Top 5 Techniques to Fall Asleep and Eliminate Insomnia without Drugs by Fred Busch

Hey Everybody! Lack of sleep and inability to fall asleep is the scourge of our western culture! Sleep deprivation affects us similar to alcohol in the ways it deteriorates motor functions and suppresses the immune system. One of the most important keys to health is getting enough sleep. One of the biggest and easiest solved obstacles people face is not being able to fall asleep!

Many people could get a satisfactory nights sleep if only they could just fall asleep! The ability to fall asleep and the skill set to mentally and physically prepare yourself for sleep can be learned and replicated! Below is my list of the keys for being able to fall asleep consistently and easily so that you can begin to reverse the patterns associated with lack of sleep!

Falling asleep is a natural mechanism everybody has access to. The key physical and psychological variables can be flushed out and systematically incorporated and then falling asleep becomes much simpler.

Of my Top 5 Most Effective Techniques to Fall Asleep and Eliminate Insomnia listed below the first three are commonly known but critically important and foundational. The really special techniques to eliminate insomnia are listed at the end of the list.  If you want to be able to help yourself  and or other people feel better in every part of their life the YogaNutrition Health Coach Professional Certification may be for you!

#1 – Resting Environment
Make sure you have the conditions for rest… Temperature… Darkness… Quiet.  Without a resting environment falling asleep is extremely challenging for even the best sleepers!  Environment should be the right temperature which means not too hot or too cold.  Environment should be dark so wear an eye cover if you are in a bright place or can’t adequately darken your sleeping room.  Environment should be quiet so wear ear plugs if you are in a place that has distracting noise in your sleeping room.

#2 – Exercise Daily

Exercise Every Day – You have to be tired to fall asleep and the physiological effect of exercise is to make falling asleep easier.  Daily exercise triggers many natural and healthy mechanisms from your circulatory to your immune system.  Falling asleep is infinitely easier when we have exercised vigorously at some point during our day.  One great way to exercise with consistency is to have a daily yoga practice!  Our Yoga Teacher Training solidifies yours ability to practice Fred Busch Hot Power Yoga everyday and also prepares you to be a professional yoga teacher!

#3 – Food and TV Stimulants Avoided

Avoid stimulants at least 2 hours before sleep always.  Stimulants like violent TV or other stimulating media should be avoided before bed.  Stimulants like caffeine and sugar are also best avoided. The less stimulated our mind is the more able it is to find stillness for entering the state of sleep!

#4 – Expectations

Now we start getting to the important stuff here!  HAVE NO EXPECTATIONS to be able to fall asleep within a certain period of clock time.  Many of us are our biggest obstacle when we go to sleep and immediately wonder why we haven’t fallen asleep yet within a minute of two.  We tend to start thinking about how we should have fallen asleep already so that ‘here we go again’ and then the thinking cycle gains momentum and sleeping becomes less likely.

When you put your head to pillow do not expect or even want to fall asleep for the first 8 to 10 minutes.  Literally just lie on your pillow with your eyes open and say to yourself ‘i don’t even want to fall asleep yet!’ It is not even normal or healthy to fall asleep within a few minutes of lying down so have zero expectations about how long it will take to fall asleep.   Instead of focusing on not sleeping begin to focus on the state of relaxation you find yourself being in a comfortable environment like a bed.   Focus on how relaxed and comfortable you are and have no need or wish to fall asleep since you are so content and so relaxed already! Keep your eyes open if you wish…i do this myself often… for the first few minutes and let them get heavy by themselves and close on their own!

#5 – Stillness of Body

Fidgeting of  the body is a result of moving of the mind.  But also moving the body keeps stimulating the mind so that by intentionally finding stillness and making firm resolution to not move at all is one of the keys to falling asleep.  Like Savasana pose in yoga our intention when falling asleep is to not move a muscle or even fire a neuron.  This is not a state of forcing yourself to be still rather an experience of being completely relaxed and deciding specifically to not move no matter what for long periods of time.

Final Notes:

False Identifications
Don’t identify yourself as ‘somebody with trouble sleeping’. Recognize instead that before you knew these variables and skills to be able to fall asleep you had difficulty doing so. Now that you have a broader understanding of the environment needed to cross the threshold to sleep you will begin to do so!

Brain Nutrition
Understand that there is a nutrition element to falling asleep also!  If you don’t have the right type and quality of certain neurotransmitters then the capacity to induce sleep is physiologically impeded.  Getting a nice RAW VEGAN PROTEIN POWDER with all the amino acids will help because many amino acids are also used as or are the building blocks for the neurotransmitters needed for sleep.

Gratitude

Gratitude is my favorite frequency to induce sleep with.  Literally count your blessings each night when you enter your bed!  No matter what your situation or challenges are your be assured that there are others who look at your situation as completely blessed!!!