Sleep The Ancient Way
Over 50% of Indians report poor sleep quality. Yet our ancestors slept without melatonin gummies, blackout curtains or white noise apps.
The difference wasn't their environment — it was their evening ritual.
Ancient Indian culture had a lot of practices to prepare the body for sleep. For them, it was not on the amount of sleep one gets, but on preparing the body for sleep-
Here are few practices they swore by:
Padabhyanga: Massage the sole of the feet with warm bronze bowl or just warm Sesame Oil or ghee before bed.
Bhramari Pranyanama: : Sit comfortably, close your eyes, place your fingers on your tragus (the small flap of your ear) to block out noise, and exhale while making a steady "Mmmmmm" humming sound.
Yoga Nidra: You lie in Shavasana (Corpse Pose) and mentally scan each part of your body, "dropping" weight into the floor.
Hormones In play-
Cortisol - Stress hormone
Melatonin - The Sleep Hormone
Serotonin - The feel good neurotransmitter that calms nervous system.
Why am I losing on sleep?
Excessive screen time before going to sleep.
Ongoing thought process/tension resulting into self talk.
Late night eating habits.
How should I start fixing it?
Have food 3hrs before sleep.
Keep the room dark 1hr before sleep with no mobile screen.
Put your legs in a bucket filled with cold water to calm your mind for 10-15mins.
How can I avoid self talk?
Take a break. Go to some other room and do something extremely boring and then reattempt.
Observe breathing. Try to calm your brain down.
Inhale for 4 seconds, Hold for 7 secs and exhale for 8 seconds. This is known as the 4-7-8 breathing technique, first popularized by Dr. Andrew Weil.
What food can I eat?
Magnesium Rich Food like Pumpkin seeds, almonds, spinach, and cashews to lower Cortisol.
Turmeric Milk, Sesame seeds(Til), Brown Rice , Dalia are rich in Amino Acid called Tryptophan which synthesises Serotonin.
How can I make my sleep more effective?
Try to increase your REM(Rapid Eye Movement) phase of your sleep cycle.
This normally comes in during the last stage of your sleep cycle.
Keep your room dark all the time to reach to this stage.
It is at this stage, the emotional repairing of mind is done.
How you wake up matters as much as how you sleep. Ancient morning rituals were designed with exactly this in mind."
Science Behind It
There are three main stages of Sleep
Light Sleep: In this phase, we just close our eyes but can still feel the environment around it.
Deep Sleep: In this phase breathing becomes slow, muscles grow, wounds heal and physical energy is restored.
REM(Rapid Eye Movement): In this phase eyes dart back and forth under your eyelids very fast. In this phase, your brain is sorting through your day. It’s deciding what memories to keep and what "trash" to throw away. This is when you dream.
Deep sleep is the phase where the body repairs whereas REM is the phase where the mind repairs.
Your body already knows how to sleep. These practices just remind it how.
