I Do Everything I'm Supposed To & I Still Can't Sleep!
Sometimes we "do all the stuff" everything we "should" do - meditation/mindfulness, yoga, breathwork etc etc and yet we STILL experience insomnia and anxiety.
Why would this be? We are a success, goal driven culture that is conditioned (almost from birth) to succeed and achieve. As such, many people approach holistic health with a perfectionism mentality.
It is challenging for a society that is programmed to always do something to learn to drop expectations and do nothing. The problem is, when we take up a health practice because we want to achieve something (being calm and zen and not feeling stress/ anxiety) we put pressure and expectations on a practice that was meant to just be. This leads to striving and unrealistic expectations.
Now anytime we feel stressed or anxious we also feel frustrated (because our practice isn't working) and this layers on to our pre-existing stress and anxiety. I
t isn't realistic to NEVER feel stressed or anxious and everyone experiences sleep disturbances occasionally. All of this is completely normal and, if you are willing to experience it and let it go, it will pass (time really does heal all wounds). It isn't the natural spectrum of emotions and experiences that is the problem. It is being unwilling to experience them, or making them wrong, which causes an issue.
When this intolerance of uncomfortable experiences is linked with holistic health practices, these practices end up being used inappropriately to "shield" us from what we are trying to avoid. This makes these passive processes part of the problem, instead of the solution.
That is why many somatic psychologists and yogi experts recommend having a set daily practice. Something you do consistently everyday, regardless of your emotional state. It is much more effective to prevent being triggered by balancing the nervous system and increasing stress resistance over time than it is to chase relaxation and sleep.
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