that's there," and still pick what you do next.

Your thoughts are just input

Try thinking of your thoughts as input. Ideas your brain hands you all day long.

Some are great. They help you solve problems and plan your life. But some are just noise. Looping. Worried. Plain wrong.

When you start seeing thoughts as input instead of truth, something shifts. You get to look at each one and decide if it is worth listening to.

Is the thought helpful? Great. Use it. Is it just spinning in circles? You do not have to obey it. You can say "I see you" and put your attention back on what you were doing.

This helps a lot when a thought pushes you to do something that sets you back. Like skipping your sleep plan.

Or trying some new trick to force sleep. When you can step back and think "that's a thought, not an order," you get to make the better choice even while you feel scared.

And from that spot, you can be kind to the scared part of you without letting it take over.

One easy tool: say "thinking"

When you catch yourself spinning into worried thoughts, say one word to yourself.

"Thinking."

That's it. One word.

It sounds too easy. But it works. When you are caught in a chain of worry, you are inside the story. You are living it.

The second you say "thinking," you step outside of it. You are back in the room. And now you get to choose what happens next.

If "thinking" feels odd, try "I'm having a thought." Or "I'm having the thought that I won't sleep."

The exact words don't matter much. What matters is the shift. From being your thoughts to seeing them.

Sometimes a thought is worth your time. Other times, especially at night, you will see that you are just spinning. Naming it lets you stop and turn.

One thing to keep in mind

This is not about blocking thoughts or shoving them away. Worried thoughts may come back again and again, especially in a rough stretch. That's normal.

The goal is just to hold them more loosely. Let them be there without fighting them. And keep doing what matters to you, even when a scared thought tags along for the ride.

You do not need a quiet mind. You just need a new way to deal with the noise.

If you want to end insomnia for good and want me to keep you personally accountable until you do, start your 7-day FREE trial of the End Insomnia Program here👇

Start Your 7-Day FREE Trial on Skool

To peaceful sleep,

Ivo at End Insomnia

Why should you listen to me?

I recovered from insomnia after 5 brutal years of suffering. I've now coached 100s like you to end their insomnia for good, 100% naturally, by fixing the root cause - hyperarousal.

There is a kind of thinking that keeps insomnia going. If you have been awake at 3 a.m., you know it well.

One thought shows up.

"If I don't sleep soon, tomorrow will be ruined."

Then another one.

"What if I never sleep right again?"

Then another. Soon a small worry has grown into full panic.

A lot of people with insomnia say it feels like walking on eggshells inside their own head. They try hard not to set off the next wave of worry.

That makes sense. Those kinds of thoughts are one of the biggest reasons people can't sleep. They get loud right before bed. Then they get loud again in the middle of the night.

But how you deal with the thoughts is something you can change.

Challenge your thoughts

This one is simple. When a scary thought shows up, stop and ask yourself one question. Is this really true? Or is my brain making up the worst thing it can think of?

Here is how it works.

Say you are in bed thinking:

"I won't be able to work tomorrow if I don't sleep right now."

Instead of believing it, check it. Think back on the rough nights you have had. You still got through those days, right?

Even better, think about the times you were sure the day would be awful. And then it turned out fine (or maybe even great).

Or maybe your brain goes bigger.

"If I don't sleep tonight, I won't sleep tomorrow. Then it gets worse and worse until I fall apart."

That thought feels true in the dark. But it is not how sleep works.

Your body has a built-in system called sleep drive. The longer you stay awake, the more it builds up.

So a few rough nights actually make the push to sleep stronger. Your body has a backup plan, even when your brain says it doesn't.

You don't need anything fancy to do this. Just catch the thought and ask: is this really true? What do I actually know?

Where this tool runs out

Checking your thoughts helps. But it has limits. You should know them so you don't get frustrated.

First, it can take the edge off. But it is not strong enough on its own to calm a body that has been on high alert for months or years.

Real relief comes from slowly teaching your body that it is safe. That takes time. And it takes more than one tool.

