Oversleeping- the opposite of Insomnia?
When it comes to sleep disorders, the more common complaints are from people who are having trouble falling asleep and getting “quality” sleep.
Not much have been said about those on the others side of the coin. Some people have the opposite problem. They sleep too much…
I personally used to sleep up to 14 hours a “night”. Sometimes I’d hit the snooze button for HOURS.
Improving the quality of my sleep was absolutely necessary in order to reduce the amount of sleep I get. After replacing a few bad habits, I now sleep less and feel much more lively and energetic throughout the day, then when I had slept longer.
However, improving the quality of my sleep was only one part of the process.
If you’re sleeping too much and having trouble getting yourself out of bed, it’s not only because of some bad sleeping habits.
As you know, when you wake up you’re not completely in control of your thoughts and your actions. At this stage your subconscious is more dominant.
You may have to admit having some kind of emotional issues, which are suppressed deeply in your subconscious.
Oversleeping can obviously CAUSE problems. The embarrassment when you fail to wake up on time, being late to work or loss of what could be your “free time”, and the tiredness that usually comes after an excessive sleep episode, all of those aren’t going to do you any good.
You should start putting your sleep system back to order, by going to sleep and waking up at the same time every day, no matter when you’ve gone to sleep, no matter what time you go to work, and even if you have a day off.
Practice it for at least 3 weeks (they say it takes 21 days to establish a new habit).
However, if you fail to wake up on time, you should focus on self-discipline first.
You see, most people wake up on time every morning, no matter how much or how well they had slept.
Don’t beat yourself up when you fail. Instead, try to think what went wrong. Try to remember your actions and your thoughts at that morning. Then come up with a plan for tomorrow.
If you can’t even remember what went through your head when the alarm went off, try going to sleep earlier or setting the alarm to a later time.
Most importantly, dig inside yourself to find the reason you oversleep. Ask yourself a simple, yet hard question: “What are you running away from”?