This doesn’t happen to me very often anymore, but when I first launched my business, I found myself thinking about it in the middle of the night. I’d get up to check on one of my kids, or whatever, and the next thing I knew, the problem solving (worrying) wheels were turning.  Needless to say, lots of sleep lost (and very little accomplished).

One night, I happened upon a very useful insight:  I could choose not to have the conversation during the night.

That’s right.  With much less effort than I would have thought, I learned to simply say to myself, “We don’t talk about this at night; we’ll talk in the morning.”

Letting your mind race through alternatives, possible outcomes and even worries, requires active participation on your part — I don’t think it just happens.  It might originate from “nowhere” when a thought pops into your head, but you can just shut it down by choosing not to join in.

I still get those worrying thoughts in the middle of the night sometimes, but at this point, I’ve learned to immediately pull the plug on the conversation.  Not only do I sleep better, I’ve come to find that problems, like monsters under the bed, don’t seem that scary when the sun is shining.