Why does my brain make a to-do list the moment I lie down?

A shopkeeper once told me he could not sleep because he kept remembering the gate might be open. He got up, checked it — closed, always closed — and went back to bed. This happened four nights running. On the fifth night I asked him, 'Whose gate are you really checking?' He said, 'Mine.' I said, 'Then stop opening it every night just to prove it's shut.' Your mind does the same trick with tasks. It has learned that lying down brings the list, and getting up ends the list — for a moment. That relief is the reward. You have been paying it every night, so it keeps showing up for work exactly when you lie down. This is not a broken mind. It is a mind doing exactly what you taught it. The good news about a trained habit is that it can be retrained — but only if you stop paying the old reward.