4 Ways to Fall Asleep More in Love!
i will be the first to admit that sometimes i’m a skeptic. sometimes i roll my eyes when certain people, particularly my husband, suggests we try some self-improvement techniques or gets too ‘motivational speaker’ on me (it’s just the core of who he is). about 2 years ago, he suggested we try something new before we fall asleep each night. obviously, the first 17 things that ran through my head involved some freaky-deaky ideas but alas…it was 4 simple statements we would share with each other.
1. today, my favorite thing about you was…
2. today, my favorite thing about myself was…
3. today, i gave back by…
4. today, i am thankful for…
are you rolling your eyes right now? i totally get it. i did that for the first 2-3 weeks that we started doing this too. but guess what…now i actually look forward to it.
it pulls to my consciousness that i better be paying attention the little and big things my husband does during the day so i can give him credit later. it makes me pay attention to how i’m intentionally giving back to the world every day (sometimes it’s bigger- things like putting on a 3 day seminar for youth and sometimes it’s as simple as holding the door open for someone or picking up trash).
on the best nights, it goes something like “today, my favorite thing about you was that you brought me cookies and rocked your keynote. today, my favorite thing about myself was that i hopefully inspired some youth leaders. today, i gave back by volunteering to chair youth leadership seminar. today, i’m thankful for my health and that my body works the way it’s supposed to. and for cookies.”
on those other nights, when you both climb into bed maybe after a little tiff or a rough day in general, sometimes it goes something like “today, my favorite thing about you was that you showered. today, my favorite thing about me is that i could have lost my shit on the crazy person that hit my car, but i didn’t. today, i gave back by not killing the bug but releasing it outside. today, i’m thankful to have made it through to day and be here with you.”
regardless of how crappy or wonderful your day may have been, you fall asleep to only the positives of the day. you remind each other that you are conscious of their actions and how you are pretty much awesome too. this also helps to calm your mind right before bed and to remember there is always something to be thankful for.
try it out and let me know how it goes. i would also like to note that my eye-rolling has subsided and yours will too! if you aren’t currently in a relationship, you should still try the last 3 questions because we all probably need to remember why we rock each day.
the new wifestyle: how about instead of saying “never go to bed angry” we change it to “go to bed intentionally happier”
questions:
1) do you have any rituals before you fall asleep at night?
2) what’s another statement you could add to the list?
3) last thing your partner did to make you roll your eyes? (my husband insisted on eating his chocolate cake with a bite of his steak. ew.)
**if you enjoyed this article or found it useful, please share this with your friends via facebook, twitter, social media or email it to your significant other and try those 4 statements tonight!~thank you!**
jennifermckennasays
August 7, 2013 at 1:11 pm
Great Post Chelsea!! I especially love gets too ‘motivational speaker’ on me (works in reverse for us)
1) do you have any rituals before you fall asleep at night? brushing our teeth together.. long story about my dental health http://jennifermckennasays.wordpress.com/2013/01/23/flying-in-the-teeth-of-failure/
2) what’s another statement you could add to the list? I love being your wife.
3) last thing your partner did to make you roll your eyes? he said, “I just work here.”
chelsea
August 8, 2013 at 10:50 am
ha-glad you can relate to the ‘too motivational speaker’-does your husband ever call you out on it 🙂 sounds like quite the adventures in teeth brushing-hope that crown wasn’t too painful and i like the additional statement! thanks for the comment jennifer!
earlybirdmusings
August 7, 2013 at 6:12 pm
Hi Chelsea! A routine I’ve been doing since early this year is to write down three things each night that all start with “I am grateful . . .” It’s quick and having them all in one notebook gives me the chance to flip back over the gratitudes that I’ve accumulated over the year — an amazing number!
Now it will be interesting to see if I can get my husband to suspend disbelief and try your method. Think I’ll just tell him my part and see how it goes.
chelsea
August 8, 2013 at 11:28 am
thanks earlybird for letting us know your routine of writing down 3 things you are grateful for each night-love that! i also like that you can go back and read what you’ve been grateful for. how did it go last night? did he share after you did! let us know 🙂
junebugroseanne
August 7, 2013 at 7:38 pm
What a wonderful post today, Chelsea. It’s so nice to think back on the day at the end of the day and be grateful. I really like that idea. I remember that back when Bob and I were first married, we used to have this two or three-page paper questionnaire that we’d fill out about each other once a year on our anniversary. It went along the same lines as your post, as in, “my most favorite thing about you this last year was . . . . ” etc. Then, we’d exchange our questionnaire and read about what our spouse said about us. It was a nice inventory to do for our marriage.
chelsea
August 8, 2013 at 11:30 am
thank you june! that’s neat that when you were first married you would go over the 2-3 page questionnaire on your anniversary-that’s a really neat thing to do. do you think you will start that back up again because it sounds like a great thing! i might have to look into creating something like that-thanks for your comment june
dan
August 11, 2013 at 5:02 pm
Thank You chelsea for sharing this post about How to Fall Asleep
i’ve also made a new post on my blog at http://danieluyi.com and i will be very happy if you could come by and also drop a comment.
Thank you.
chelsea
August 11, 2013 at 7:47 pm
thanks for reading and commenting dan! i will be sure to check out your blog 🙂
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