• .
  • .
  • .
  • .
  • .

Yoga for Insomnia – Meditation for Insomnia

Yoga and meditation are phenomenally better for treating insomnia than a sleeping pill or many pharmaceutical drugs that promise a better night’s sleep. In some cases, you can expect immediate results, and depending on the root cause of the insomnia, it may take a little longer, but peer reviewed scientific and medical study after peer reviewed study has proven the efficacy of these tools to help you sleep well and wake up well rested.

So how does yoga and meditation address insomnia? There are several contributing factors:

  • The Twenty Third Annual meeting of the Associated Professional Sleep Society found that insomnia is a problem of hyper-arousal, or stress. When you address the underlying stress causing the mind to be hyper-aroused, people sleep better. Meditation is one of the fastest ways to address that state of super activity in the mind because it slows down the mind and/or gives it a singular focus. Have you ever tried to fall asleep at night and your mind is moving so quickly from to-do list to deadline date, that you can’t seem to breathe? This is what is called the ‘monkey-mind’ in Eastern traditions, and this is exactly what is addressed when you meditate or do yoga practices like concentrate on your breathing.
     
  • Learning deep relaxation techniques like yoga nidra can also profoundly influence your sleep patterns and quality. Yoga nidra means ‘yogic sleep’ but it is a bit of a misnomer. When you practice yoga nidra you actually train your mind to be completely aware, but at peace. It is one of the only times we sit still without having to do anything or be anywhere, and with practice, you eventually can calm yourself to focus on just your heartbeat or jus the rise and fall of your chest. You become calm and aware, but not anxiously aware – deeply, and fully and peacefully aware. Yoga nidra is done by practicing a serious of ‘cycling your attention’ practices. It is just one yogic tool for helping with insomnia, that works just as well as meditation.
     
  • Yoga practice such as asana teach mindfulness while you are moving, so you take your attention away from kids, spouses, bosses, etc, and put it on you. You move slowly and breathe. You connect the here and now with every movement, and again, with practice, you learn how to calm your stress-response even in the most crazy environments. It starts in a peaceful, quiet room, but spreads to every day practice and eventually, even into your sleep.
     
  • Yoga pranayama helps teach you how to breathe correctly and then utilize the energy inherent in every breathe to store life-force or prana in the body. The more prana you have the less sleep you actually need, but the more restful you sleep when you do lie down at night to rejuvenate yourself. Learning to breathe like yogis do can do wonders for your sleep too.