Yoga Nidra – do yoga in your sleep

Doesn’t this sound great? Doing yoga without any effort? That’s definitely what I love about Yoga Nidra or yogic sleep.

One of the best things about doing yoga teacher training is that you always learn things that open up a whole other world. I know that yoga in general is a big topic but I didn’t quite realise just how much history, philosophy and science there is actually behind the physical asana practice until I did my yoga teacher training!

So during one of our teacher training weekends last year we learned about Yoga Nidra. I had heard of it before but had never experienced it. As I have been struggling with meditation (also see Why is it so difficult to meditate) I was really interested to learn about this topic as Yoga Nidra is said to help with stress and anxiety but in a slightly different way to meditation.

So what is Yoga Nidra?

Yoga Nidra is a state of consciousness which is between being awake and being asleep. It’s supposed to be very powerful and 45 minutes of Yoga Nidra are said to be as restful as 3 hours of sleep!

When you do Yoga Nidra you listen to a very specific set of instructions which will help to bring you into a deep state of relaxation. You don’t actually have to do anything as it’s just like going to sleep which your body already knows how to do so there is nothing specific to learn about Yoga Nidra beforehand!

This is a great explanation that I found on YouTube so check this out if you are interested to find out more!

During our teacher training and my last yoga retreat we did Yoga Nidra sessions that were about 45 minute long which makes me hardly an expert but I found it really interesting and it made me want to discover it more.

It’s actually very difficult to describe but I felt as if I was fully conscious during the 45 minutes and it felt a little bit like I was falling but caught myself in the last second. I definitely didn’t go to sleep but there are parts that I didn’t remember and I felt fully rested afterwards!

Yoga Nidra Resources

This website has got yoga nidra audios to listen to in different languages which is quite a good place to start.

Another great one is this yoga nidra audio by Tim Rowe, a London based meditation teacher.

There are plenty of resources on YouTube as well and if you are going through a difficult time or if you simply find it difficult to switch off then I would definitely recommend to try it!

You don’t need to know anything about yoga or be able to do any yoga poses (other than lying on your back) to do Yoga Nidra!