La Bisagra - Trudi Richards

Author:	Trudi Richards
Title:	Insomnia
	Waking Up With Insomnia Maybe it's just a last resort - a way to exhaust the dimented babbling of my "stupid mind" so that a little intelligence can come through? I have always wanted more hours in the day. But not that many more! It must be around 3:00 am when I wake up out of a perfect, beautiful sleep. Not again! I turned off the lights last night at 12:07am - I know I have not achieved anywhere near the 5-1/2 hours minimum that biology says I need. But ideas are marching into my mind, lining up for the charge. Usually I try to shut them off so I can sleep - and end up lying there for hours in guilty frustration, more and more awake, stubbornly not enjoying my warmth and comfort... These ideas, however, are irresistible ones, thoughts and insights and plans I've been seeking, for days and weeks, even years. Ideas about what interests me most, about a key aspect of my work. Again I'm faced with the challenge I've never yet dared take on: do I use my insomnia? Or do I once again play it safe and try to sleep? Finally, I take the plunge. I get out of bed into the freezing blackness. My robe is short, and my socks are thin. I stagger downstairs and pour a cup of Soy Dream, which I heat in the microwave. Steeling myself, I look at the clock - by a miracle, it's almost 6am! I must have been awake since 5:15 or so - I have almost gotten my five and a half! With amazed relief I go to my desk. Oh - I know I will still be sleepy later - I always am, after only 5 hours; I only feel really good after 6-1/2 or seven. But for some reason, this time I don't dread that ragged feeling. I know I can at least practise that new relaxation technique, which is sometimes almost as good as sleep. I begin to write down the ideas. More keep coming. I write for four or five hours. Finally I've got them all - but I'm still curiously fresh. I keep going, developing and reworking the ideas, all day - I never do end up feeling too sleepy. An old suspicion sneaks up on me. Maybe my fixation on sleep - that I must have a certain amount, each night the same, over over again - is nothing but a big belief. For years, after all, even though I've made "Sleep First!" my motto, I still never have enough energy to do my work and everything else I want to do, to jump in and release all that energy roiling around in my brain. And time - I have even less of that than I did long ago, before I believed in insomnia, because I now dedicate so many hours to the quest for sleep, jealously guarding my need for sleep above all else! Perhaps insomnia is a kind of perverse gift from the gods - a puzzle containing its own solution. Perhaps the requirements of living are not so ironclad. If I dare defy this monster and embrace Life fully, maybe I can kick the habit of mechanical living - and really wake up! And then, I suspect, I'll sleep just fine. Paradox: After a night of perfect sleep, my day was full of self-doubt and indirection. After a night of anger and insomnia I awoke to see the beauty and rightness of all things.