Some might say that this is a perfectly normal feeling. They may even say that it is healthy. But insomnia is not a pleasant experience for most people. And if you’re dealing with it this week, here is some advice to help you cope with it.
First of all, make an effort to relax, and take a bath as soon as you get home from work. This will help clear out your mind, and allow the sleep that you need. Once you have a good night’s sleep, try to meditate. It is important to learn how to meditate for a few minutes each night, because you may find that this helps you get more sleep. It may take some practice, but you will get better at it.
Meditation is also important to stay sane. And if it is, and you have insomnia, you need to learn how to meditate. It’s not for everyone, and it can be challenging to do, but it has been shown that meditating for 20 minutes twice a day will reduce your stress levels by 50%. When I was diagnosed with fibromyalgia I was stressed to death, so I learned to meditate with a friend, and got into a meditation class.
I used to be a runner, but I have since gotten into yoga, Tai Chi, Pilates, and other forms of exercise. Meditation has been shown to reduce stress, and keep you cool, so it would be a good idea to practice it.
Meditating is something that’s not for everyone, but for people who don’t mind being alone (or those who get bored easily), it goes a long way towards calming down your nerves.
I know you’re probably thinking, “Yoga is not for this, it’s too physical,” but you’ve read that somewhere before. So meditating is not something you should skip out on because it’s not relaxing, but it is a very relaxing way to relax. It’s as simple as saying “I’m here, I’m here” out loud.
For those who are new to meditation, it’s the act of sitting quietly for a long, long time where your attention is fully on the breath. It’s the same as in any other form of mindfulness. The thing about it is that you’re not just focusing on your breath, you are focusing on the breath in the same way you would if you were focusing on a friend or a car.
I think it can be a bit of a trap to think that a meditation practice (or anything else) is about focused attention. Its not until you put it into practice that you realize that a lot of the benefits are actually about relaxing your mind.
For the longest time I have been convinced that meditation and mindfulness are about focused attention. I was sure that if you were just focusing on your breath, you would be able to get in a meditative state, but that was just not the case. Maybe I am just not meditating right.
In the West, meditation often comes with the idea that it’s something that you have to do regularly and that once you’ve done it, you can meditate on forever. That idea is a bit misguided. While there are many ways in which meditation can be practiced, the main reasons why we meditate are not the same as the way we meditate.
