Three Happy Endings: Yoga for Better Sleep

by Nina

My friend Liz has a chronic disease but she takes great care of herself. She eats a healthy diet, and, when she is up to it, takes long walks and yoga classes at her neighborhood yoga studio. Because she has sleep problems, she recently decided to start practicing yoga at home as well, after she comes home at night. “It works!” she told me happily. “I sleep like a baby after doing yoga.” Today I decided to ask her what kind of yoga she does, and she said something very interesting. “It depends on what time I get home.” She went on to explain, “If I get home around 6:00 pm, I’ll do some flow yoga, with poses like Warrior 1, 2, and 3, and Half Moon pose. But If can’t practice until 8:00 or 8:30, that’s counter productive.”

“That makes perfect sense to me,” I said.

“Really?” Liz looked intrigued.

“Yes,” I explained. “Standing poses and vinyasa yoga are stimulating to your nervous system. When you stand up, your blood pressure has to rise to keep the blood pumping up toward your head. So if you do stimulating poses too close to bedtime, it’s going to be hard to go to sleep soon afterward. It’s like drinking a cup of coffee too late in the day.” Then I asked her what kind of poses she does if she can’t practice until 8:00 or 8:30.”

“Legs Up the Wall pose,” she replied. “And Shoulderstand and Plow pose. I also like to do that restorative yoga pose where you lie back on a bolster with your knees apart and the soles of your feet touching.”

“That’s perfect!” I said. “The first three are inverted poses, which automatically trigger the relaxation response. These are exactly the poses that are best to do right before bed to help you to sleep better. And that restorative pose is Supta Baddha Konasana or Reclined Bound Angle Pose, and it’s one of the most soothing and relaxing restorative poses.”

Flowers in the Shade by Brad Gibson

I went on to tell her that this is exactly the way I teach yoga for better sleep. It is important to get exercise during the day, but any vigorous exercise, including yoga, too late in the day can be over stimulating. So if you are having sleep problems, this is something you should consider when you are planning your day. Do your vigorous exercise, including standing poses, flow yoga, and backbends, earlier in the day. And try doing inverted poses, forward bends, or restorative yoga in the evening before bed to see if they help improve your sleep.

There’s no hard and fast rules, however. Liz discovered the best times for herself to practice vigorous versus relaxing yoga by experimenting. And the only way for you to find out the best times for yourself is by going through a similar process. However, I can tell you that if you take a nighttime yoga class and have difficulty sleeping afterward, when you come home, instead of getting right into bed, try practicing your favorite calming pose first and see if that helps.

Liz improving her sleep by practicing yoga at home is just one of the happy endings to this story. The second happy ending is that she made her home yoga practice her own by experimenting, observing, and coming up with her own yoga solutions that suited her particular needs and concerns. That, I told her, is advanced practice.

The third happy ending is that I asked Liz for her permission to write about her today, and she said yes. Thanks, Liz!