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What is Yoga Nidra? What is Psychic Sleep? Why do it?
ANCIENT
INTUITIVE
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Traditional, energetic practises, for anyone, anywhere.
What is Yoga Nidra?
Welcome.
Today we'll be talking about Yoga Nidra. Yoga Nidra translates to psychic sleep. It’s a state of sleepless sleep where we're on the borderline between being awake and sleep. It’s a state of inner awareness that connects the subconscious and higher consciousness. You listen to a specific set of instructions which will take you into this deepest state. We normally practices this in a lying down position known as shavasana.
Yoga Nidra brings a state of deep relaxation and can be used as a prelude to sleep. Generally speaking, most people don't know how to sleep, they'll fall asleep thinking over the checklist that they've done for the day or haven't done. Maybe they're thinking about their problems or have some anxieties before they go to sleep. And when they eventually do sleep, their mind continues on with these thoughts and their body becomes tense. They wake up feeling lethargic, restless, and maybe they don't want to get out of bed. Maybe they hit the snooze button, all in all they haven’t had a great, deep, restful sleep. We can stop this from happening by practicing yoga nidra just before sleeping. It will relax the whole body and the mind. Sleep will be deep and meaningful. You'll need fewer hours of sleep and you'll wake up feeling refreshed and energetic.
During yoga nidra, the physical senses of the body become introverted. This is called pratyahara, sense withdrawal. The mind is fixed on the centre, the blood and energy are drawn into it. And this causes the withdrawal of the senses at that centre.
In the deep state of relaxation that results all the tension is released and the mind becomes clear and thoughts are more powerful. In this state of yoga we can contact our inner personality to change our attitude, our thoughts, and ourselves. It's a method of introspection.
It's been used by yogis for thousands of years to bring them face to face with the inner self. So if you ever want to know yourself or to go deeper within the self, this is a really great and easy place to start. At the beginning of yoga nidra, we always set a resolve or sankalpa. So this is like an intention, it should be something that's really important to you, something short, but something of significance that you can embed into the subconscious. This type of auto suggestion is very powerful and should have a spiritual objective. The sankalpa or resolve can actually change your whole life. When you're practicing yoga Nidra, you're doing it every night for a whole week, that way it's best to stick with that same sankalpa for that whole period. And what you're doing is auto programming in the brain that message, so you can actually change old habits. You can break addictions. And it's suggested that you can even cure certain mental illnesses.
After every practise reflect on the sankalpa immediately after, but before you open the eyes. However, if you're practicing this right before sleep and you fall asleep, that's ok. See if you can remember that same sankalpa in the morning.
Maybe it will slightly evolve and change into something more meaningful, but it will be the same.
In yoga nidra, the mind should be completely taken up with the instructions. So the mind should be alert and aware. It's not used to go to sleep. However, if you do fall asleep, let the body sleep. That means that you need the rest. So in a normal practice, you're not using yoga as a means to sleep. You can use it before sleep to help you go to sleep and get a better sleep, as said, but you're not meant to fall asleep. During the practise, you do not try to understand or rationalise any of your words or instructions. You don't try to make any efforts to remember them because we don't want to exhaust the mind. When we exhaust the mind, we go to sleep faster.
We practice yoga nidra lying down in savasana, a position with the head flat on the floor. The body should be straight. The head in line, legs slightly apart, and arms close to the body with the palms facing upwards. If this is not comfortable, you can change the position lying down. Maybe you have the hands resting on the body. Maybe you have the hands, you know, underneath the buttocks or something like that. If you need a pillow from the head, if you need to make these minor adjustments, please do that.
The body should be completely still. The body is totally relaxed, the clothes are loose. There should be no physical movement once the instructions have begun. It’s also best to practise on an empty stomach, it should not be full. We also close the eyes throughout so the yoga nidra works in the theta brain brainwaves, which we've discussed previously.
We're taking you into this sort of lucid, dreaming state.
I'll take you through the different stages of yoga nidra. There's around seven different stages in this practice. The first one is a resolve or sankalpa. This is where we set that intention. The second stage is breath awareness. Third stage is rotation of consciousness. This is where we move through all different parts of the body. This is done in a specific order that is normally not changed, that way the subconscious becomes used to this order. You'll find that when we practice yoga nidra together, that it's the same order that we do things in the mind should move quickly from part to part as it said, but we're not fixating on any one part of the body. We then move into part four, which is a recollection or awakening of feelings. Then we have conceptual awareness of the psychic centres and psychic symbols. These are usually rapid visualisations or maybe those different visions and experiences. This does change between different yoga nidras. No.6 is when we then repeat the sankalpa. And this brings awareness of unity with the supreme self, the atman. Then we return to normal consciousness very gradually and slowly, and we start to move the limbs. This is the end of the yoga nidra.
All yoga nidra practices have this same practice, this same sequence that we move through.
When you are first starting this practise, start with a shorter practise first and them work your way through to the longer practises. The longer practises become more advanced as they take you deeper into the subconscious.
Enjoy the ride.