Improve Your Sleep with Yoga

July 2, 2007

Posted by Maggie Spilner

As a yoga teacher, I’ve often found that class participants mention getting a good night’s sleep as one of the benefits they gain from their classes. Relaxing postures, combined with yoga breathing techniques, meditation and the soothing voice of a teacher can wrok wonders to calm down an overactive mind and restless body.

Preliminary research by Sat Bir Singh Khalsa, PHD, an instructor in medicine at Harvard Medical School’s division of Sleep Medicine, published in 2004, found that just a half hour to 45 minutes of daily yoga practice that emphasized meditation and breathing, helped chronic insomniacs sleep through the night. Participants kept detailed sleep diaries and improved their ability to fall asleep and stay asleep by an average of 12 percent. (Khalsa, SB, Appl Psychophysiol Biofeedback, 2004 Dec:29(4):269-78)

A 2007 study conducted by Chris Streeter at Boston University School of Medicine used brain imaging technology to detect the amount of a certain brain chemical, gamma-aminobutyric (GABA) after a 60-minute yoga session. Compared to controls who simply read, the yoga practitioners had a 27 percent increase in GABA, which is associated with anxiety disorders. (Streeter, CC, J Altern Complement Med. 2007 May:13(4): 419-26)

And an article in the May/June 2007 Psychology Today reviews the work of Patricia Gerbarg, MD, a professor of psychiatry at New York Medical College, who used yoga breathing with psychological counseling, and a control group to compare the effect on tsunami survivors dealing with post traumatic stress syndrome (PTSD). After just four days, all the yoga users scores on PSTD and depression were greatly improved and the effect persisted. Psychological counseling added no additional benefit. Gerberg ended up giving the control group yoga breath training, too.

In the United States, many yoga classes emphasize physical postures and play down breathing (pranyama) and meditation techniques. If you’d like to try yoga to improve your sleep, but have felt intimidated by pictures of strenuous postures, look for classes geared to your age-group or that are titled “gentle” or “restorative” yoga and ask the teacher if she will be teaching breath practices and meditation.

Helpful Tip: To find a yoga teacher near you who has received appropriate training and is registered with the Yoga Alliance, the established governing body for Yoga teacher certification, go to www.yogaalliance.com