Second, sometimes you can't argue your way out of worry. Because the worry is not always wrong.

If you check the thought "tomorrow might be hard," the honest answer might be... yeah, it might be.

You have made it through before. That is worth remembering. But pretending it will be easy is not the same as being honest.

Here is the trap to watch for.

If you start using this tool in a desperate way, trying to argue your fear away so you can finally sleep, it turns into a fight.

And you can't win that fight by trying harder.

There is another way

So think of this as one tool. It works great for thoughts that are way off base.

But what about the worry that remains after you challenge it?

There is another way to handle that. One that does not ask you to change your thoughts at all. It changes how you hold them.

Instead of arguing with a thought, you step back and watch it.

You stop treating every scary thought like an order you have to follow. You start seeing it as one more thing your brain is doing.

That change, from being inside your thoughts to watching them, changes everything.

If you want to end insomnia for good and want me to keep you personally accountable until you do, start your 7-day FREE trial of the End Insomnia Program here👇

Start Your 7-Day FREE Trial on Skool

To peaceful sleep,

Ivo at End Insomnia

Why should you listen to me?

I recovered from insomnia after 5 brutal years of suffering. I've now coached 100s like you to end their insomnia for good, 100% naturally, by fixing the root cause - hyperarousal.

Some feelings are really hard to sit with. Like when you feel scared at bedtime. Or upset after another bad night. Or worried about how tomorrow will go.

When a feeling like this shows up, we want to push it away fast. That makes sense. But here is the thing: pushing it away does not work. Most of the time, fighting a feeling just makes it bigger.

So let's try something else. Instead of pushing the feeling away, we are going to turn toward it. I know that sounds strange. Stay with me. It helps.

Try these three easy steps

Next time a hard feeling shows up, try these three steps. You can do them in the middle of the night. You can do them during the day. Anytime works.

Step one: Notice it.

First, name what you feel. Are you scared? Sad? Worried? Then find where you feel it in your body. Feelings do not just live in your head. They live in your body too.

Maybe your chest feels tight. Maybe your belly feels heavy. Maybe your shoulders feel tense. Where do you feel it? Take a second and find the spot.

Step two: Say it out loud.

Now say what you feel. You can say it in your head or out loud. Try something like, "I feel worried right now." If you feel more than one thing, name them all.

This might seem too simple to matter. But it really helps. When you put a name on a feeling, it gets a little easier to handle. That is not just a nice idea. Studies show it works.

Step three: Let it be there.

This is the hard part. Let the feeling stay. Do not try to make it go away. Just let it be what it is.

See if you can soften your body a little. Try to be gentle and curious about the feeling, like you are just looking at it.

You do not have to like it. You just let it be there. Stay with it as long as it feels okay.

Here is what matters. The goal is not to make the feeling disappear. The goal is to let it be there without fighting it. When you stop fighting, you suffer less.

Remember this when a feeling feels like it will last forever

When you are stuck in a hard feeling, it can feel like it will never end. Being scared makes you think you will feel scared forever. Being sad makes tomorrow look dark.

But here is the truth. Feelings do not last forever. They come, and they go. They always have.

Watch your own feelings for a while, and you will see this is true. The feeling that feels stuck right now will change.

When you let a feeling be there instead of fighting it, it can move through you faster. Fighting keeps it stuck. Letting it be helps it pass.

You do not have to just sit and feel all day

Letting a feeling be there does not mean you sit and feel it all day long. That is not the point.

You can still do the things that matter to you, even when a hard feeling is with you. You can carry the feeling and still live your life. In fact, that is one of the best things you can do.

The big picture

Here is what ties it all together. Hard feelings do not last forever. And bad nights do not last forever either. Some days will be hard. Some might even feel hopeless.

But nothing stays the same. The hard nights pass. The heavy feelings lift. The tired days turn into better ones.

So when things feel really hard, hold on to this. You will find a way. And things will change. They always do.

