This week began with too many questions and too little sleep. Not mine—my patients’. Though I must admit, some of their insomnia seemed contagious.
It started on Monday evening. As the city crawled through its traffic and tired deadlines, my consulting room lit up with the quiet chaos of familiar faces. Patients trickled in, phones still buzzing with office calls, some wondering if the maid would come tomorrow, others clutching their stomachs like they’d swallowed a deadline and Bengaluru’s evening clinic hour had begun—with complaints, questions, and the usual soundtrack of burps, backaches, and bus route woes.
My first appointment was with an insomniac chef who appeared to have dark circles under her eyes. She walked in smelling of curry leaves, anxiety, and desperation.
“I can cook 300 meals a day, but I can’t digest silence,” she said.
Turns out, she hadn’t slept well in five years. Her brain stayed on boil, sautéing tomorrow’s menus, staff shortages, and GST filings. I asked her to describe her evenings. “I keep scrolling until the phone falls on my face. That’s my cue to stop,” she laughed. Kind of. I prescribed Ashwagandha, warm oil foot massage, early dinner, and—more importantly—a phone curfew. She nodded, distractedly. As she left, I could still hear the sizzle of her thoughts. She wasn’t fighting just sleeplessness. She was battling pace.
On Tuesday came Mr. Iyer, a retired banker. Crisp white shirt, polished shoes, but a nervous tic in his left eye that gave away more than his polite words did. He sat down and immediately launched into his blood pressure readings, his son’s NRI status, and the daily newspaper headlines—none of which he could control, but all of which he was trying to digest.
“I was in charge of 800 crores once,” he said, puffing his chest, “and now I get anxious over whether the maid will show up.”
He, too, was sleepless, not from action like the chef, but from inertia. The stillness of retirement had become unbearable. He missed being useful, being needed. I told him his doshas weren’t out of balance. His sense of identity was. Vata finds strange ways to whisper when life feels unanchored.
I gave him a simple breathing practice and a medicine. Nada Anusandhana. Chanting “A-U-M” slowly, feeling the vibration. He scoffed. “That’s for spiritual types.” I smiled and told him it was for anyone with a nervous system. He agreed to try. As he left, he stopped and asked, almost sheepishly, “Can I chant when my wife’s watching TV?” Of course, I said. Healing sometimes begins not with a lifestyle overhaul, but with the permission to do so.
Wednesday brought in the tattoo artist. Hair like a crow’s wing, arms full of ink, voice like a Bengaluru auto driver at 5 p.m. “Doc, I’ve tried weed, whiskey, and white noise,” he said, “but I can’t sleep if I don’t hear my ex-girlfriend’s playlist.”
He was young, sharp, and heartbreakingly lost. His work was beautiful, but his nights were messy. He showed me a tattoo he’d done the night before—Shiva in a cosmic dance, half-finished. “I got up at 3 a.m. and couldn’t draw the other half,” he said, like he was confessing to Brahma himself.
I asked him what he missed most. “Being still without breaking down.” That line stayed with me.
I didn’t give him any medicine right away. Instead, I asked him a simple question: “What do you think you’re avoiding when you don’t sleep?”
He looked at me for a moment and said, “Maybe… memories.”
I nodded. Sometimes, sleep isn’t the problem—it’s what comes with it. The mind tries to rest, but the heart isn’t ready. We don’t stay awake because we’re full of energy. We stay awake because we’re afraid of what might come up when things go quiet.
That night, I sat in my living room with the windows open and the fan humming. Three patients, three kinds of sleeplessness. One from speed, one from stagnation, and one from sorrow. But the root? The same. Disconnection—from rhythm, from self, from trust.
Ayurveda says nidra is one of the three pillars of life. Not just rest, but restoration. The pause that repairs. Yet we treat it like a stubborn app that won’t load. We poke it, reset it, and finally give up with a sigh and a screen.
What these three taught me—though they’ll never know—is that no one’s truly looking for “sleep.” They’re looking for rest from their roles. From performance. From the noise between the ears. They’re looking for permission to be human, soft, unfinished.
That night, I stepped out onto the balcony and let the city move on without me. No phone in my hand. No checklist in my head. Just the quiet hum of traffic and a dog barking at nothing in the dark.
I didn’t light a lamp. I didn’t say a mantra. I just stood still, letting the night be what it was—imperfect, unfinished, and calm in its way.
And it struck me—maybe not every ache needs a remedy.
Some feelings don’t need fixing.
They need room to breathe.
A little time. A little kindness.
A moment without pressure to feel better.
Many times, healing begins the moment we stop trying so hard.
