Tired and Wired

The energetics of collapse

Are you tired? What sensations accompany that feeling? How do they change when you bring awareness to them?

I realized recently that when I feel tired, what I’m actually experiencing is a resistance to tiredness—a kind of inner tension.

I once received the meditation instruction, “If you feel tired, don’t resist it. Let the tiredness engulf your body.” The fruition of this practice is a more basic experience of depletion. It feels watery, like the muscles are softening and dripping downward. It may even feel pleasant.

When I allow the tiredness to fill my whole body, the inner conflict resolves. I find both that my energy replenishes more quickly and that it’s easier to fall asleep. On the other hand, when I resist the tiredness by tensing up—or I go for that double espresso shot—I go into a state of fatigue or collapse.

It takes energy to feel tired. Ever been too exhausted to fall asleep? It’s a full-body sport! The watery quality of the kidneys has to seep into your bones, and your dreaming self has to take flight. It may feel easier to tense up, lean on your elbows, and hang your head over a computer screen. You can stay up for hours in this fractured zombie trance.

In collapse, you sense that you need to rest, but some inner tension offsets the body’s natural restorative cycle. You just sort of go limp.

Instead, try building energy. Do some gentle qigong, talk a walk—anything that recruits the whole body. The stretching and yawning reflex is a great example of how your body does this naturally.

It goes without saying that there is no replacement for sleep. Sleep is king. It is the Elixir of Life and the portal to Wisdom. I could write operas to the somnolent majesty of sleep…

I didn’t always feel that way. Growing up, I was a noncompliant napper. One of my earliest memories is of being forced to nap by my babysitter, lying wide awake in a dark, unfamiliar bedroom. Frozen.

I still gaze with burning jealousy at those who fall asleep the moment their head hits the pillow. But that is my burden. In the words of Agent Dale Cooper, “Albert’s path is a strange and difficult one.”