Gentle Bed Yoga for Better Sleep

Do you struggle to get to sleep? Join me as I guide you with bedtime yoga to help you relax and unwind before bed. This yoga for better sleep will help you switch off your mind and get a goodnight's sleep.

Yoga is an integral part of my lifestyle, it helps me deal with day-to-day stress and get a good night's sleep.

Much Love ~ Derek

Transcript

Now if your body is desperately trying to fall asleep but your mind is like no then this yoga class is right for you to help you unwind, To help you switch off, To help you doze off into sleep. Get comfortable right in your bed, No need for a yoga mat and open up the window bit so you can let some fresh air in. Let's get to it. Yoga for better sleep. So sit in a comfortable cross-legged position right on your bed. Bring the hands one palm over the other, Over the belly. Close the eyes for a few moments and bring the awareness to your breath. With each inhale the belly grows, Inflates like a balloon. With each exhalation the balloon deflates. So continue a few of these breaths, Balloon breaths, Into the belly. Inhales and exhales. Consciously slowing down the mind. Consciously slowing down the breath. We are here to unwind, To release into deep relaxation. Now the awareness of the mind travels onto your feet. You feel without touching your big toe. Feel all the nerves traveling, Sending signals into the big toe and moving on to the second toe of either foot. It can be both. Move on to the third, Middle toe. Move on to the fourth. Now the awareness is full like a laser onto the pinky toe. Feel it. The energy travels upwards to the heels, To the ankles, To the thighs, To the knees. Blink the eyes open. Awareness throughout the whole totality of your body. Rest the hands onto your knees. It is important that throughout this practice, In order to switch off the mind and the brain, To introduce slow inhalations through the nose. This helps to relax the body. This helps to oxygenate the brain or help it soothe and become like jelly. So for now we are going to start a movement so we can get out of the mind and move into the body. We're going to bring the right hand to the side of the bed. Bring the left hand up and over with an inhale and enter a nice side bend. Bring it over to the other side. Slow inhalation. Reach both hands up to the sky and exhale over to the left, Opening up the ribcage. Inhale, Bring it up to the sky with both hands. Reach, Exhale, Draw a wide circle. Bring the hands onto the knees and give your neck some gentle, Easy rotations without pushing it, Without tension. Keep the breath soft, Gentle. Give it a pause. Now with the hands onto your knees, We're going to start rotating the chest above the hips. Small circles to begin with. Let's introduce a connection with the breath. As we inhale, We go forward. As we exhale, We round the shoulders, We round the heart and we go back. And again, Inhale, Open the chest. Exhale, Hug it in. Now let's go the opposite direction. Inhale, Exhale, Back. Inhale, Forward. Exhale, Back. And pause it into center. Give yourselves a nice upright spinal column. Let's bring it to the side once again with the right hand down, Left hand up. Inhalation. This time enter a little bit deeper. Try to keep the left glute rooted and sunk into the bed. Keep the breath moving. As you rise it up, Be inhalation. Exhale the other side. Deeper than before. More relaxed than before. As the asanas progress and as this class continues, We enter deeper and deeper into a relaxed state. Bring it up through the sky with both hands as you inhale and drop them down to the ground. Now we're going to give ourselves some love with the thumbs onto the foot. The foot that's in front of you, Let's grab hold of it and give yourselves a gentle foot massage. Slow movements. There's really no rush here. The aim is to allow the mind to feel safe. The reason of not sleeping is because of stress. The mind is, You know, Worried about work, About life situations, Relationships, Family. And it's running, It's pacing. During this class we want to help it, Allow it to feel secure, Slow down and just sleep. Switch off. Now let's go ahead and do the other foot. So switch it over. Bringing it nice and easy. You can also, You know, Target the toes one at a time. Slow movements. Explore which part of the foot is tight. Where does it feel nice and relieving? Perhaps it can also be on the heels, On the callus. Excellent. That's it for the foot massage. Now we're going to bring both hands in front of us and we're going to walk them forward. Nice and easy. And just round the shoulders. Drop the head down. Keeping the breath gentle. Keep reaching with the spine forward and up. Listen to your breath. Let it guide you. Walk the hands back towards the feet. Now we're going to do