We've heard many people claim that practising yoga has helped them sleep. This fantastic article from The Globe and Mail does a great job of explaining the benefits of yoga, and even has a video demonstrating some poses. If you're not convinced that yoga can help you sleep, we'd like to draw your attention to these parts of the article:
[In a study] published in Applied Psychophysiology and Biofeedback, 20 participants suffering from chronic insomnia recorded their sleeping and waking habits in a diary for two weeks. Then, for eight weeks, they practised about 45 minutes of yoga before bed and continued recording these habits. Their total sleep time improved by about 12 per cent, and the time it took them to fall asleep dropped by about 30 per cent.
Furthermore:
In 2006, the U.S. Department of Defense researched the iRest program (based on yoga nidra) as a treatment for soldiers returning from Afghanistan and Iraq with post-traumatic stress disorder – a major symptom of which is insomnia. The success of the program led to its adoption at Veterans Affairs facilities across the country.
Sounds like this could be worth a try. We'd love to hear from you if you've tried yoga as a method to improve your sleep - did it work for you?
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Last updated: April 30, 2010
