Craving a Snooze?..Connect your Soul to the Divine

We all do at some point in our lives.....some more, some less.... experience "insomnia" . Insomnia has a variety of causes, including physical illnesses, psychological illnesses, side-effect of medications, stress and anxiety, other sleeping disorders (sleep apnea, Restless Legs Syndrome, narcolepsy e.t.c) environmental and behavioral factors, and body rhythm inteferences such as jet lag or working different shifts e.g. the night shift. Women may actually suffer more from insomnia than their male counterparts......(gender inequalities even spill over into one's sleep!!!!). Hormonal influences, such as menstruation, pregnancy and menopause can disrupt a woman's sleep, and ofcourse women are prone to higher levels of anxiety due to often burdened livelihoods (especially in the developing world). Nothing is more frustrating than wanting to sleep and not being able to sleep, irrespective of how many sheep one counts, and of course the more one tries to sleep it further builds their frustration and heightens their insomniac mechanisms. A sad cycle if you ask me. But also a grand witness to the amazingly powerful minds human beings posses.

How many of us give ample attention to the preparatory process preceding our sleep ? I don't mean do we brush our teeth? shower? etc, I mean do we prepare our mind for sleep? The answer to this will vary from person to person, circumstance to circumstance and environment to environment. And whatever your answer, it is still possible to apply simple methods, immediately prior to sleep, enabling you to savour the array of benefits that sleep avails. Some include:

- If you are in physical pain, apply any pain-relief techniques, well before your sleep

- Do not have heavy meals before you sleep, an avoid diuretics caffeine/taurine intake.

- Do some light deep breathing exercises before you sleep, and sleep in well aerated space.

- If you're taking medication with side-effects that interfere with your sleep, discuss with your doctor

- "Unwind your Mind"

Now I would strongly suggest the last one "Unwind your Mind". It may sound tedious, challenging and just unnecessary trouble, or you think well 'my mind isnt wound up at all'...actually often we don't know when our minds are 'wound-up' [ please note that in this context 'wound-up' DOES NOT mean crazy, it means strained and embroiled with many issues at once] That's one of the abundant testimonies of the complexity and power of the human mind, it has windows -which we may choose to look into or not- that are filed in the conscious and the sub-concious. So much of our anxiety can be shifted into our sub-consious and this can influence our sleep patterns, dreams and general well-being post-sleep. Ok, so when 'unwinding' the mind, we are also relaxing the soul and spirit. Its probably the most effective and is the simplest to adopt as a habit before sleeping. It involves meditating, praying and connecting with God or superior being you believe in. For Bahá'ís this implies an understanding that humans have certain spiritual duties before God. Bahá'u'lláh urged His followers :

"Meditate profoundly, that the secret of things unseen may be revealed unto you, that you may inhale the sweetness of a spiritual and imperishable fragrance..."

Specifically, Baha'is are encouraged to reflect at the end of each day on our deeds and their worth. Other than this, Bahá'u'lláh did not specify a particular approach to meditation. Instead, each individual is free to choose his or her own meditational form. This I have found as an excellent and practical approach to countering any sleep disorders. The combination of prayer and meditation allows one to 'unpack' the complex/troubling/challenging issues of the day and lay them at the doorstep of Divine Threshold, separating the matters of the physical realm from one's self and detaching. This leaves the mind less weighty, and facilitates improved sleep patterns. Explore this page for more on how prayer brings into action higher forces, as yet comparatively little known; and how these forces are more arbitrary in their action than the physical forces: http://info.bahai.org/article-1-4-7-1.html ..... and enjoy endless nights of refreshingly peaceful sleep :)

For more on Sleeping Healthy you may wish to browse this: http://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/health/public/sleep/healthy_sleep.pdf or try out the brief sleep disorders quiz : http://quiz.ivillage.com/health/tests/whsleepdis.htm