a similar posture. Baddha Konasana. The feet connect, The knees out to the side. Let's not connect the heels all the way into the thighs. Keep some distance so we can make this a little bit more easy and more accessible for this time of the night, You know, So we can release. We're going to walk the hands forward and just breathe deep into your inner thighs. Keep the head high without rounding too much. Allow the spinal column to lengthen and guide yourselves with deep breaths into a relaxed state with full conscious bodily awareness. Perhaps you can feel your toes again. One by one, Target them. And slowly releasing it, Walking it back. Our practice will now continue on to the knees. So guide the feet forward gently. With the assistance of your hands, Let's climb slowly onto the knees. Nice and easy. We will now enter a child's pose. We want the feet to connect together as one. Open up the knees as wide as it can go. Sit back onto the heels. Nice and comfortable. And then walk the hands forward until the chest meets the ground. Nice and easy. A supported version that you can try here, If you feel like it, Is to grab a pillow or a cushion. Place it down in front of you, Right around the belly and the chest. And you can use this as a comfortable shield so you can lay down even more comfortably. So we want the breath here to slow down. We want the energy of the mind to shift, To move away from the head and travel down throughout the body. We are not the mind. We are the body. From head to toes. We are the breath that travels in and out, Just like the waves of an ocean. Inhales and exhales through the nose, With no rush. We will now lift up the head gently. Walk it with the hands slowly to rise. We are going to bring ourselves now onto our knees for tabletop. So nice and easy. The hands are exactly underneath your shoulders. The knees exactly underneath your hips. And we are going to do a few cat-cow positions. On the inhale, Drop the belly. The head is high. Keep pressing on the hands firmly. On the exhale, Bring the chin in and round the shoulders to the sky. And again. Inhale. Exhale. Round it in. A few more with your own speed of breath, Your own rhythm. Find it, Dance it and move it with the natural rhythm of your breath. Perfect. Settle through neutral spine. We will now thread the needle by bringing the right hand exactly underneath the face. The left hand opens up to the sky. And then release it down. Thread it through the hand and knee. Place the arm to the ground and twist the chest and allow the opposite hand to straighten. From here, You lower the head down. If it's comfortable, Of course. If not, There's also the option of a cushion, A pillow. Allow the chest to open. Allow the spine to twist, Just like a sponge that we use for dishes. When it dries up, You know, We need to soak it with water, Twist a little bit, So we can make it soft again. Same goes with our spine. It needs to be mobile. It needs to be flexible for health, For vitality. We're going to return the front right hand next to the face, So we can use it to assist to lift up into our hands and knees. We'll now do the other side. So your left hand is in front of you. The right hand opens up and thread it through. Drop it down to the arm. If it feels comfortable and okay, You straighten that left arm and keep the chest twisting and opening. Priority here is your breath. Keep your breath as your companion of relaxation. When it's shallow and fast, No matter what you do, Even if you fall asleep in such state, Chances are that your sleep will not be relaxed. It will be a disturbed sleep. If you need to do slow breathing, That will guarantee a more relaxed sleep, So you can wake up and feel refreshed, Restored, Rejuvenated. So throughout this class, I invite you to breathe slow. Return the left hand near the face. Press it down, So you can rise onto the knees. Now bring both elbows and hands forward for sphinx pose. Drop the elbows down. Straighten the legs behind you. If the bed is not enough for your feet, That's perfectly fine. The aim here is to keep pressing down on the elbows for a nice long neck. Keep your buttocks here slightly energized, So we can protect the low back. From here, We're going to start waving it from side to side with the assistance of the breath. On the inhale, We bring it over to the left. On the exhale, The chin travels down and over to the right. Inhale, Left. Slow movement. Exhale, Right. Inhale, Left. One more flow. Exhale to the right. Release it through center, And now we're going to guide the left knee to the side of the body. So now this should be at a 90 degree angle. Don't bring it all the way up high for tension. Bring it somewhere halfway for a more easy restorative posture. Flex the foot. Bring the hands in front of you with the elbows, And