Have you ever had or do you currently have difficulty sleeping? It’s exhausting isn’t it?

We all know that when we sleep well, we wake up feeling refreshed and ready for our daily activities, whatever they may be. Sleep affects how we look, feel and perform on a daily basis. Lack of sleep, therefore, can leave us feeling overwhelmed by our regular routines as well as a little haggard looking.

To get maximum benefit from our sleep, both quantity and quality are important. If sleep is short on quality and duration, then the body does not have sufficient time to complete all of the phases needed for muscle repair, memory consolidation and release of hormones regulating growth and appetite. The result is we wake up less able to concentrate, make decisions, or engage fully in our work and social activities.

Some of the many benefits to a good night’s sleep – apart from the obvious physical appearance and energy – include a healthier immune system and a more balanced appetite by helping to regulate levels of the hormones adrenalin and leptin, which play a role in our feelings of hunger and fullness. So when we’re sleep deprived, we may feel the need to eat more, which can lead to weight gain. So the bottom line is sleep is good!

Unfortunately, the majority of people try to sleep without resolving the tensions in their body. You might say to yourself “I don’t have any tension”, but the truth is we all gather tension during the day. Whether you think too much or not at all, you gather tension. If you work physically or not at all, you gather tension. Whether you follow a carnivorous, vegetarian or vegan diet, you gather tension. All these tensions accumulate in the muscular, emotional and mental systems of the human body.

Even while sleeping, thoughts and worries revolve in the mind so that the tense person wakes up after a night’s sleep feeling exhausted.

In yoga and mindfulness, we deal with the release of tensions. We realise that if the mind is tense, the stomach will also be tense. If the stomach is tense, then the whole circulatory system will be tense. It’s a vicious circle. Unless you are free from muscular, emotional and mental tensions, you are never truly relaxed* and therefore proper, true, restful sleep cannot be achieved.

The good news is that there are things we can do to help us release the tension we build up during the day so that when nighttime comes we have less, if any, tension in the body – thereby having a greater chance of experiencing a full and restful night’s sleep.

Physical exercise for this month

Take regular short breaks during the day to relieve physical tension. Stretch, go for a walk and try tensing and relaxing tight parts of the body, thereby preventing or at least minimising a build-up of physical tension during the day.

Try as you breathe in to bring as much tension as you can to different parts of the body – for example, the hands. Breathe in, bringing the hands into a tight fist and hold the breath momentarily while you hold the tension. Then when you feel ready, slowly release the breath and tension in the hand simultaneously.

Mindfulness exercise

Take regular short breaks during the day to relieve emotional and mental tension. How? Breathe!

Try the 4 - 7- 8 breath. Breathe in through the nose for the count of four, hold for the count of seven and exhale through the mouth with a whoosh sound for the count of eight.

The more we practice being aware of the breath and our own body, the more adept we become at noticing when and how we accumulate tension during the day. This, in turn, gives ourselves a greater chance to release the pressure valve as soon as we begin to feel tension in the body and mind, thereby making it a lot easier to be truly relaxed come bedtime.

Something to ponder

As we lay down to sleep, it’s important not to try too hard to sleep as this will just create even more tension in the body and mind.

When we lay down to sleep, perhaps placing one hand on the tummy and one hand on the chest, just watch and feel the movement of the breath in the body. See if you can keep the attention on the movement of the belly, as it rises on the inhale and falls back towards the spine on the exhale. Each time the mind wanders off, just bring your attention back to the feeling of the breath in the body.

I wish you many, many hours of restful sleep! Catherine

For further information, visit www.croiyoga.ie. For more practical mindfulness exercises, visit Catherine Callaghan Yoga on YouTube.

* Yoga Nidra by Swami Satyananda Saraswati