Acquainted with the Night

It could have been in the last year I worked full time, when I fell afoul of a power play I barely understood; or a few years later when we were having trouble paying our mortgage; or any night, really. Many of them are full of fidgets and fears and thoughts you don’t need. In the middle of the night I am usually not solving problems. I am just turning them over and over, like stones. And so I decided to get up.

I slipped out of bed as quietly as possible and went to see what the moon was up to, wrapping a blanket around my shoulders. Then I seated myself on the floor at the head of the stairs, pressing my tailbone as close to the wall as I could get it. I folded my legs crosswise and rested my open palms on my knees. My back was as straight against the wall as possible.

I began to breathe, following the energy up from my tailbone along my spine, slowly, trying to feel, if not each vertebrae, at least each area of my back. Up the back, the neck, and over the top of the head I followed the energy. And then down, flowing down my face and fountaining over my chest like water. My body wanted to spasm and I let it. The flow felt so good as it rippled downward. Then another breath, beginning at the base of the spine. I counted each one, up, over and flowing down the “microcosmic orbit” as the Taoists have it.

I did a set of five of these and then rested. Depending on the levels of tension I was finding in my body, I did sets of five revolutions. Usually two, sometimes three before I dared go back to bed, knowing I would sleep, the hamster wheel of thoughts having been stopped.

I never turn on lights, pick up a book or a computer on nights like this. The dark is restful and charged with refuge and reflection. It is often pleasant to be awake. When it isn’t, I go to the wall. The microcosmic orbit drives consciousness away from the overstimulated hyper cortex part of the brain and back down into its more primitive parts, awakening whole body reflexes. This relaxes and refreshes.

As an older person, I don’t expect to sleep all night. With fewer responsibilities these days, I don’t really need to. It is also true that almost any indulgence that I allow myself will come home to roost at night. This means that it has been many years since I have been able to enjoy coffee, red wine or dark chocolate without consequences, to say nothing of stronger alcohol, very spicy food or lavish sweets. Recently, when friends discussed the thrills of having an affogato, an ice cream topped with espresso and liqueur, I had only to imagine the sleepless nights to realize that, yes, I could have one. But would it be worth it?

In a study in which he tried to reproduce pre-industrial light patterns, sleep researcher Thomas Wehr found that after a few weeks acclimating, subjects slept for 3-5 hours, were awake for one or two hours, and then went back to sleep for 3-5 hours. This may have been the pattern of our ancestors. It has been suggested that older people also fall into it.

People have made much of this study. Churches of many denominations assume the hour of wakefulness was used in contemplation, calling it “the hour of God.” We are as close as we ever get to our inner life at this time, thoughts and images arising we don’t expect. But when thoughts are anxious, I have several practices, in addition to the microcosmic orbit meditation described above, to make time awake at night pleasant or productive.

My sister Solveig uses her wakefulness to visualize the people in her life and what she knows of them, sending love and attention. She has had an adventurous life and her family is spread far and wide. I too love polishing the images of the people I know and have known. It is also helpful to remember favorite places, or imagine idyllic places, placing yourself in favored circumstances. Reliving the colors and smells of the world, the sounds of a forest or beach may smooth out current cares we can do nothing about.

Kathryn Hulme, who was part of a Gurdjieffian study group during World War II known as “the rope,” writes in her book Undiscovered Country [published 1966] of the practices she was learning which contributed to self-awareness and study. Each night when she went to bed, she replayed in darkness her entire day, all the sensual and intellectual experiences she had had, trying to discern what they meant for her. I have always found this useful too.

In a city of ten million people, all of us in darkness and quiet by consensual agreement for at least eight hours per night, I often wonder what other people think about. But then again, do we really want to know? I just finished reading Svetlana Alexievich’s book Second Hand Time: The Last of the Soviets [first published 2013]. In oral discussions with people over a period of ten years, Alexievich has captured and printed the innermost stories of many people. There was no need to lie to her and people said exactly what they thought, what they had been carrying in their hearts. It was very hard to read. Russian history has been convulsive. Even the love stories were often litanies of pain and separation.

But if the same thing were done here in the U.S., would it be any different? Would we really want to know the intimate stories of our neighbors? What keeps them up at night? What rounds their brains make? Certainly we want to know about our families and friends, but maybe that is enough. Maybe that is all we can handle.

The courteous silence people keep in public speaks to this. We need an invitation to share our inner worlds with each other. And this is probably because we all know we must sleep at night. The health of children and adults depends on it. Tomorrow there’ll be breakfast, there’ll be school, there’ll be laundry. In the middle of the night we may ask ourselves “why?” But in the morning, we ask ourselves “why not?”