How to End Insomnia?

Your body and your brain never stop being active. Even when you lie down and sleep, your body sends an immeasurable amount of neurological data to your brain, for example from your gut, muscles, joints, and your immune system. When this data creates too much negative stress in the brain, your sleep gets affected. As a result, you might start experiencing trouble in falling and staying asleep. This is how insomnia can develop.

To fix the situation there are two ways.

#1 The Common Way to End Insomnia

The commonly used way to end insomnia is to first identify what causes stress and then to implement behavioral life-style improvements. This includes improving your diet, following a regular day-schedule, doing physical exercises, doing emotional and mental practicing, and creating a positive sleep environment. All these improvements are important and can help. Only, it takes time to get results.

#2 The New Way to End Insomnia

The second solution is to learn how to do sleep-inducing movements. The resulting feeling of calmness can instantly start helping your brain in shifting itself into the sleep state. There is no more natural way to induce sleep, because body movements have a neuroeducative power to instantly evoke positive processes in the brain.

Moving into Sleep Easily & Naturally

When you do movements with attention, you instantly evoke a response and activity in your brain. In history, movement has always been a tool to learn new skills and abilities, and also to heal the body. This is why it is also possible to induce sleep by doing certain movements very slowly and gently.

Try how it Feels

To feel how to do a sleep-inducing movement, here is a simple introduction exercise.

To prepare, rest your right hand, palm down, somewhere comfortable, for example on your thigh.
Relax your body as well as you can.
Notice how you breathe: feel how the air flows in and out.
Never hold your breath, simply breathe naturally.
Then, think of your right index finger.
Feel the contact it makes with the surface under it.
Gently, when you inhale, slowly press your index finger against the surface it touches.
When you exhale, release the tension until the finger is completely relaxed.
Repeat many times.
As you continue like this, pay attention how the quality of what you do starts to create a smooth, calming, and peaceful sensation, something that gradually can move you toward sleep.

Unique Way of Learning

Because everyone is unique, and you have a one-of-a-kind neurological organization, please be patient - one movement cannot completely or permanently overcome all neurological stress right away. However, after you feel the first “a-ha” moment, you may notice that the body-brain system starts to recognize the new input and learns to respond faster. One day, it will simply be enough to imagine doing your favorite sleep-inducing movement, to immediately feel calmer and feel how you move into sleep.

This sample movement is one out of several you can do. In my method I have included several types of movements, together creating a complete body-brain calming effect.

Too high or low support will twist your neck muscles, which can affect your whole body.

If you prefer to lie on your back, make the support thinner than when you lie on your side.
Fold the towel so that your neck feels well supported and you can roll your head easily from side to side.
Note that the alignment of your neck often reflects first the way it is when you stand or sit.
Therefore, after some time, it might be necessary to adjust the hight

If you lie on your side, create a support so that your neck is in line with your spine.
Experiment with different heights, until you feel your neck is as relaxed as possible and free to move.
If necessary combine a folded towel with a flat pillow
Be aware that some pillows get compressed during the night and won't give you consistent support.
A folded towel, on the other hand, maintains its shape very well.
Once you have created the right support for your head, move it a little backward, so that nothing or as little as possible touches your cheek.
A gentle touch on the cheek triggers a rooting reflex, which activates the neck muscles to turn your head.
Ideally, the core support is under the side of the skull, behind the ear, where you can find the center of balance of your head.
Note also that your neck doesn't need any support. Therefore, avoid squeezing a soft pillow under your neck as it will bother you by limiting body circulation and free movement.

The support you get is firm, yet comfortable and the flat surface promotes comfort and ease in movement.

Some weeks ago, my mother-in-law told she had a stiff neck every morning. When I asked her how she supported her head, she told having a basic, soft, and quite a thick pillow. I then told her how I support my head with a folded bath-towel, sometimes combined with a thin pillow. This allows me to adjust the support so that my head is well balanced and free to move. It is a great solution, functional and cheap.

Thanks for reading.

Wishing you the best of sleep!

Oliver

As always — thanks for reading.

Questions and comments are welcome!