If anyone is interested, I have occasional insomnia and found a valerian-hops-skullcap combination (found in any health food store, or grocery store) Works great for temporary conditions. I have tries everything, and some make me groggy, or forget my dreams (which sucks) But these herbs seem to enhance them. Kava works for some people as well, if anxiety is an issue. Believe me, I know anxiety!
But sometimes life just throws us a full mind, and it’s hard to get to sleep.
Insomnia - Can't sleep!
Ok, so I’ve made a thread before but I do not wish to dig through the graveyards of these forums. Anyway, I get really bad insomnia and all the suggested techniques that have been said (such as relaxing your body slowly and counting backwards), have not worked. I really don’t want go down the road of drug induced sleep.
I moved your post into the BIG topic.
This is a split topic, I collected most of the advice from the first part and posted it here click for post … it should make a good starting point.
There is also an insomnia article in the knowledgebase forum.
My doctor ignored me.
It turns out I had sleep apnea so bad that now I have congestive heart failure and I have to sleep with a c-pap machine and oxygen. I can now sleep and I love my c-pap machine so much that I would marry it if I could.
I didn’t dream for years and now I dream all the time, because I received the proper treatment.
If your insomnia is severe - see a doctor!
(sorry about the long post)
I’m not sure what kind of sleep disorder this is, but I’m almost positive I have one. Every day, it’s just simply impossible for me to fall asleep until sometime between 2-4 a.m. Even if I’m extremely tired and go to bed at 11 p.m., I still find myself lying in bed for hours. This has happend to me for as long as I can remember, but I’ve found it got worse over the years. When I was in elementary school, everyone I knew had a bed time of 8-10 p.m. or so, and I had a bed time of 12 a.m. That time gradually got later over the years, and unfortunately the time you have to wake up for school gets earlier. The current time I have to get up is 6 a.m., 6:30 at the latest. Falling asleep at 2 every day and getting up at 6 is hardly enough sleep to even keep me functioning. I can’t ever do anything in the morning on weekends because I really need to catch up on sleep and end up sleeping in until 2 p.m.
I’m not sure if this is relevent, but it’s odd how I actually stay awake. I lay there for an hour or so (regardless of what time I go to bed) and I start to see HI, vivid dream scenes, hearing voices, etc., but when I’m on the verge of entering the dream and finally falling asleep, the logical part of my brain turns back on and it makes me realize what I’m seeing, which causes me to wake up. Many people have trouble doing WILD because they cannot keep focused as they fall asleep, but for me it’s quite the opposite. I can lay there for hours without moving or even trying to stay awake, and I won’t fall asleep, but the problem is that it takes forever to enter SP. One time I was sitting there trying WILD for atleast 2 hours and nothing happend. I just decided to give up and let myself fall asleep. I had to fall asleep three times before I was able to stay asleep. The first time I entered a dream in a couple minutes. It made absolutely no sense and within 10 seconds I realized it was a dream and woke up. The second time it happend again, so on the third time I actually used MILD to tell myself to not realize it’s a dream so I could finally just sleep.
Has anyone ever heard of something like this before or had any experiences? It doesn’t really sound like insomnia since I have little trouble falling asleep if I can pick my own sleep schedual. Any ideas?
Ive been watching meditation, bineral beats, and trance videos allnight, and I feel like Ive took three valums. This stuff realy works try this one, I gurantee you will feel sleepy. I use it when I cant sleep, and it works wonders.
youtube.com/watch?v=xba56LlV … re=related
edited in from next post…
Use headphones
I’ve stumbled upon the perfect cure for insomnia…start a fight club!!
Thank you for the link to that video, Kava. It helped me sleep.
It was happening to me after looong working in front computer, but when I started going out more, everything went back to normal.
I have some minor problems while falling asleep. I simply can’t find my place in the bed. I start moving around to get comfortable. Because of this I can’t WILD. And it also takes me a while to get back to sleep if I wake up at 3 or 4 in the morning.
I often have the exact same problem. I usually take a while to fall asleep. HOW do you wake up at night for WILD? I don’t use an alarm clock. I program myself to awaken at a certain time (though usually I’ll wake up on my own after every dream period). Usually if you wake up of your own accord your sleep rhythm doesn’t get disrupted as much as it would have, had you used an alarm clock.
