Do you find that the minute you lay your head on your pillow, your mind starts racing through every embarrassing past experience you’ve ever had?
All you want to do is switch off and try and sleep, but your mind wants you to replay things you’d rather not think about again. Keep reading to find out what we can do to try and quieten our minds when we want to sleep.
Why Embarrassing Memories Show Up Right When You Want Sleep
Emotional moments tend to stick in your memory, and your brain prioritizes those emotional feelings during quiet time, making repetitive negative thinking more common at bed time.
Overthinking and rumination act like a loop, with small triggers like sounds, smell or images kicking off a mental loop, which reruns the same scene over and over. Chronic rumination or repetitive negative thinking keeps feeding that replay, which makes it harder to fall asleep.
When your mind is running through your embarrassing moments, it keeps your nervous system on alert, raising your heart rate and stress hormone levels, making your thoughts feel more vivid and real.
How Silence And Darkness Make Thoughts Louder
When you’re laying in bed, in the dark, there are no visual distractions, so your mind starts to replay things you’d rather it didn’t.
Once the lights go out, your brain loses the visual distractions, letting your inner critic step forward, replaying moments that trigger shame or perfectionism. You’ll notice small
The quiet also lowers your sensory input to the “amygdala”, which is the part of the brain linked to fear. Without distractions, you amygdala can amplify anxious memories and negative thinking.
If you have trauma or high anxiety, the nighttime negative thinking gets stronger. Your body might still be on alert even with nothing happening, and that tension just keeps the replay running. Therapy can help you to learn to name these reactions, and reduce their power over your sleep.
Try Box Breathing To Settle The Spiral
Box breathing is a simple breathing pattern you can try whenever your mind is racing and replaying moments you’d rather forget. It’ll calm your nervous system by giving your body a steady, predictable rhythm to follow.
Follow a 4-4-4-4 rhythm where you inhale for 4 counts, hold your breath for 4 counts, exhale for 4 counts and hold for 4 counts. You can repeat this cycle for a few minutes, and the steady pace interrupts your rumination, to stop you ruminating on the loop of replaying thoughts.
Simple Grounding Reset You Can Do In Bed
If the box breathing doesn’t work for you, you can try and breathe in for four counts, hold for one count, and breathe out for five counts. Repeat this five times noticing the rise and fall of your chest.
Next, use a 5-4-3-2-1 grounding scan. Name five things you can see, four things you can touch, three things you can hear, two things you can smell and one thing you can taste.
If a replay start, place a hand on your chest and whisper “I’m safe now”, and this ritual reduces shame and reminds you that the memory doesn’t control the present.
You can use a short grounding list you can repeat when you’re in bed. Feet on mattress, breath slow, body heavy and mind here, keeping it under five phrases so it’s easy for you to recall.