Hold the Pen – What I’m Tinkering With This Week

First off, if you have no clue what I’m talking about when I say ‘hold the pen’, give this a quick skim first.

Okay, now that we have that out of the way. 🙂

I travel for work once a month back to Madison. I’m pretty used to those trips by this point, but there is one thing that gets out of whack every time I go there.

Sleep.

I tinker with this a lot at home but have typically just accepted that it’s horrible when I’m out of town.

If I was left to my devices I would sleep from 9pm – 2:30am. Then I’d wake up and write or do something else creative for a few hours, then go back to sleep around 6am and sleep till 9 or so. That’s what my body wants to do. Every night of my damn life.

There are three things I’m implementing this week to see if it keeps me sleeping better despite not being in my bed for a few nights.

Essential oil spray. I made my own by mixing 15-ish drops of Aura Cacia’s Tasmanian Lavender essential oil, 1 tsp of pink Himalayan salt, and water in a 2-ounce spray bottle. I spray it on my pillow and sheets right when I lay down, and when I wake up at 2:30am ready to write the next great American novel, I spray it again and hope for the best. I think it’s helping. Whether it helps when I’m away from home has yet to be tested, but will be Tuesday night.

The temperature in the room. I wake up hot but love falling asleep feeling like I’m cloaked in a group hug. The warmer and cozier the better. But when I wake up sweating my ass off at 11pm I’m regretting my choice on the thermostat. So, I’m opting for a little more torture at bedtime in hopes that it pays off a few hours later. Keeping the heat set at 60 or so means that my once warm and inviting sheets are now more like an ice bath of fabric, but it will be worth it, right? We’ll see.

Lastly, when I wake up in the middle of the night wide awake, I’m putting on a guided meditation on Headspace. Have you tried it? I’ve done this a couple times at night now and I think I’m getting somewhere. Having something to queue up right away that will focus my thoughts on something intended for sleep and relaxation is better than what my brain naturally turns to. Which could be work, an email I didn’t respond to, waffles, whether or not ‘squink’ is a word….. I’m committing to using Headspace whenever I wake up in the middle of the night this week. I did that last night and hearing a very pleasant woman tell me what it was like to be a beachcomber by the ocean lulled me right back to sleep.

So that’s what I’m tinkering with this week. If you’d like to share what you’re tinkering with, I’d love to hear it. Or if you have specific sleep habits the help you stay asleep at night, I’d like to hear that too!