The ongoing interactions between food (including water), sleep, and healthy life are not new. Yet, humanity has not been able to embrace all the findings and adjust accordingly fully. If and when we do, we will be genuinely immortal because we will have learned the methods of staying healthy and living a long life. On the other hand, we would have mastered the art of living a good life through good sleep hygiene.
First, we must identify many people’s significant culprits of sound sleep: anxiety and stress. When we mention stress, know that it includes physical, emotional, and psychological stress, which affects our minds and bodies. However, practicing good sleep hygiene products can improve one’s sleep effectively and prolong one’s life.
For example, suppose you discover that stress contributes to your inadequate sleep. In that case, it is only wise to learn some rituals for faster and more prolonged sleep. Therefore, this article is about learning some of these rituals that can help you develop sleep hygiene towards a better life.
Unique Meditation for Better Sleep Hygiene
One simple sleep hygiene ritual to get you to sleep is to use a guided meditation strategy. This method has been proven effective in reducing the stress that may prevent you from sleeping. As a result, you can do well to improve your overall health and quality of life.
Naturally, undertaking meditation exercises the mind and slows down every mind wandering and distraction. Eventually, your mind gathers its parts and concentrates on a singular focus. This process may be otherwise known as a thoughtless awareness process.
You can initiate this process using a solemn soundtrack from any online platform. Download the track on your smartphone through an app and put it on repeat play. In addition, you can place the device with the ongoing soundtrack beside your bed.
Close your eyes and follow the promptings of the track until you find your mind inside the flow. Don’t forget that the aim is to stop all other activities, including thoughts that may be going on in your mind. So, the breathing and posture issues are only secondary to aid the first one.
Mindfulness
You should be mindful of your thoughts if you need to find sleep easily with healthy sleep hygiene. The negative thoughts we think are often responsible for the negative energy that causes worries, anxieties, and mental stress. All these factors contribute to a lack of sleep.
These factors affect the mind and can make the body tired and wearied. And by the time they lead to lack of sleep or poor quality of sleep, it will take a more significant effort to unwind and focus. An overactive mind requires a force of mindfulness to get back on track.
Mindfulness will help calm your thoughts and other mental activities while reducing anxiety and depression. You can also be confident that you will have an improved and relaxed mood. While meditation helps your mind to zone out, mindfulness helps your mind to zone in in a good way.
You can learn to accept things the way they are, especially if you can’t do anything about them immediately. There is no need for unnecessary analysis or self-judging that hardly makes you feel better. Instead, you get better aware of innate solutions as you look within.
Progressive muscle relaxation
The first two rituals for sleep hygiene focus primarily on the mind, while muscle relaxation focuses on physical fitness. The Progressive Muscle Relaxation method is used to relieve any tension that may exist in your body, which also relaxes the mind. Moreover, the process helps you focus more on your body and its internally generated energy.
You can begin this process by slowly breathing for some minutes to exercise your heart muscles. After then, when you feel ready, you should take a deep breath and hold it while you tense your feet alongside your toes for some seconds. Let it take about 3 or 4 seconds before you stop. Now, you can slowly release a deep breath and the tension.
Repeat the same process for your lower leg, and remember to hold your breath while tensing the body part for some seconds. Afterward, you can begin to release the halt and the portion slowly. Feel free to repeat this process on other body parts, starting with the lower regions. Continue with the upper legs up to the lower back’s abdominal muscles.
Work your way up to the upper back with the chest, hands, and arms while rounding off your shoulders and neck. Remember to hold your breath when you tense up your muscles. After each strain and release, you can begin to relax at the end of the exercise.
Deep breathing exercises
A breathing exercise is another way to build healthy sleep hygiene. This exercise helps you to stay calm in a relaxed mood while working your heart rate slowly. At the same time, it enables you to focus your mind away from tension matters. You can also carry out this exercise in various ways and postures, such as standing, sitting, or even lying down.
In other words, the exercise is different from the meditation that emphasizes the position you assume before taking it. When doing the breathing exercise, you also need to focus on your abdominal breathing, not the chest breathing. Monitor the differences between the two by placing one hand on the chest and the other on the stomach when carrying it out.
Conclusion – other rituals for healthy sleeping hygiene
While we have described some of the practices that can enhance your sleep hygiene, we cannot ignore the remaining traditions as stated below:
- A routine bedtime yoga can help reduce the stress you gather throughout the day and help you unwind. Yoga benefits both the mind and the body to regain lost shape.
- Massage with essential oils such as lavender and chamomile that can help you to relax
- Warm milk contains tryptophan, the amino acid that induces sleep. this nutrient is found in abundance in turkey, and some people can add nutmeg to the milk
- Sleep apps can also help you get some essential hours of sleep with some monitoring and stimulating sounds and features.