Meditation for insomnia: 3-minute letting go session, during a break

About this practice

Nothing to learn and nothing to fix: 3 minutes of letting go for insomnia, during a break. A guided session of about 3 minutes, suited to all levels. Nothing is recorded and no account is needed.

What this works on: insomnia

Insomnia is often maintained by the fear of not sleeping. Anticipating a bad night raises arousal at bedtime, which produces the bad night.

It tends to show up as:

• Dreading bedtime
• Hours awake with a busy mind
• Sleeping worse as the week goes on

Removing the pressure to sleep is the active ingredient. This gives you something to do that is not trying.

Doing this on a break

• Leave the room if you can
• Do not start anything else in the same gap
• Set a timer so the break has an end

A break spent half-engaged with a screen is not much of a break. Guard the whole five minutes.

How letting go works

Letting go is about loosening grip rather than dropping things. It works on the effort attached to a problem — the holding, rehearsing and bracing — which is separable from the problem itself.

• Pick one thing you are gripping and loosen a single finger
• Release the effort with the exhale, not the issue
• Set down temporarily; you can pick it up again after

What happens, minute by minute

1. 0:00If you're sitting, let the chair do the work of holding you upright.
2. 0:13Ask yourself what you could stop holding for the next sixty seconds. That one is a good start.
3. 0:29There's a difference between relaxing and stopping. We're aiming for the second one, gently.
4. 0:43Notice that you don't have to start a breath. It arrives by itself.
5. 0:56Notice the difference between the breath at the front of your nose and the breath in your chest.
6. 1:12Let your whole body be as heavy as it wants to be.
7. 1:25Whatever the counting of hours until morning is doing right now, your breathing can keep going underneath it.
8. 1:41Notice the space around the frustration of not sleeping. It is there, even if it is small. Put your attention in that space.
9. 1:59Let the breath be shallow if shallow is what your body wants.
10. 2:12Notice how the wide-awake mind at 2am changes shape when you stop resisting it. Usually it gets smaller, not bigger.
11. 2:29You might be planning something. Notice the planning, then come back.
12. 2:41You have been carrying this competently for a while. A few minutes off will not undo that.
13. 2:56Stretch whatever feels stiff, then carry on.

Questions people ask

Meditation is a practice, not a treatment. If you are dealing with ongoing distress, please also reach out to a professional.