Falling to sleep

I recently posted a picture of my son Jacob fast asleep in the laundry basket. I had been working and Daddy was in charge of bedtime. Say no more!

A few clients have since commented on my post saying they wish they could fall asleep with such ease so I thought I'd share a Kinesiology technique that can help when its difficult to switch a racing mind and body off.

Of course it helps if you follow standard sleep hygiene advice, like turning off electronic gadgets, adjusting the light and temperature in the room to your bedtime needs, avoiding overeating or over drinking etc... a quick Google search will give you more general tips like this but I wanted to share something a little bit different.

Basically it involves calming down the energy channels in your body called 'meridians' many of which either begin or end at your fingers and thumbs. So all you do is use one hand to wrap around the thumb of the other hand, staying there for about a minute or two or three... and if you can, really do your best to sense your skin, the temperature and any other sensation you may feel in that area while you do it. You might feel a subtle pulse, a tingling or a feeling of warmth/coolness. Then you move to the index finger and do the same thing, then the middle finger, then the ring finger, then the little finger. Then swap hands and repeat - IF you aren't asleep already!!! I know so many clients who don't get to the second hand when they use this technique.

A few images of how the technique looks, when you have done one hand, swap and do the other hand, it doesn't matter if you start with your left or your right.

I like to think it works because our bodies are comprised of energy, eastern medicine understands this and many of the techniques I use in my Kinesiology sessions borrow techniques from Traditional Chinese Medicine. This energy (sometimes called chi or prana) is carried around our bodies by pathways called meridians, and as I said above there are many meridians that begin and end on our fingers and thumbs so by holding them we are sending settling, somatic messages to our bodies energetic anatomy( which is just as vast and complex as our physical body) that it is time to rest.

As you can see from the first picture, my son Jacob clearly doesn't need to use this technique... but I hope it can help you if you find sleep hard to come by sometimes. Obviously if your sleep problems are more serious or ongoing, you may need to check in with your doctor... and/or come and see me to find out what's going on from a deeper level.

Give this a go anyway and let me know how you get on!