Which Comes First: Restful Sleep or a Nourishing Yoga Practice? – Michelle D. Williams

WHICH COMES FIRST: RESTFUL SLEEP OR A NOURISHING YOGA PRACTICE?

By Michelle D. Williams

Ihave this goal to get up early to do my yoga practice. I envision about 20 minutes of pranayama, followed by a

half hour break for tea and kitty pets, then another 30–60

minutes of asana practice. It seems simple on paper,

especially since I work at home for myself and have no kids to get out the door.

But I continually fail at this goal. And it’s often because I’d rather sleep a little longer. Sleep has been a lifelong issue for me—falling asleep in particular. Even as a kid, I’d lie awake at night, first listening to the low murmurings of Johnny Carson coming from the living room, and then, after my mom went to bed, listening to the furnace shutting on and off, or the crickets singing outside, or the trains coming and going in the distance.

But sleep is just as important to our overall well-being as eating healthy foods and getting plenty of exercise. According to the Division of Sleep Medicine at Harvard Medical School, sleep plays a critical role in immune function, metabolism, memory, learning, and other vital functions. Sleep gives the body an opportunity to repair and rejuvenate itself. New research shows that many of the major restorative functions in the body like muscle growth, tissue repair, growth hormone release, and protein synthesis occur mostly, or in some cases only, during sleep. Other rejuvenating aspects of sleep are specific to the brain and cognitive function. A recent study revealed a link between sleep and brain plasticity, which is the brain’s ability to change and restructure itself. The benefits list goes on.

So why, then, do so many of us neglect our sleep? Many people get by on just five or six hours of sleep a night. We live such busy, amped-up lives that it’s difficult to get to bed early. We work long hours and then pack our evenings full of extracurricular activities, meetings, projects, and chores. Or we sit on the couch watching episode after episode of our favorite cable TV (or BBC—Downton!) shows late into the night. Once we do crawl under the covers, our minds are still active, going over interactions from the day and planning for tomorrow or next week—or next month even. So we end up with insomnia or just a very truncated sleep cycle. Sleep Interferes With Life My own difficulties in going to sleep have stemmed from different issues at different times in my life. I’ve always had a very active, analytical brain and a nervous system that does not quiet down easily. Also, I’m a person who definitely doesn’t like

If you don’t jump on the sleep train when it comes to your station, it will take off and leave you behind.

to miss out on things. If friends are going out or having a dinner party, I want to be there. If there’s an interesting performance to be seen or a few in one week, I’ll try to fit them all in. I take dance classes and poetry classes and join book groups and work on crafty projects in the basement.

Other things can interfere with my ability to fall asleep, like having a huge dinner or drinking too much alcohol, working past my bedtime, or messing around with Facebook and email. Also, I slept in the same bed as my mother until I was seven years old, which was wonderful in many ways. But I remember that adjusting to sleeping in my own bed was a challenge, so on some very deep level, I think going to bed and falling asleep strikes fear of being alone.

Over the years, as I became more proactive in taking care of my own well-being, I made positive changes to my diet, began to exercise more, and developed a yoga practice, but I still found it difficult to focus on my sleep habits. After all, sleep is a passive activity. Even though I knew I struggled with insomnia, I still thought I should be able to get into bed, close my eyes, and sleep would just happen. Of course, when I was younger, I could get by on less sleep.

But these days, a poor night’s sleep takes its toll. For me, that means not getting out of bed quite as early as I’d like to, so I’m groggy. My yoga practice gets cut short, or I’m late to start work. It can also mean that I’m fatigued throughout the day, or I don’t think as clearly and creatively as I’d like to, or I don’t have the

energy to work on the more challenging asanas in my practice. Does Poor Sleep Disturb My Practice? I decided to consider my difficulties in getting good sleep—or my resistance to working on my sleep habits—in the context of the obstacles outlined in Sutra I:30. Patanjali’s obstacles get in the way of attaining a calm mind, which has a huge impact on sleep. Mr. Iyengar groups the obstacles into four categories:

PHYSICAL

• Vyadhi (illness). When I’m sick, I often don’t sleep well.

Even if my physical being is just a little out of balance, I can