It was one of those nights last night. You know the kind: You fall asleep immediately but then wake up at 3:00 AM and your To Do list starts dancing in your head. You lie there, thinking of everything that needs to be done; of everything that you need to cram into the day, and the next day, and the next day after. You cram a full week of worry and stress into each minute as  you toss and turn. You’re not really awake enough to get up and do anything, but you can’t sleep, either.

So last night, I tried a new approach. Whenever my thoughts veered off into Worry Worry Land, I started going through all the colors of the rainbow. (Or of the chakras, which ever you prefer.) I would concentrated on “red” until I could actually see red in my mind, then move on up to orange, yellow, green, etc. And it didn’t just distract me, it actually calmed me down and relaxed me.

 How does that work? Well, first of all, it does break up that negative internal dialogue, and gives you something else, something non-stressful but engrossing, to think about. It’s easier than trying to create a tropical beach fantasy because you know what comes next. But the most intriguing reason is that, supposedly, doing this exercise changes your brain waves in much the same way meditation does, inducing a theta pattern (4-7 cycles/sercond) instead of alpha (13-30) or beta (7 - 13).

No matter what the theory, the end result is what counts. I definitely was less stressed and more relaxed. My cat, who likes to sleep stretched out next to me, really appreciated that I wasn’t tossing and turning, disturbing her. And although it took a while, I was able to go back to sleep. About 45 minutes before my alarm went off, of course.

 But I’m not as tired this morning as I usually I am after a night of wrestling my To Do Lists in Worry Worry Land. I definitely have more energy. So it worked, at least somewhat.