Wired and tired is the state where you are exhausted and cannot switch off at the same time. You lie down and your mind keeps running. You sit on the terrace and your leg bounces. You are anxious for no reason you can point to, and the anxiety has no object — it is just there, in the chest, in the jaw, in the way you check your phone without wanting to.

The plain explanation: your nervous system won't stand down. The sympathetic branch — fight or flight — has been on for so long that "on" has become its resting state. The parasympathetic branch, the one that governs digestion, sleep and repair, isn't getting a turn. You can be safe, on holiday, in one of the most beautiful places in Europe, and your body is still scanning for the thing that is going to go wrong.

This isn't a diagnosis. It's a pattern, and it is by far the most common one I see in Cannes among people who have recently moved, recently sold a company, or recently stopped moving after years of movement.

Why safe places don't feel safe

The system that keeps you alert doesn't know the difference between a real threat and a long list of small ones. Relocation is a long list of small ones: the bank, the school, the language, the car, the paperwork, the friends you haven't made yet. None of it is dangerous. All of it is unresolved. Unresolved is what the alert system feeds on.

Then you arrive at the point where the list is mostly done — the villa in Le Cannet is furnished, the children are settled — and you expect to feel relief. Instead you feel nothing, or you feel worse. The body has been in a posture of readiness for months and doesn't have a "list finished" signal. It only has "still on".

The signs it's your nervous system and not your life

  • You can't nap even when you're desperate to
  • You wake between 3 and 5 am, alert, with nothing specific wrong
  • Small noises make you flinch; small decisions feel large
  • Your shoulders are near your ears and you didn't notice
  • Rest makes you more restless, not less

If your life were the problem, fixing the life would fix the feeling. When it's the nervous system, the life can be fixed and the feeling stays. That is the tell.

What settles it

Not thinking. You cannot reason a nervous system down; it doesn't speak that language. It responds to bodily signals of safety: stillness, warmth, slow breath, another person's calm attention held on you for long enough that the body believes it.

This is why a Reiki session works for wired-and-tired people even when they are the last person who would believe in energy work. It is 45 minutes of exactly those signals, with nothing asked of you. You lie down, fully clothed. My hands rest lightly on or just above the body in a set sequence. There is no conversation, no instruction to relax, no breathing to get right. The body is simply given, for 45 minutes, every reason to stand down — and most of the time, somewhere around minute ten, it does.

People describe it afterwards in almost the same words: "I didn't know I was that tense until it stopped." Sleep that night is usually different. One session shows the body what off feels like. Whether you need more depends on how long it has been on.

I won't promise this fixes anything. If the anxiety is severe, has a specific trigger, or comes with panic, speak to a doctor or therapist first — this works alongside that, not instead. What I can say is what I see every week: a system that has forgotten how to stand down can be reminded, and it usually remembers faster than people expect.

FAQ

What does "wired and tired" mean? It's the state of being exhausted and unable to switch off at the same time — a nervous system stuck in alert even when there's nothing to be alert about. Common after relocation, a long work push or a hard year.

Why can't I relax even on holiday? Because the nervous system doesn't have a "holiday" signal. It has "on" and "off", and after months of unresolved small stresses, "on" becomes its default. It needs bodily signals of safety to change, not a change of scenery.

How does Reiki help a nervous system that won't stand down? A session is 45 minutes of stillness, warmth and calm attention with nothing asked of you — the exact signals the parasympathetic system responds to. It's complementary; if anxiety is severe, see a doctor first.

If this is you right now

One session is enough to find out whether this is the thing. Message me on WhatsApp — I'm in Cannes, and I come to Antibes, Nice and the villages behind them. A single session is €180.