If you want help applying this, want to recover from insomnia for good, and want me to keep you personally accountable until you do, start your 7-day FREE trial of the End Insomnia Program on Skool.

To peaceful sleep,

Ivo at End Insomnia

Why should you listen to me?

I recovered from insomnia after 5 brutal years of suffering. I've now coached 100s like you to end their insomnia for good, 100% naturally, by fixing the root cause - hyperarousal.

Picture this.

You're standing at the edge of a bottomless pit. On the other side stands a monster, huge, terrifying, impossibly strong.

A rope stretches across the pit between you, and you're both pulling with everything you have.

This is the Insomnia Monster. And the harder you pull, the harder it pulls back.

You're terrified of falling in, so you dig in your heels and pull harder.

You think: if I could just pull hard enough, the monster would tumble into the pit, my distress would vanish, and I could finally sleep.

But no matter how hard you try, you can't win. You're locked in a brutal stalemate, leaving you exhausted.

This metaphor captures something essential about insomnia. But to understand why it matters, we need to talk about two kinds of pain.

Clean pain vs. dirty pain

This idea comes from Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, and it's one of the most useful frameworks you'll ever learn for insomnia.

Clean pain is the unavoidable pain of being human. The fatigue of a poor night. The sadness of disappointment. The anxiety that comes with uncertainty.

These feelings are real, and they're a natural part of life. You can't eliminate them, and you don't need to.

Dirty pain is different. It's the suffering we pile on top of clean pain through our reactions.

Through our response, we take the original difficulty and amplify it into something far more distressing.

Dirty pain shows up in many familiar ways:

• It's desperately struggling against your thoughts and feelings.
• It's evaluating your situation in catastrophic terms.
• It's never questioning the story you're telling yourself.
• It's letting difficult feelings keep you from what matters.
• It's berating yourself when you're already hurting.
• And it's becoming so used to misery that you struggle to experience anything else.

Here's why this matters so much: a substantial portion of your emotional distress is dirty pain.

Which means it's within your power to reduce.

Much of the suffering of insomnia doesn't come from the lack of sleep itself. It comes from how we react to it.

So what do you do with the monster?

Back to the tug-of-war. You're pulling and pulling, and you cannot win. The monster is too strong.

So what can you do?

You drop the rope.

You don't have to play the game. The monster might still be standing there on the other side of the pit, but you don't have to fight it.

The moment you drop the rope and stop struggling against what you can't control, you start to suffer less. You start to reclaim your life.

This applies to both the struggle at night and the struggle against daytime distress.

And it points to something powerful: acceptance dramatically lowers the stakes of sleep. When you're not locked in a fight to the death every night, falling asleep gets a whole lot easier.

An exercise: dropping the rope

Here's a way to actually feel what this is like.

Take a breath and notice what's happening in your experience right now.

You might close your eyes.

Become aware of any unpleasant thoughts, feelings, or sensations, perhaps ones tied to your sleep. Observe it, and notice the ways you've been struggling against it.

Now bring to mind the image of the tug-of-war. See if you can feel that strain in your body, the pulling, the tension, the effort.

Then imagine dropping the rope. Actually picture it falling from your hands.

As you do, let go of the struggle against that difficult thought or feeling. Take a deep breath in, and as you exhale, release any tension you're holding.

Notice any shift toward ease. The difficult thing may still be there, but now there's room for it to exist without you having to fight it. Stay with that spaciousness for a minute.

You can return to this anytime. It won't magically make you calm or happy. But it will show your body and mind what it feels like to stop fighting, and that's where relief begins.

If you want me to hold your hand as you recover from insomnia, keep you accountable, and make sure you sleep great again for life, start your 7-day FREE trial of the End Insomnia Program:

Start Your End Insomnia Program 7-Day FREE Trial on Skool

To peaceful sleep,

Ivo at End Insomnia

Why should you listen to me?

I recovered from insomnia after 5 brutal years of suffering. I've now coached 100s like you to end their insomnia for good, 100% naturally, by fixing the root cause - hyperarousal.