-
HW 30DYC: Day 26 Bedtime yoga to help you sleep
Bed yoga has several options and applications. I will talk about this in more detail myself in the post on the bed yoga module. In this post, I’m talking about bed yoga before bed. The goal: to sleep better. The means: Stretch, Relaxation, Self massage and Meditation.
Needed: Yourself, a bed (preferably 1meter 40 or larger), mood light, relaxing mantras in low voice e.g. from Deva Premal (optional).More and more people have difficulty falling asleep and staying asleep through the night. This is partly due to moderate evening rituals, busy days and the difficult disconnection of what happened during the day and the next day must happen. In the night you process the day, and in this sense the night also reflects your day. If during the day you are constantly running from one thing to another and don’t take a single moment of rest, your mind will also be very active during the night. If during the day you just stare lethargically in front of you or drag yourself along; during the night the mind will also only show a flatline. The optimum is, as you have guessed, somewhere in between. In which you are both physically and mentally active during the day; but you also withdraw in time to reflect, come to yourself and take a rest. In this way you can check if you are still walking in the direction you want, and take action if that is not the case. In addition, this gives you the opportunity to rest during the day so that you do not add to the pressure on the night. (I MUST SLEEEEEP! Doesn’t help you most of the time to fall asleep in a relax way) There is a dutch song (Nachtvuur) that describes this nicely: “I can not sleep if I have to think that I should not think, that does not go well. And my thoughts run around in circles and I chase them. I wish my night fire could be quiet for a while but it stays on.”
We can create peace during the day by taking real lunch breaks, taking 5 minutes (or even just 1 minute) of conscious breathing or meditation, taking a quiet walk in silence or just brisk walking or exercising, stretching at your desk,… and then… before bed introduce a slowing down bed ritual like… doing bed yoga.
Bed yoga: The goal is to bring your energy down and find peace and grounding in your body. So preferably start standing next to your bed and while inhaling bring your arms up and while exhaling consciously bring your arms and hands down as if you are pushing the energy down towards mother earth, towards your pelvis and your feet. Repeat this 7 times (for each chakra) and finally also squat down wide-legged with the soles of your feet on the round (preferably), your torso between your legs and your hands in bid position, your torso is convex , your head hangs down and you rest your 3rd eye on your fingertips. Breathe in and out deliberately for a moment and try to lengthen the exhalation. After 10 breaths, bring your hands to your feet, bring more energy into your feet and ground. Make contact with mother earth. Next, stretch your legs, trying to keep your hands on the ground and let your torso hang forward. By doing this you stretch the back of your body, the western side of our body. Try to relax, lengthen your breathing, make the connection with mother earth and find peace in your body. Let everything of the day slip away from you. If you have a mantra on you can chant along with it. In addition, you can swing your pelvis smoothly, or nod your head ‘yes’ to everything you take away from the day; what you are grateful for. And shake ‘no’ for anything you want to fret about and not take from today to tomorrow.
Then you go to bed and do mainly postures that stretch the western side/back of the body and bring energy to the ground chakra. Anything with forward bending and extended expiration is good. E.g. Sitting forward fold whit extended legs, butterfly legs bending forward with the spine, pigeon pose, hurdler pose bending forward or to the side, plow pose, and finish with Happy Baby and Shavasana. Place your hands on the soles of your feet; or put the soles of your feet together, try to ground to your feet as much as possible and create the peace and calmness in your body and mind before bed. If necessary, chant quiet mantras along. This way you focus on the texts instead of on your thoughts about the past or future. (It is a kind of guided meditation). Choose mainly for quiet and matras sung in low notes, low frequencies activate the lower chakras (High notes / frequencies activate higher chakras)
Good night! Sleep tight 🙂
For me the bed is the ideal place to practice happy baby. Because my spine has rather protruding vertebrae and is somewhat round and my hips are not ultra flexible yet I manage to lie stable and relaxed in happy baby in bed. On the mat I roll over…
Tip to get into happy baby if you are not very flexible yet you can first bring your legs all the way back over your torso and head, grab your feet there and from there let your pelvis gently come back to the mattress. In addition, you can put your head on a pillow to be a little more comfortable, or put a pillow under your pelvis to make up for your mobility deficit in the hips and feel a little more support in the pose. This also makes it easier to relax.
-
2 Replies
-
-
🤣 I like your GIFs and feedback aswel 😘
-
Log in to reply.