Every night, when things finally get quiet, I should be able to let go and drift off. But instead, I wrestle with the idea of sleep itself. For most people, sleep is natural, even comforting. For me, it’s complicated. It feels like two things at once — a loss of control and a kind of temporary non-existence.
The control part is huge for me. During the day, I get to steer things. I make decisions, move around, set the tone for what happens. But when I fall asleep, that control disappears. My mind goes wherever it wants, my body does what it does, and I’m not the one calling the shots anymore. Dreams come and go without my permission, and the idea of surrendering like that makes me uneasy. It’s like handing over the keys to something I should always be driving.
Then there’s the stranger part — the non-existence of it all. Sleep isn’t just closing your eyes and resting. It’s a chunk of your life where you stop experiencing anything. It’s hours that vanish into nothingness. One minute I’m here, awake and alive, and the next it’s just blank. And that blank space feels too much like death’s rehearsal, like practicing not existing. I don’t think about it lightly — it honestly unsettles me.
Put together, these two things feed each other. The fear of not existing makes me want control, and the loss of control makes the non-existence feel heavier. It’s a cycle I replay every night, and it keeps me awake far longer than I’d like.
Most nights, I end up waiting until my body finally overrides my mind and pulls me under. Sometimes I distract myself, sometimes I fight it, and sometimes I just stare into the dark and hope it feels different than the night before. Maybe one day I’ll learn to see sleep not as surrender, but as trust — trust that I’ll wake up, trust that life will be waiting, and trust that letting go for a little while doesn’t mean I disappear.
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