How to rest

Here’s another single-spell post.

(if you’re new, I use “spell” to mean something like “procedure”. There’s no “real” magic here)

People (it me, I’m people) are remarkably bad at resting, and a lot of things we end up doing to rest are really more dissociative rather than restorative. I think it’s worth putting some effort into fixing that, and I’ve got a couple of spells that are… tactically good for this - I don’t necessarily feel like they address the broader problem¹, but they do give me restorative ways of resting in response to particular problems.

This is the spell I use to recover when I’m very tired and failing to function as a result, but am unable or don’t want to have a nap. It’s especially useful for periods where I would ideally be asleep (e.g. insomnia or waking up too early), and thanks to working from home I also sometimes do it during the workday if I find myself staring at the computer ineffectively.

Isolation Rest

1. Close the blinds / curtains / etc and turn off the lights so it’s darkish in your room.

2. Put on some sound cancelling headphones, connected to either your phone or your laptop. I find big over-ear headphones much better for this than earbuds, but earbuds will do if that’s all you’ve got.

3. Play this youtube video through them. 

   1. You could try other sound tracks, but for whatever reason this one in particular works very well for me in a way not many other things do. It’s almost certainly partly that this is the one that I’ve been using for a while so I’ve got a strong association with it, but I think it’s also well suited to the task without the familiarity.

   2. My second best choice would be thunderstorm noises or some similar track from from mynoise.net.

   3. Don’t use actually good music. Definitely don’t use an audiobook.²

4. Put on a 45 minute timer. You can do shorter if you don’t have time for 45 minutes, you can do longer if you want, but if you’re going past an hour probably you want something that results in an actual nap.

5. Put on a sleep mask.

6. Lie back on your bed and close your eyes and listen to the music until the timer goes off.

Here are some additional things that help:

• I cover myself in a weighted blanket.

• I put a bolster cushion under the back of my knees.³

• If it’s currently cold I put on my electric blanket to warm up the bed.

• If it’s currently hot I make sure there’s a fan running in the room.

• I will sometimes take 50mg of caffeine before.

• I will sometimes take 400mg of ibuprofen before.

Debugging notes

I sometimes have a weird amount of resistance to doing this. Here are some things that help:

• If I’m feeling twitchy and like I can’t lie down, some stretching first can help.

• Often when this is happening, it’s because I have a headache, and I want to dissociate from that and spending time in my own head would prevent me from doing so. When this happens taking ibuprofen reliably fixes it (because I know the protocol will give it time to kick in).

• Sometimes a gradual transition in is helpful. e.g. I put the headphones on early and put the track on. I start an hour long timer instead of a 45 minute one with the goal of doing the full protocol within about 15 minutes. I go to bed and lie in the position but read a book for a bit instead of putting on the eye mask immediately.

Some problems that can come up during the protocol:

• Sometimes I get weird spikes of anxiety during. I find lifting the eye mask and opening my eyes for a couple seconds reliably makes them go away.

• The goal of this is not to sleep. If you find yourself frustrated that you’re not falling asleep, stop trying to fall asleep, it’s not for that. You might fall asleep during and that’s fine, but it’s probably slightly better if you don’t.

• Similarly this is not a meditation practice, you’re allowed to think about whatever you want. If you’re caught in an unpleasant thought loop or thinking about something that stresses you out (like chores you need to do), quit it. If you’re not sure how to quit it, use “Breath Holding Attention Lock” below.

• If you’re uncomfortable, feel free to wriggle about or stretch or the like. There’s no requirement to stay perfectly still.

• If you’re bored, try:

  • Looking for any parts of your body that feel tense and stretching them out.

  • Paying attention to the sound track.

  • A couple of breath holding attention locks

  • Doing some box breathing (breath in, hold your breath, breath out, hold your breath. Keep the same count for each of the four steps. A slow count of 4 is traditional, though I usually do longer than that and try to slow it down as far as I can manage)

  • Finding something to think about to occupy your mind. e.g. a problem to solve, a question about something you’ve been doing recently, etc.

  • Pay attention to any “light behind your eyes” / hypnagogic visual effects.

• Sometimes if I’m very stressed beforehand, as I relax I’ll find my body gets very twitchy. If that happens, let it. It’s not a problem. If you’re super uncomfortable with it, interrupt the protocol and get up rather than trying to suppress it.

One of the best use cases for this is if I wake up early enough that it’s too early for me to want to get up, but late enough that I’m not going to manage a full REM cycle before I have to get up unless I get right back to sleep right now. Similarly, if I wake up in the middle of the night and can’t get back to sleep.

When this happens I use this as a sleep substitute that is allowed to turn into sleep if I want it to, and basically perform the spell without a timer (though I’ll likely have an alarm going off at some point).