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Insomnia is a complex problem that can involve the mind(thoughts), the brain and the rest of the body. In general insomnia is the inability to fall asleep and/or stay asleep which leads the person to not receiving an adequate amount of sleep.
Doctors seem to differ widely on their opinions about just how much sleep a person actually needs. I've heard figures ranging from 9 hours a night all the way down to 6 hours. Clearly, the amount of sleep one needs is highly individual.

One of the biggest and most overlooked contributors to insomnia is one's philosophy about sleep itself. Very often people unconsciously train themselves to dread going to bed for fear of tossing and turning throughout the night. Very often sleep gets labeled as something we must do' and it is the stress of having to do' this one more thing at night(i.e. get sleep) which prevents sleep from finding us in the first place.

Mentally labeling sleep as something we do' also has the potential to evoke performance anxiety in people who are trying to get a better night sleep'. According to some philosophy sleep is something that happens automatically within minutes of lying down and is not something that we necessarily do' consciously. Thus perhaps, as some Zen philosophers have suggested, we should allow sleep to find us(or to happen on its own accord) rather than vigilantly pursuing it.

In addition, very often this process of trying' so hard to get to sleep seems to lead to a series of stimulating thoughts which prevent our bodies from falling asleep. Stimulating thoughts could be anything from tomorrows worries to a slight received by a colleague or employee made during the day. All of these negative thoughts have the potential to activate the fight or flight response which will cause a sustained state of wakefulness(i.e. cause us to stay awake). Please do not be upset if you do experience this fight or flight response. It is not necessary to punish yourself for getting worked up(many of us are already worked up for whatever reasons and bedtime is a time to give yourself a break). Your fight or flight response was very useful during the better part of the evolution of your species, and it may one day save your life.

However, if you do often find your heart rate accelerating during the night and you do find yourself becoming excessively worked up in bed then I would recommend trying to learn the Relaxation Response (this is the title of a thin red book which I highly recommend reading). According

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