More and more studies are published which show that the proportion of people who don’t sleep well is on the rise. According to a 2017 study by DAK, one of the largest German health insurance companies, 80% of all employees have occasional sleeping problems. Sleeping disorders for employees between 35 and 65 years have increased by 66% since 2010. 1 in 10 employees suffer from insomnia, an increase of 60% since 2010. Similar studies are published in other countries.
I was one of these people. As a child I woke up at every noise and could not fall back to sleep for hours. This was exacerbated when I got older and peaked when I worked as an investment banker in the City of London. With the extreme working hours and frequent airplane trips, it would take me a long time to fall asleep. Or I was so exhausted that I fell asleep immediately, but then woke up between 2am and 4am laying awake for hours until I eventually managed to go back to sleep. I remember well this feeling of helplessness at night. I had little time available to sleep and then I was not able to sleep in the time I had.
I tried everything, from literally “counting sheep”, to staring at a candle, but to no avail, nothing helped. I was desperate in these early morning hours, worried I wouldn’t be able to cope with the day ahead. I even decided to pretend to sleep in an attempt to reduce the mental stress of not being able to sleep, but this did not always work and it is certainly not comparable with deep rejuvenating sleep.
This all changed when I came across Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine. With Universal Medicine therapies, in particular Esoteric Yoga and the Gentle Breath Meditation, I learned to reconnect to my body. I was once a Master of ignoring my body. My body was just a means to an end enabling me to reach whatever goal I wanted to achieve. But now I understand that my body has an unimaginable and wise intelligence. When I am deeply connected with my body I can feel that I am part of a universal wisdom that is very grand and expansive.
Step by step I learned to feel my body throughout the day, not only in the evenings when I finally allowed myself to stop and go to bed. I now understand that the way I live during the day affects my sleep at night. I made thorough re-evaluations and many loving adjustments in my life, like making brief stops throughout the day to check that I was still present and with my body, rather than pushing through ceaselessly. I also started to eat nourishing foods rather than fill myself up with whatever was available.
I managed to return to a simplicity that was in stark contrast to my complex life. Now I just do whatever I need to do, without fretting that this might not be enough or wanting everything to be different. I realised that my exhaustion and mental unrest was not a result of working too much, but instead the quality with which I was working and living in. Once I began listening to the wisdom of my body and stopped pushing through life from my head, I started to reconnect with a natural flow that felt very beautiful, did not deplete me and most interestingly, I was able to get much more done in my day.
This return to my body has given me an incredible settlement that I have never experienced before in my life. Sleeping is no longer a problem. Now I fall asleep instantly and either sleep straight through or I wake up, turn over, and go right back to sleep. I can even sleep sitting up in a train or airplane, something which I would have never imagined possible in my wildest dreams!
I cannot value enough that I was able to return to this simplicity in my life: I feel my body, and my body is tired, I give myself the permission to sleep and then I just fall asleep.
Author: Anke Parr
I tried everything, from literally “counting sheep”, to staring at a candle, but to no avail, nothing helped. I was desperate in these early morning hours, worried I wouldn’t be able to cope with the day ahead. I even decided to pretend to sleep in an attempt to reduce the mental stress of not being able to sleep, but this did not always work and it is certainly not comparable with deep rejuvenating sleep.
This all changed when I came across Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine. With Universal Medicine therapies, in particular Esoteric Yoga and the Gentle Breath Meditation, I learned to reconnect to my body. I was once a Master of ignoring my body. My body was just a means to an end enabling me to reach whatever goal I wanted to achieve. But now I understand that my body has an unimaginable and wise intelligence. When I am deeply connected with my body I can feel that I am part of a universal wisdom that is very grand and expansive.
Step by step I learned to feel my body throughout the day, not only in the evenings when I finally allowed myself to stop and go to bed. I now understand that the way I live during the day affects my sleep at night. I made thorough re-evaluations and many loving adjustments in my life, like making brief stops throughout the day to check that I was still present and with my body, rather than pushing through ceaselessly. I also started to eat nourishing foods rather than fill myself up with whatever was available.
I managed to return to a simplicity that was in stark contrast to my complex life. Now I just do whatever I need to do, without fretting that this might not be enough or wanting everything to be different. I realised that my exhaustion and mental unrest was not a result of working too much, but instead the quality with which I was working and living in. Once I began listening to the wisdom of my body and stopped pushing through life from my head, I started to reconnect with a natural flow that felt very beautiful, did not deplete me and most interestingly, I was able to get much more done in my day.
This return to my body has given me an incredible settlement that I have never experienced before in my life. Sleeping is no longer a problem. Now I fall asleep instantly and either sleep straight through or I wake up, turn over, and go right back to sleep. I can even sleep sitting up in a train or airplane, something which I would have never imagined possible in my wildest dreams!
I cannot value enough that I was able to return to this simplicity in my life: I feel my body, and my body is tired, I give myself the permission to sleep and then I just fall asleep.
Author: Anke Parr