Habits are sneaky little things, you stay steadfast and break some old, and well sort of bad ones and you think yay…I’ve done it! That wasn’t so hard at all! But the thing is, you need to be vigilant because just when you look away complacently, Bang, the old habit is back!
Well, the last couple of years I developed this annoying (to me) habit of dozing off on the couch in the living room while watching a show(s) post-dinner. I’d then find myself waking up at some unearthly hour, plodding off to the bedroom, only to jostle for a good hour before actually falling asleep again.
The latest research confirms that good sleep, both in quality and quantity, is essential for our physical and mental well-being. For some reason, we seem to pride ourselves on sleeping less. In recent years, sleep has also been packaged as a ‘luxury experience’ – special mattresses, pillows, sheets, aromas, et al. Anyway, that makes for a whole new post.
Now back to my dozing off on the couch issue. I resolved to break this habit, tried various behavior modification techniques – an alarm that would go off at 10 pm to remind me to get packing to the bedroom, got the husband to shake me awake if I slept off, called myself ‘names’ for tripping every time, made a pact with myself that I would not lounge, that I would stay upright while watching TV… but slowly but surely I would get horizontal and then in a few minutes would be off to la-la land.
Then it struck me, why not change the orientation of the couch. Get the 2 single-seaters to face the television, move the 3 seaters to the side. Lo and behold, it worked! The show played at night, I tried to get comfy but could not in a single-seater, I got irritated and moved to the bedroom and slept… soundly 🙂
But then after a few months, I was like, I have cracked this, let’s get the 3 seaters to face the television. It worked but only for a bit, and sure enough, I was dozing off on the couch again. I let the situation persist as the pandemic was unfolding and my sleep habits took a back seat.
I started to feel tired and fuzzy and a bit crabby, so now it’s back to the single-seaters facing the television and I am hoping I will not find some creative way to get comfy on the single couch. The mind is innovative like that.
So here’s to good sleep – as important as good eating and exercise habits.
We are building healthy habits at https://happilyhealth.com/
Author: Pooja Shivdasani
