How Danny overcame the insomnia struggle by abandoning sleep rituals, embracing acceptance, and moving toward the life he wanted to live (#66)

In 2019 Danny was going through a stressful period in his life while also being on a big health and fitness kick. When his sleep started to become a problem, Danny became very concerned and his doctor offered medication.

When Danny started to make some lifestyle changes to reduce stress, reduce the intensity of his training, and ensure he was eating sufficiently, his sleep started to improve. Danny felt relief, believing that he'd found the cure — that sleep needed a certain amount of exercise or a certain type of diet to happen.

As time went on, Danny found himself increasingly focused on protecting his sleep through diet and exercise. This, in turn, created a lot of sleep-related anxiety — and when really difficult nights returned in 2022, Danny realized that diet and exercise weren't the guardians of his sleep after all. Looking for answers, Danny spent his days troubleshooting and trying to figure out a way forward.

Danny discovered that the key to getting his sleep back on track was to reduce the power and influence sleep had over his life. For sleep to be effortless, he needed to move away from putting effort into making a certain amount or type of sleep happen.

In this episode, Danny describes the approach he took. It involved committing to actions that mattered to him each day (no matter how small), independently of sleep. It involved identifying and eliminating sleep-related rules and rituals. It involved ensuring his actions served him rather than insomnia. It involved acknowledging all the difficult thoughts and feelings that came with insomnia and being kinder to himself when things were difficult rather than trying to fight or avoid them and being harder on himself.

This process wasn't easy. It took commitment, resilience, and effort. It requires ongoing practice. Today, Danny's sleep is back on track. And, when the occasional difficult night shows up, it no longer has any power or influence over him or the life he wants to live.