Many people cannot sleep at night.
They try wearing socks, drink relaxing herbal teas or take tryptophan or melatonin, read a book, keep a stress journal, and try all sorts of other expedients to help them fall asleep and get a good nights rest.
What if I were to tell you that you could use this downtime as a chance to practice meditation? Here's what you do.
In order to practice meditation before you fall asleep, you must first lie on the right side of your body.
There is a very good reason for this - it's because it puts less strain on your heart when you lie down this way.
Next, you have to decide what type of meditation you want to practice.
One practice you can try is to set yourself up for lucid dreaming.
In order to do this, while you are lying on the right side you can visualize a little flame in the region of your throat (the "throat charka" region).
You could even imagine a ball of light or a series of silver discs that spin like a gyroscope in the middle of your throat.
This is one of the basic practices that prepare people for lucid dreaming or the practice of dream yoga wherein you try to stay aware during your dreams and learn to control them.
Of course another thing you can do is to take a very deep breath and then slowly release that breath with clenched teeth while letting the energy rise up into your head before you fall asleep.
This simple practice alone will help you remember your dreams and may lead to lucid dream states as well.
Another type of meditation practice to use this chance to do a full visualization of the bones in your skeleton to harmonize all the energy all over your body.
Starting with your feet, you visualize that all the bones in your feet start shining with a bright white light.
As you go up your legs, you progressively visualize that all the bones shine with a bright white color and proceed in this manner visualizing all your skeletal bones up to the top of your head.
Once the visualization reaches your head, you imagine that your whole body turns to atoms and then blows away so that nothing but emptiness is left.
Let go of the body and all its tensions and you will often fall asleep naturally this way after you harmonize its energies.
If this practice brings too much energy to your head you could do the reverse practice and imagine that there is a golden duck egg filled with ambrosia sitting on top of your skull.
Imagine that this golden elixir starts melting and the liquid descends downward caressing your entire body and washing away all the poisons and tensions as it falls.
Imagine that your body turns into crystal pure clarity as this happens and then also disappears into emptiness as you do this.
Another practice that you could do is while lying on your right side is to recite mantras in the region of your heart ("heart charka") behind your breastbone or sternum.
All you must do is take an auspicious mantra or prayer and visualize a silvery flame or moon or auspicious vision of a Buddha or some other holy figure behind the breastbone and about two inches within the body.
Recite the mantra from that point or imagine that the sound comes from that point.
Eventually you will get tired of this exercise as you listen to the endless mantra and then fall fast asleep.
This is how you can use the time when you can't sleep for something productive that will also tend to restore your energy and lead to relaxation and rest.
You keep your mind busy with these visualization, mantra, and energy practices until you're tired of them, your body's energy becomes harmonized and you then naturally fall into slumber.
There's yet one more, and perhaps the most powerful form of meditative introspection you can use if you cannot sleep no matter whether you are lying down or sitting up.
Keep inquiring -- looking into the mind to find its source, the source behind your thoughts.
Look within to find your mind's owner, the source of the "I" or person experiencing the thoughts.
If you can do this while forgetting the body and discarding the thoughts that come up in the mind, you'll make great progress in Advaita Vedanta or Zen.
That's how you can use the time when you can't sleep for beneficial activity which will help rejuvenate your body even though you don't obtain any hours of nap time.
They try wearing socks, drink relaxing herbal teas or take tryptophan or melatonin, read a book, keep a stress journal, and try all sorts of other expedients to help them fall asleep and get a good nights rest.
What if I were to tell you that you could use this downtime as a chance to practice meditation? Here's what you do.
In order to practice meditation before you fall asleep, you must first lie on the right side of your body.
There is a very good reason for this - it's because it puts less strain on your heart when you lie down this way.
Next, you have to decide what type of meditation you want to practice.
One practice you can try is to set yourself up for lucid dreaming.
In order to do this, while you are lying on the right side you can visualize a little flame in the region of your throat (the "throat charka" region).
You could even imagine a ball of light or a series of silver discs that spin like a gyroscope in the middle of your throat.
This is one of the basic practices that prepare people for lucid dreaming or the practice of dream yoga wherein you try to stay aware during your dreams and learn to control them.
Of course another thing you can do is to take a very deep breath and then slowly release that breath with clenched teeth while letting the energy rise up into your head before you fall asleep.
This simple practice alone will help you remember your dreams and may lead to lucid dream states as well.
Another type of meditation practice to use this chance to do a full visualization of the bones in your skeleton to harmonize all the energy all over your body.
Starting with your feet, you visualize that all the bones in your feet start shining with a bright white light.
As you go up your legs, you progressively visualize that all the bones shine with a bright white color and proceed in this manner visualizing all your skeletal bones up to the top of your head.
Once the visualization reaches your head, you imagine that your whole body turns to atoms and then blows away so that nothing but emptiness is left.
Let go of the body and all its tensions and you will often fall asleep naturally this way after you harmonize its energies.
If this practice brings too much energy to your head you could do the reverse practice and imagine that there is a golden duck egg filled with ambrosia sitting on top of your skull.
Imagine that this golden elixir starts melting and the liquid descends downward caressing your entire body and washing away all the poisons and tensions as it falls.
Imagine that your body turns into crystal pure clarity as this happens and then also disappears into emptiness as you do this.
Another practice that you could do is while lying on your right side is to recite mantras in the region of your heart ("heart charka") behind your breastbone or sternum.
All you must do is take an auspicious mantra or prayer and visualize a silvery flame or moon or auspicious vision of a Buddha or some other holy figure behind the breastbone and about two inches within the body.
Recite the mantra from that point or imagine that the sound comes from that point.
Eventually you will get tired of this exercise as you listen to the endless mantra and then fall fast asleep.
This is how you can use the time when you can't sleep for something productive that will also tend to restore your energy and lead to relaxation and rest.
You keep your mind busy with these visualization, mantra, and energy practices until you're tired of them, your body's energy becomes harmonized and you then naturally fall into slumber.
There's yet one more, and perhaps the most powerful form of meditative introspection you can use if you cannot sleep no matter whether you are lying down or sitting up.
Keep inquiring -- looking into the mind to find its source, the source behind your thoughts.
Look within to find your mind's owner, the source of the "I" or person experiencing the thoughts.
If you can do this while forgetting the body and discarding the thoughts that come up in the mind, you'll make great progress in Advaita Vedanta or Zen.
That's how you can use the time when you can't sleep for beneficial activity which will help rejuvenate your body even though you don't obtain any hours of nap time.
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