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How Kundalini Yoga Can Help You Fall Asleep In 9 Seconds Flat
Sleeplessness and insomnia are way too common in the United States.
You're staring at the clock, too wiped out to get up and do something else yet too alert to drift past the twilight into the rest you need. The deadline of morning is looming, and you're anxious and frustrated. The sun finally rises, and you prepare for the day ahead with a dry mouth and puffy eyes.
There are very few people on the planet who haven't had some kind of undesired up-all-night experience. Even though everyone deals with it, our modern remedy methods haven't been all that progressive or effective.
The billion-dollar pharmaceutical sleep-aid industry is certainly not interested in you finding a way to create a sustained change naturally in your circadian rhythms. It's planned and capitalized dependency at best. Whatever the benefit these sleep aids offer, which can be a lot for someone with chronic insomnia, they don't return the body to its natural ability to self-regulate. And intrinsic, homeostatic, adaptogenic sleep cycles in the human body are both possible and ideal.
Kundalini yoga is here to help. When done correctly, it can put you into a calm, restful state in nine seconds flat.
Some of the Kundalini yoga technologies for sleep not only create balanced circadian rhythms, but they deepen the glow of the skin, making you more sexually magnetic. They build oxytocin in the brain and even give you enhanced experiences of your own prosperity. Yogi Bhajan, the master of Kundalini yoga, gave a definition of richness as being able to fall asleep on command.
To be fair, falling asleep in nine seconds will take some practice. But once you get the hang of it, it does work. There are countless teachings on sleep in the canon of Kundalini yoga. Here are my favorites.
If you're up at 4 a.m., meditate.
I'd like to debunk something right now. If you wake up automatically at 3:30 in the morning and can't get back to sleep, that's not insomnia. That's called intrinsic human wiring to meditate.
Yogis know that the hours between 3 a.m. and 6 a.m. are the ideal times to meditate. They call this time the amrit vela or ambrosial hours, because during this early morning window you can very easily connect to the celestial nature of all that is. Meditating during this hour cleanses the subconscious mind of stress and fears with 40 times more effectiveness than at any other time. Subconscious buildup of stress is one of the biggest factors in insomnia, so if you meditate when you wake up early, you'll have a head start on helping your body get back to what feels like regular sleeping patterns to you.
So, let's get over the stress of a natural early morning wake-up. It's ideal. And almost every highly successful person has a physical and mental practice that they do first thing in the early morning.
Take a cold shower.
I know it sounds counterintuitive. Cold showers wake you up, right? But actually, cold water hydrotherapy is adaptogenic. It soothes and smooths the electrical current running through your nervous network and balances your glandular output. Cold showers allow the body to self-regulate. So if your body knows it's time to go to bed but just can't seem to stop producing adrenaline, the cold shower is magic. And simple.
There are a couple of methods of cold-shower hydrotherapy. Some include dry brushing the body in upward strokes toward the heart, rubbing the skin with almond oil, and then getting in the cold stream. But I'm a fan of just jumping right in. If you're not ready for a full plunge, you can also splash cold water on your feet, wrists, armpits, and face.
Sleep east to west.
Use the compass on your smartphone to arrange your bed so that you can sleep east to west. This configuration soothes your energy field, allowing for more regenerative rest.
Play a recording of a gong.
The sound of the gong purifies the subconscious mind (part of what is keeping you awake) and lets the body relax deeply. Special "healing gong" and "wish-fulfilling gong" tracks are available from the Grammy-winning group White Sun.
Practice Shabad Kriya.
By far, Shabad Kriya is one of the premier sleep aids from Kundalini yoga as taught by Yogi Bhajan. It works by effectively regulating, readjusting and decalcifying your pineal gland.
If you're dealing with regular insomnia, you probably know about melatonin, circadian rhythms, and the pineal gland and how that relates to sleep. But the pineal gland is also the broadcast of your radiance. So not only is Shabad Kriya a powerful tool for amplifying the biochemical processes for rest, but it also activates an incredible inner glow. Yogi Bhajan left these promises to go with the meditation: You will think better, work better, share better, love better, and even fight better. Enticing.
For best results, practice Shabad Kriay every night before bed. If you wake up in the middle of the night, just start the meditation again and continue until you fall asleep.
While lying in bed, find a comfortable position on your mattress that allows your spin to be straight. Place your hands in your lap, right hand resting in the left palm, with the thumb tips touching. Palms face up.
Inhale through the nose in four equal parts, mentally using the sounds Sa-Ta-Na-Ma. Hold the breath, mentally using the sounds for a total of 16 beats. Exhale through the nose in two equal parts with the sounds Wahe Guru. Begin again. This will take between 15 to 62 minutes or until you fall asleep, and it will end naturally—when you fall asleep.
Guru Jagat is one of the youngest senior Kundalini Yoga teachers in the world and the face of the new Kundalini movement. She is the founder of RA MA Institute for Applied Yogic Science and Technology, a yogic institute with locations in California Spain, and New York. Her first book, Invincible Living, was published in January 2017 by HarperElixir, an imprint of HarperCollins. She lives in Los Angeles and has been featured in Vogue, The Los Angeles Times, Harper's Bazaar, Town&Country, Women's Health, and The Washington Post.
More from the author:
Kundalini Yoga 101
Check out Calm Your Nervous System And Stoke Your Inner Fire Through The Power Of Yoga
More from the author:
Kundalini Yoga 101
Check out Calm Your Nervous System And Stoke Your Inner Fire Through The Power Of Yoga
Guru Jagat is one of the youngest senior Kundalini Yoga teachers in the world and the face of the new Kundalini movement. She is the founder of RA MA Institute for Applied Yogic Science and Technology, a yogic institute with locations in California Spain, and New York. Her first book, Invincible Living, was published in January 2017 by HarperElixir, an imprint of HarperCollins. She lives in Los Angeles and has been featured in Vogue, The Los Angeles Times, Harper's Bazaar, Town&Country, Women's Health, and The Washington Post.
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