The Wired Body.

Your sleep isn't broken. Your system is stuck in a state of low-level alert, and it doesn't switch off at bedtime. You might recognise this as the exhausted-but-wired feeling: your body is desperate for rest but physiologically unable to land there.

This happens because your nervous system's threat-detection system, the sympathetic nervous system, is chronically activated. It doesn't distinguish between a work deadline, a difficult conversation, and a physical threat. It just stays on. And a nervous system that's "on" cannot allow sleep. Sleep requires the body to feel safe.

The good news: this is not a character flaw or a broken body. It's a system that learned to protect you, and hasn't yet received the signal that it's safe to stand down. That signal is teachable.

More routines. More supplements. More willpower. These all attempt to work around the nervous system rather than with it. You can have a perfect sleep hygiene routine and still not sleep, because the problem isn't the routine. It's the activation level your body is sitting at before the routine even begins.

Somatic work: body-based practices that speak directly to the nervous system in its own language. Slow exhales, gentle body awareness, physical grounding before bed. Not to force sleep, but to shift your system from threat-mode into safety-mode. Sleep follows naturally from that shift. It cannot be added on top of activation.

Before bed, lie down and place one hand on your chest, one on your belly. Breathe normally for two minutes, don't try to do anything, just notice. Then take three slow exhales that are longer than your inhales. The extended exhale directly activates your parasympathetic nervous system, the rest-and-digest state. See what you notice.