That Doesn’t Look Like Yoga to Me
“That doesn’t look like you’re doing yoga to me.” says my husband. I’m lying on my back, gently swaddled in a blanket, head phones on with a peaceful expression on my face. I have a daily yoga nidra practice and it’s one of the deepest, most life-changing forms of yoga.
Yoga nidra is sometimes called yogic sleep, but it’s much more than profound nap! It takes us on an internal journey to a place where we are free of the mind and all it’s entanglements. The senses, the ego, the stored memories that shape our behaviour, the constant spinning around decisions – all those aspects of the mind dissolve, and we get to experience the blissful peace beyond all of that.
It changes our brain waves. Lab-tested results of yoga nidra show that it shifts the brain waves to a higher propoertion of delta waves (dreamless sleep) and theta waves (that suspended feeling you have between waking and sleeping).
The deeply restorative effects of yoga nidra include:
reducing our total sleep need,
a reduction in cortisol, the stress hormone,
and it replenishes dopamine a.k.a. the main chemical of pleasure that flows through our bodies.
How does yoga nidra differ from sleep?
In the state of yoga nidra, the mind is asleep, the body is asleep, but awareness remains aware, you are the witness.
The yoga nidra practice can be steered to work on specific outcomes, here are ones I regularly work with:
Healing – of physical and mental challenges
Changing deep-seated beliefs and patterns
Self-knowledge – experiencing that we are something other than our minds
Your yoga practice does not have to have you tied up in knots to deliver the benefits.