Sleep / Investigation11 min
Are we trying too hard to sleep?
The booming sleep industry promises control over our most instinctive state. The evidence tells a more complicated story.
How we feel now
Mind
Psychology, relationships, attention and the complicated business of being a person in the present tense.
Stories / The evidence / The edit
Cover storyRead next
Selected storiesMind / Essay01
WHEN DOES “SETTING A BOUNDARY” BECOME AVOIDING THE CONVERSATION?
There are sentences that now arrive carrying their own moral authority. “I’m protecting my peace.” “I need to honour my boundaries.” “I don’t have capacity for this conversation.” Often, this is progress. People have better language for saying no, leaving harmful situations and recognising that access to them is not automatic.
Mind / Sleep / Practical02
YOUR SLEEP TRACKER IS GUESSING. HERE’S HOW WELL.
There is a particularly modern way to ruin a perfectly decent morning: wake up feeling reasonably rested, check your sleep score and discover that apparently you slept terribly.
Mind / Relationships / Essay03
WHY WE WANT THE INVITATION BUT NOT THE PARTY
You can know exactly why a dinner would not suit you. It is late. It is expensive. The journey home is awkward. You have been looking forward to a night alone. Then you learn that the dinner happened and nobody asked, and the feeling is suddenly less straightforward.
Mind / Culture / Essay04
STAYING IN IS THE NEW GOING OUT
Imagine an evening at home arranged for a photograph. A low light falls across the table. There is a candle, a glass, a book whose cover looks unusually good beside the fabric of the sofa. Nothing appears to need washing, charging, moving or finishing. Even the decision to stay in looks as though it has been made by somebody with excellent taste.
Mind / Practical05
Digital Detox Tips
The first page of results is all hospitals and universities. Here is the same evidence without the waiting room tone.
Mind / Practical06
How to Relieve Stress Naturally
Natural usually means nothing. Here is what it should mean, with honest limits and nothing to buy.
Mind / Practical07
How to Practise Mindfulness at Work
A wellbeing programme cannot fix a workload. Used honestly, the practice is still worth something.
Mind / Work08
How to Reduce Stress at Work
Most advice assumes you control your workload. Occupational health guidance starts with the conditions instead.
Mind / Practice09
Mindfulness Exercises: What They Do
The clinical evidence is real but narrower than the marketing, and the starting instructions are simpler.
Culture / Essay010
When Your Life Starts Feeling Like Content
The imagined audience can be welcome. It does not need a vote in every decision.
Attention011
The “Scroll Type” Test: Instagram vs. WhatsApp Happiness Gap
Screen-time totals cannot tell connection from passive scrolling. The feeling afterwards might.
Research012
Depression and Memory: Why You Can Feel Stuck in the Same Grey Day
A humane reading of emerging memory research, without the viral neuroscience.
Mind / Essay013
Why Do We Want to Be Yearned for Again?
The fantasy is no longer being wanted. It is being missed.
Mind / Culture014
Why Does Everyone Want Less Internet?
Nobody wants zero internet. They want an internet that ends.
Relationships / Culture015
Summer Is Over. Why Does Everyone Suddenly Want a Relationship?
Cuffing season is a cultural label, not a hormone switch. Autumn still changes the set.
AI / Psychology016
464,687 Messages
What happens when the easiest relationship in your life is the one that asks almost nothing from you?
Psychology017
The problem with making everything a boundary
A useful therapeutic idea has become a blunt instrument for ordinary human friction.
Attention018
Your phone is not the only reason you cannot focus
Work design, stress and uncertainty are also competing for your cognitive bandwidth.
Relationships019
The underrated intimacy of doing nothing together
What companionship looks like when nobody is performing closeness.
WellnessTactics field guide
What the evidence says
A fast, clear reading of the claims currently taking up space in the mind conversation.
Magnesium
Helpful for deficiency; less certain as a universal sleep aid.
Sleep scores
Measurement can help, or create a new source of anxiety.
Morning light
A simple cue for the circadian system.
CorrespondenceOne good thing,
One good thing,
every Friday.
The week’s most useful research, one considered recommendation, and the things genuinely worth your attention.