I don’t have trouble sleeping anymore. Maybe that’s not a very novel statement, but it seems to me that there are a lot of people that could benefit from a good, sound night’s sleep — parents with young children I’m talking to you — so I’ll let you in on the secret of how. In the history of Christianity, and especially amongst the Desert Fathers, it seems that the ascetic practice was to deprive oneself of sleep, which does have its merits as a practice of self-discipline, but I’ve found that for me, 8½ hours of sleep (7 if I’m really active) makes me more focused, more motivated, and less prone to irritation, which are all qualities I’m trying to cultivate on my spiritual journey. That’s not to say that I never deprive myself of sleep, I just try to do so deliberately — more on that next Advent or Lent.

So what has ever prevented me from getting to sleep when I wanted to? Undisciplined thought, pure and simple. How many times have you laid down to sleep and starting thinking about the cringe-worthy moment you had that day, then remembered that you needed to add something to the grocery list, and oh! you need to do your taxes, but where are you going to find those tax receipts you got two months ago, maybe they’re in the … and then it’s an hour later and if you get to sleep now you can still have seven hours so you’ll be fresh for that meeting tomorrow at… what time was the meeting again? oh! and you forgot to invite so-and-so, and THEY saw that cringe-worthy moment today… et cetera.

I won’t bother to expound on the expert advice of winding down at the end of the day, avoiding screen time, maybe reading a book or having a bath, because all these things do help, but the one thing that I know that will always work — if I can be disciplined about it — is to pray. And the prayers that always work for me are Christian Meditation, its close cousin Centering Prayer, or praying the Holy Rosary. These methods of prayer are meant to be done mindfully, and I’m sure there’s someone somewhere that will be scandalised by the suggestion that they be used to drift into unconsciousness, but I’d respond that no one should be scandalised by the suggestion to pray more — no matter the time or the place. I’ll save the details of these methods and how one can adapt them oneself for a different post; the videos linked above describe what they are and how to do them. What I will say is that each of them require a semblance of discipline of the mind to be effective in calming the spirit and drifting off to sleep. When I’m repeating a mantra (Christian Mediation) or sacred word (Centering Prayer) or Hail Mary (Holy Rosary), I frequently find myself thinking the same types of thoughts I offered in the paragraph above. The trick is to realise this as soon as possible and to redirect my attention back to the prayer, whichever prayer that may be. If I can continually and patiently redirect my thoughts back to the prayer, it’s only a matter of time, and a short matter of time at that, until it’s “lights out”.