drop the forehead down to the forearms. The aim here is to bring the belly as close to the floor, Or as close to the bed actually, As possible. To do this, You might have to shift a little bit the knee out to the side, And try to align the hips more down. You might notice that your left buttock is, You know, Popped out to the sky. This means that your belly is detached. To help connect it and attach it to the bed, You open and spread the knees, And you align the hips down flat onto your bed. And here in moments of silence, I've been talking too much already. Let's give some time for silence, So help you relax. Breath by breath, Soften into deep relaxation. I'm going to lift up the head slowly, And just change the legs here. Nothing too much. Guide the left leg back, Bring the opposite knee in. Remember to keep it at a 90 degree angle, To help you keep the posture correct, To keep it more aligned, More enjoyable. Drop the forehead down, And into silence, Release, Unwind, Surrender. And slowly lift up the head, Guide the elbows a little bit more back. Our practice will continue laying down on your backs, So make way. Let's first guide the right leg out straight, And then like a barrel, You will roll to lay flat on your backs. Nice and comfortable. We're going to enter a twist, By hagging in the right knee into the chest. And from here, Guide it all the way across, To the side. You can touch the bed, If not, Remember you can use props, A cushion, A pillow will do. The other hand, Your right, Opens to the side, Allowing the chest to open, Giving space and time to your breath, To unwind. If it's shallow, If it's short, Consciously try to slow it down. Now this is easier said than done, I understand completely. When stressed, The breath is shallow, There's no lies about that, But through yoga, Through constant daily practice, We train the mind to slow it down, Even in stressful situations. I'm going to twist it the other direction, So lay flat on your backs, Bring the opposite knee in, Your left, Then guide it across, Twist in it, And extend the left hand to the side. Breath is gentle, Breath is slow, And slowly unwind. Back through center, Kick both legs out in front of you, Lay to the side for a moment, You can bend the knees with the assistance of your hands, You lift, You rise into a seated position. Now we're going to close off with Viparita Karani, Legs up the wall, To help reverse the blood circulation, To help, You know, Freshen up the whole blood flow in the body. Now to get into it, Use the wall right next to the bed, Placing the side of your hip right next to the wall, And from there, With one dynamic movement, You drop the elbows, You kick the legs up the wall, And you slowly rotate mindfully, Feet are high, Head is relaxed, And you can see here, In my situation right now, The butt is quite far away from the wall. Now we want to correct that and bring the butt as close to the wall as possible, So that our legs are upright, Flexing the feet, And bring the hands near to the belly, One palm over the other, Closing the eyes. This is where the real work takes place, Letting go of any control, Even of the breath. Inhales and exhales through the nose. I want to practice mindful breathing. Now you will take one inhale, One exhale, While watching it with the eyes of the mind. Now you might do this once, You might do this twice, And then the mind drifts away into thoughts, Into tomorrow, Into yesterday. Natural, Our mind is like a monkey, Always searching for stimulation, For new entertainment. Once you catch it, You bring the monkey back in through center, Conscious breathing, Inhales and exhales. Next time might last for three or four breaths, And then again the monkey drifts away. This is a journey, Not a battle, So just soften into it, Let it be, With now or without judgment. Now we'll let go and release into silence. The body is heavy, The breath is light, Release, Let go. The belly is rising, The belly is falling, The dance of life taking place within us. In and out, Inhales and exhales. I'm going to introduce tiny, Gentle movements to the toes, To the hands. We're going to exit by bringing the knees, Or bending the knees, And then hugging them into the chest, And guide them down to the side of your body. The eyes bling open, Use the hands to assist you, To slowly rise, Getting comfortable onto your mat, And getting comfortable onto your bed. Reconnecting with breath, Conscious inhales, Conscious exhales. So throughout this practice, The aim was to move into the body, Away from head, Away from mind, And flow into the breath, The circle and natural force of life. I hope this practice helped you relax, Help you unwind. I hope you can drift off into sleep. From my heart to yours, Have a beautiful evening. Doze away, Sleep away. Namaste.