An Empty Bedside Nightstand

What I rediscovered in the space where my phone used to be

For the past three months, I’ve been crawling into bed at night, clutching my cellphone from the nightstand as I go under the covers. This habit did not exist six months ago.

It all started innocently enough.

One Saturday afternoon, while stretched out on our living room couch scrolling through YouTube on my phone, I stumbled across music reaction videos. Here, people who looked young enough to be one of my own kids expressed awe, admiration, and respect for the songs I listened to in high school and college.

As I lay there watching, a smile spread across my face, and a quiet warmth seemed to spread over my body. Watching young people from diverse backgrounds and musical interests react this way stirred up my own long-standing attachment to music and all it has carried for me over the years.

Gradually, I started making sure my phone was on the nightstand before going to bed. It became a familiar, needed presence I could turn to like a trusted friend.

I can now see that our bedroom, the bed my wife and I shared, and the surrounding space gradually faded from my awareness until little remained except the glowing screen in front of me.

A couple of nights ago, while reaching for the phone as I crawled into bed, I paused and stared at it in my hand. For a moment, the routine seemed strange. Here I was, preparing for sleep with a glowing screen inches from my face, voices and music flooding my ears. For the first time in weeks, I considered whether it would be better to stop bringing my phone to bed.

Over the next few nights, this question kept gnawing at me, but I still kept taking the phone to bed.

And then, one night, I didn’t put the phone on the nightstand. For the first time in months, the nightstand was empty.

When I lay my head on the pillow, the bedroom seemed to expand. The bed my wife and I shared, and the surrounding space that had previously faded into the background, suddenly felt present again. Somehow it all seemed alive, almost as if the room itself were talking to me.

What’s happening? I asked myself.

Then I became conscious of the darkness in the room and how my body seemed to blend with it as I sank into the mattress.

I began to wonder whether I’d be able to fall asleep right away or lie awake for a long time.

Suddenly, several unrecognizable images, green and flesh-colored, appeared in rapid succession. Were my eyes closed when this happened? I couldn’t tell, and I had no idea where the images came from. Were those human faces I’d just seen? I asked myself. I couldn’t be sure.

At once, my thoughts turned to some recent family concerns. Faces, conversations, and situations involving specific family members began moving through my mind. I began to meditate on these concerns, consciously sending thoughts of love and care to specific family members.

With my eyes closed, I turned my attention to what might happen after I fell asleep. What kind of dreams might I have? Would I be ready for whatever came, especially if it brought fear or dread, as sometimes happened over the years?

Almost immediately, I found myself offering a simple prayer: I want to be ready for whatever comes, not trying to avoid or deflect it, but meeting it with courage, faith, and openness.

Had I gone to sleep already and woken up again? I didn’t know for sure, and I’d lost track of time.

As I lay there, another thought came to me. Over the past three months, I’d been waking up two or three times a night to go to the bathroom. It had become rare for me to sleep straight through the night. I began to wonder whether my bedside phone had anything to do with it.

My attention shifted to the pelvic area. Using a mindfulness technique I’d practiced before, I rested both palms there and held my attention gently on that place. Whispering in my mind, I encouraged this area to relax, calm down, and be well.

Again, I couldn’t tell how long I’d been awake or whether I’d been asleep at all.

Time seemed irrelevant.

The empty nightstand had given something back to me I hadn’t realized I’d been missing.

It would be hard to go back.