Insomnia affects 1.6 million Americans every year, according to a 2006 national analysis conducted by the National Institutes of Health. Long-term sleep loss contributes to work loss, car accidents and illness.
Using meditation techniques from the yoga tradition of 5,000 years called Yoga Nidra can help you fall asleep and get the deep rest you need. Learn use this technique by creating a sleep ritual. Record the steps below into a tape recorder and play it back to yourself as you are preparing for sleep.
Significance
Long-term sleep loss can increase the risk for developing anxiety, congestive heart failure, diabetes, depression and obesity. The National Institutes of Health conducted a survey in 2002 that found 61 percent of women and 39 percent of men complained of insomnia.
Asians and African-Americans reported less cases of insomnia, as did those with a higher level of education.
Effectively managing insomnia can preserve good health and reduce the need to consume sleeping aids or relying on caffeine during the day to function.
Identification
Insomnia is defined as difficulty in falling asleep and remaining asleep throughout the night. Meditation techniques have been used to successfully induce sleep. Specifically, yoga nidra, meaning "deep sleep," has been used for thousands of years in India.
Classically yoga nidra is defined as the non-dreaming state where samskaras, or patterns that create more karmic debt, can be examined. Yoga nidra was practiced as part of a spiritual practice.
Types
Yoga nidra can be taught in a number of different ways. Many techniques combine mind-body relaxation methods such as progressive relaxation, visualization and pranayama, or breath work.
Anyone can practice yoga nidra if they do not force any aspect of it--to do so would be counterproductive.
Features
A simple version of yoga nidra includes focusing on each area of the body and gently tensing the muscles in that area and then releasing the tension. One could begin at the feet and work up to the face and repeat the process until a sense of deep mental and physical relaxation is achieved.
Yoga nidra often includes pranayama, or breath work. Visualization is also used as a means to further reduce stress and invite deep relaxation.
An effective and easy to remember breathing exercise is to inhale through the nose comfortably to fill the belly and chest, pausing for a moment and exhaling out through the mouth completely. Repeating this breath pattern two or three times may be useful in reducing obvious physical tension in the lungs and body.
Expert Insight
In addition to practicing yoga nidra techniques of progressive relaxation and breath work, keep a notebook on your nightstand. Before going to bed, simply list any concerns or things you do not want to forget to do the next day or later in the week, in the notebook. Writing these issues in a notebook will capture them--leaving you free to mentally release them. Doing so may help you use the meditation techniques described here for restorative sleep.
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