Most people don’t pay much attention to this nightly activity, other then realizing it is necessary for functioning well in your waking life. You may shrug-off your dreams as just peculiar movie scenes presented to you during sleep. The reality is, we spend 1/3 of our lives sleeping. Do you want to ignore 1/3 of your life?
Are you sleeping?
Many people lie in bed at night, wide awake and frustrated at their inability to fall asleep. They feel tired, perhaps irritable and have difficulty thinking clearly the next day. There are many reasons for insomnia, including the following:
· Stress
· Worry
· Over-stimulated nervous system
· Consuming stimulants, like caffeine
· High Vata (too much air element makes us spacey
· Exercising before bed
There are also many natural and nurturing remedies for insomnia, taken from the ancient Ayurvedic texts. A few of these peaceful slumber rituals are as follows:
· Wash your feet with warm water and rub them with warm sesame oil before bed. If sesame oil is too heating, you can use coconut oil, which is more cooling, (for those hot-blooded Pitta types).
· Sleep with your head facing east and toes facing west. This provides a restful meditative sleep, as the head is pointing in the sun’s direction
· Sleep on your right side. This blocks off your right nostril, so that you can breathe in the lunar energy through your left nostril. The lunar energy is calming and peaceful to the mind and body.
· No intense mental activities for 2 hours prior to sleeping.
· Sleep in a dark, clean and well-ventilated room.
· Meditate before bed. This quiets your mind and prepares you for a more restful sleep.
Dreams are the language of the subconscious mind
The subconscious mind records the imprints of all of the days' activity. The subconscious mind speaks to us in our dreams through iconography. In dream time, the subconscious mind has the opportunity to release some of its accumulated load. Have you ever noticed that you might see something during your day, like a pair of blue glasses, left on the table in the lunch room at work, and then in your dream that night, the blue glasses show-up? This happens all of the time. Our subconscious mind takes in the imprint of the blue glasses and discharges this in our dream state.
The dreamer is the dream
Dreams are created by our subconscious mind and are for us to see ourselves more clearly. Everything in the dream is a reflection of our selves. Even the blue glasses! Each icon has a personal meaning for us. Blue glasses might mean “cool, clear vision” to me and to you something entirely different. So, I could ask myself, “What am I getting a cool clear vision of in my life?” Exploring the language of our dreams can help us to learn the art of self-inquiry. This is the self-questioning process that enables us to go deep inside ourselves to decipher more clearly who and what we are not. It brings us closer to the truth of who we really are, our divine nature.
Sleep is for healing
Dreams are an interesting exploration and there is an excellent method for self-inquiry into our dreams that is taught as part of the Sleep and Dreams course. The true importance of sleeping is not dreaming though.
Sleep is meant as an opportunity for deep healing. Dreamless sleep is the ultimate state. Dreams can take a lot of our energy. Have you had the experience of waking-up from an intense dream, feeling emotional and exhausted? Excessive dreaming depletes our energy, both mentally and physically. When our mind is more meditative and silent during sleep, the body has the opportunity to regenerate cells and relax deeply. That is why the last thoughts we have before we go to bed are so important. We carry them into our sleep. So, meditate, read a beautiful text, such as the poet Rumi or chant a mantra before drifting into slumber.
Further examination of 1/3 of your life
Bhuvanewari and Satkiana have devoted an entire book and course to the study and experiential exploration of dreams. You will explore sleep and dreams through the science of Ayurveda, Yoga, Shamanism and Bioenergetics. This course is a must for the spiritual seeker who sleeps. Advanced yogis who do not sleep are exempt!
Dream iconography course starts Tuesday Nov 2 in Ottawa.
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