How Chanukah and Wrapped Gifts Reveal the Secret to Better Sleep

Today is the last day of Chanukah.

Last night was the party.

As a sleep coach, I often notice how moments of anticipation — even joyful ones — can quietly take over our nervous system. And for most of this week, my house felt like it was holding its breath.

Not the loud, chaotic kind of excitement — but the tight, buzzing kind. The kind where kids count days the way adults count minutes before a flight takes off.

For weeks, my kids were deep in decision-making mode.

Flipping through Toy 4 You magazines. Circling. Recircling. Changing their minds.

“I need this.”

“No wait — this one.”

A month of wanting… refining… imagining.

And then it happened.

The packages arrived.

There was a rush. A spark. A moment where everything suddenly felt real.

They knew exactly what was inside.

And still — they couldn’t open it.

The rule was the rule.

So I did my part. I bought the wrapping paper. I folded. I taped. I sealed each gift carefully, deliberately, almost ceremoniously.

And this is the moment that stops me every single year.

Because my kids didn’t protest.

They didn’t say, “What’s the point?”

They didn’t roll their eyes and say, “We already know what it is.”

They wanted it wrapped.

At one point, I watched my teenage son quietly walk into the room where I keep the presents. He didn’t touch anything else. He didn’t open a thing.

He figured out which one was his.

And he just… rested his hand on the wrapping paper.

For a second too long.

His face glowing — not surprised, not confused — just completely lit up.

And I stood there thinking:

Why does this still matter so much… when there is no surprise left?

The answer didn’t come right away.

But later that night, as the house quieted and I sat with my own thoughts, it clicked.

The wrapping isn’t about surprise.

It’s about containment.

Wrapping turns waiting into something safe. It creates a boundary around anticipation so it doesn’t spill everywhere. It allows excitement to exist without overwhelm.

The gift is known — but it’s held. Protected. Given structure.

And the more I thought about it, the more I realized how deeply this mirrors what I see every day in my sleep coaching work.

People don’t come to me because they don’t know how to sleep.

They come to me because they’ve lost the ability to wait.

They know sleep will come — they’ve slept before. They’ve read the articles. Tried the supplements. Changed the pillows. Adjusted the room temperature.

The gift has already arrived.

But night after night, they hover over it.

Unwrapped.

Exposed.

Checking.

Grabbing.

Forcing.

“Am I tired yet?”

“Why isn’t it happening?”

“What if tonight is another bad night?”

Sleep, unlike most things in life, cannot be opened on demand.

The more you pull at it, the more it retreats.

What sleep needs isn’t more effort.

It needs more wrapping.

In the same way my kids needed the ritual of wrapping paper, sleep needs structure that signals safety. A wind-down routine that gently closes the day. Predictability. Containment. A soft edge between wakefulness and rest.

This is where so many well-meaning people get stuck.

They lie in bed trying to sleep — mentally unwrapping every thought, every sensation, every fear.

But sleep doesn’t arrive when we are watching it.

It arrives when we trust it.

Chanukah teaches this lesson beautifully.

The light doesn’t explode into the room all at once. It’s gentle. Incremental. One flame at a time. We don’t rush it. We don’t skip ahead.

We allow the process to unfold.

Sleep works the same way.

It’s not something we force open.

It’s something we prepare space for.

When we stop checking, stop gripping, stop demanding — the nervous system finally exhales.

And that’s when the gift quietly opens itself.

Last night, my kids tore through that wrapping paper in seconds. The moment was quick. Loud. Over almost as soon as it began.

But the magic wasn’t in that moment.

It was in the days they waited.

The trust they held.

The excitement contained just enough to feel safe.

And every year, watching this unfold reminds me of something I wish more exhausted, frustrated sleepers knew:

Sleep is not lost.

It’s not broken.

It’s already yours.

Sometimes, all it needs…

is to be wrapped a little longer.

So tonight, as you wind down before bed, I’ll leave you with this question:

What if you stopped trying to open sleep — and simply let it stay wrapped?

A gentle next step

If this idea resonates — if you’re tired of forcing sleep, monitoring it, chasing it — you don’t have to figure this out alone. Sometimes all it takes is a calm, grounded conversation to help you wrap your nights differently.

If you’d like, you can book a free 30-minute call with me here:

https://calendly.com/chevymermelstein/30min

And if you want to go a little deeper into this theme of letting go and trust, you might enjoy a previous post I wrote about how acceptance — not effort — is often the turning point for real sleep change:https://www.chevymermelsteinsleepcoach.org/post/if-it-doesn-t-challenge-you-it-doesn-t-change-you-how-acceptance-can-transform-your-sleep