Your first response to this article may be, no sh** sherlock. But seriously, stay with me. I’ve been having some big-time sleep issues and instead of reaching for sleeping pills, I’ve discovered something a little more gentle. Yoga before bed. And, sometimes after, though usually I’m awakened by a child in need, so the wake-up yoga practice doesn’t quite work for me.
After countless nights and days blended together dealing with screaming children, I found myself thirsting for relaxation. However, as any parent knows, relaxation and parenthood are mutually exclusive. So what to do? It’s pretty simple: breathe. Though not that simple to remember to do. Enter yoga.
Now, I don’t have time for a yoga class. If I did, I might actually go, but more likely I’d pick an item from my ever expanding to-do list and accomplish something. So I dug up a yoga deck of cards from Rodney Yee that I’ve had for ages and put it beside the bed.
I’ve promised myself that each night, before getting into bed, I’ll do one pose. Just one pose. I’m keeping my expectations low so that I’m sure to stick with it. If I said I’d “do yoga” before bed and left it open, then I’d find excuses (valid or not) to not do it.
The one pose is concrete and precise. It is, in a word, doable.
By the way, have you seen a yoga deck? It’s a deck of cards, each one with a different pose. Each card has a photo of Rodney Yee in a pose with an accompanying description of the pose. Back when I actually went to yoga class and was given this yoga deck, I mistakenly thought the deck was too simple. But now I see its worth: the descriptions. In class, the teacher talks about a pose and may even come to adjust your body. But the deck gives more description than I’ve typically heard in a class, so it’s quite informative.
I started out choosing a card at random and doing that pose. I kind of liked the serendipity of that – like the first night I picked the cat/cow pose (the one where you’re on all fours and you bend your back up and down while breathing). That day my back was actually hurting me a lot so I thought, “wow, exactly what I needed!”
Now I actually shuffle the deck and choose one that works. Like last night. I needed help breathing out some tension after a long day dealing with lawyers and rage-a-holics. So I chose child’s pose (where you curl up in a ball, face down, and extend your arms). It really helped me release some pent up emotion. For real. Just laying there, closing my eyes in a nurturing, protective pose actually helped my mind let go, my breath to deepen and opened my body up for the tension to leave.
I’m actually kind of amazed that I’m quickly looking forward to the end of the day so that I can do my pose! Which, oddly enough, inspires me to breathe more regularly throughout the day.
Just one pose a day is doing this!
If you don’t have access to a yoga deck and you don’t know (or remember) enough poses to do this on your own, then here’s a link to Daily Candy‘s Yoga for sleep video. Pay no mind to the distracting music and fake night’s sleep. The yoga advice from Tara Stiles is pretty solid.
Alternately, the Rodney Yee 50-Card Practice Deck that I use is below.
If you, too, are in need of breathing, then try this and let me know how it goes. Happy sleeping.
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