Meditation for Better Sleep in Stressful Times

If you are currently having trouble sleeping due to increased stress and anxiety, it may be a good time to turn to meditation. Meditation is a skill that you can practice to help you get to sleep faster, have more quality sleep, and feel more refreshed when you wake up.

What is Meditation

Meditation trains your mind to be more aware and to gain a healthy perspective. Due to representations in film and TV, it may seem that meditation’s purpose is to turn off thoughts and feelings- but this is not true. The purpose is to observe them without passing judgment.

There are tens, if not hundreds, different types of meditation out there to try: There are guided and unguided meditations, movement-based, and still ones. With so many different choices to choose from, there is one for everyone’s personality.

Why You Need Meditation

Even without the current global concern of coronavirus out there, life is stressful. Life is full of things that cause negative thoughts and emotions. All this can build up and negatively impact our lives. 

For example, as stress increases, it becomes increasingly harder to fall asleep. The worst part of missing sleep due to stress is that the lack of sleep actually causes your stress levels to skyrocket, which will make it harder to sleep the next night. This is where meditation can help.

To break the cycle, you can unwind with meditation. Meditation is scientifically proven to help reduce stress and sleep better. When you are experiencing a high-stress time in your life, focus on adopting the new habit of meditation and decrease your stress.

How Meditation Gives Better Sleep

Lack of sleep is often caused by stress, depression, and anxiety. While there are other causes that can keep you from sleeping, these are three of the main factors that cause loss of sleep.

Meditation helps with sleep by reducing the three main factors of stress, depression, and anxiety. Furthermore, by practicing meditation you allow your brain to engage in processes that make it easier to fall asleep faster and stay asleep longer. This can be important as quality sleep is deeply related to good health.

3 Tips to Remember

When starting out on a meditation journey it is important to remember three tips. These tips are helpful when starting out because they allow you to have a better journey. The tips focus on establishing the habit, rather than being “good at it”.

Tip 1: Start Short

No one ever started running a marathon, they had to start off slowly by doing short runs before starting the longer ones. The same is true for meditation. At first, it may be a chore to meditate for 10 minutes at a time. 

Don’t beat yourself up for being unable to do longer sessions right away. In fact, by starting with a short five to seven-minute session it is more likely that you’ll make meditation a life long practice.

Tip 2: Count Your Breaths

Even the most practiced at meditation have times when they become distracted. If you find this happening to you, a good trick to refocus is to count your breaths.

When you find your mind wandering away from the meditation, start slowly and softly count each out breath. Inhale to the count of 10 and then count your exhales back to the number one. This will help you refocus on the meditation itself.

Tip 3: Be Kind to Yourself

When you’re meditating it can be easy to allow thoughts of inadequacy to come in. You may start to think thoughts like “I’m bad at meditation” or “I wish I could meditate longer.” Don’t let those thoughts take hold! Be kind to yourself and remember you can’t be anywhere you aren’t.

You will eventually get better at meditation. Don’t feel bad for not being the best at it. You’ll eventually get there. This is the meaning of “not being anywhere you aren’t”. Just remember – Meditation is a journey and every step you take in the journey is a positive one. 

Meditations for Better Sleep

When you need better sleep, there are many meditations to improve the quality of your sleep. In the below infographic by SleePare, there are 10 easy meditations that you can try to help reduce stress and improve your sleep. As a bonus, you can do many of these meditations from the comfort of your bed, allowing you to fall asleep fast.

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