As for finding a place in the bed. What helps is if I just try to WILD in the position I just woke up in. That’s usually comfortable. Other than that, I really have no idea.
I’m not using an alarm clock. I usually wake up after every dream too(I set my intention)
It has been hard to sleep the last few days. I have tried hot tea, a warm shower before sleep, foot baths, melatonin, taking walks in the day, blocking out light from the bedroom…and i just can’t sleep. I start drifting away and get those random thoughts that marks the beginning of sleep, then i have to move, and i am wide awake again! I have had 2-3 hours of sleep, in the late morning, for the last 4 days. It is getting annoying.
Could it be that it can be fixed with a change in eating habits? Maybe if i eat more carbohydrate rich food in the morning, and more protein rich food in the evening? It feels like my mind and body just refuses to shut down.
Ive noticed I have a very hard time to sleep these days 
I just feel that I want to be outside, even in nighttime. It felt like eternities before I fell asleep yesterday 
Yes this happens to me. I’ll even just change positions on my bed and put my head where my feet normally would be. Don’t know why altering my usual sleeping position/location helps but it does… It’s also really easy for me to fall asleep on my desk at school …zzzzzzzzz
That’s right folks,the reason you aren’t getting sleep is because you are not exercising enough. Go for a 30 minute run, afterward’s stretch a lot, drink a shitton of water, go pee, do NOT watch any TV all day(very important). And go to sleep, however, have a night light on, otherwise you’ll be so deep in sleep you won’t wake up to record your dreams. Hope this helps all of you guys. Namaste
I am starting to wonder if my ego might have something to do with me not falling asleep easily anymore. Before I started Lucid Dreaming I never had trouble falling asleep! All it took was for my head to touch the pillow and I was gone! Now I make affirmations that I will be lucid and make plans about what is is I will do once I am lucid. I close my eyes,…and can’t sleep, am wide awake. I was actually up till 5:30 last night, so I had about 3 hours of sleep. So I was thinking maybe part of me doesn’t want to fall asleep and lucid dream, I have not a clue as to which part of me, seeing I really love and want to lucid dream as much as I can.
It sounds to me not like part of you doesn’t want to fall asleep/LD, but more like you’re too excited. Like a little kid trying to sleep the night before going to Disney World or something. I say little kid, but really I’d probably be up all night, too, thinking about Disney 
My advice: relax and let it come to you rather than chasing it down so hard. Maybe even try NOT doing so much preparation right before bed one night. Try not to think about it. Mind you, don’t NOT think about it so hard that you keep yourself up trying NOT to think about it
After all, dreams are all in the subtle subconscious, not the over-active mind.
Lately everyone has problems with falling asleep, as far as I can see. Even myself. Last night I stayed awake untill 1 AM 
! But I think I know what my problem is. The last week I didn’t go for a jog in the morning nor in the evening.
I have some tips for people who desperatly try to fall asleep, which may help you. I took them out of personal experiences 
.
What is the sleeping state ? - if interested, click the spoiler below, even thaught we all know that.
[spoiler]Characteristics of Sleep
We all know how sleep looks – when we see someone sleeping, we recognize the following characteristics:
•If possible, the person will lie down to go to sleep.
•The person’s eyes are closed.
•The person doesn’t hear anything unless it is a loud noise.
•The person breathes in a slow, rhythmic pattern.
•The person’s muscles are completely relaxed. If sitting up, the person may fall out of his or her chair as sleep deepens.
•During sleep, the person occasionally rolls over or rearranges his or her body. This happens approximately once or twice an hour. This may be the body’s way of making sure that no part of the body or skin has its circulation cut off for too long a period of time.In order to maximize your sleep time, there are four main considerations. You must:
•Begin your preparations for sleep during the day
•Schedule your sleep patterns deliberately
•Practice habits that help your body to relax before sleep
•Control your sleep environment
Prepare for Sleep All Day
From the moment you wake up in the morning, you have choices to make that can affect how well you sleep that night. Making wise choices throughout the day can help you sleep soundly at night and awaken with renewed energy.
One such choice is to get regular exercise. The next page explains when you should work out to sleep better at night.[/spoiler]
Sport or exhausting activites is the answer, to eliminate the toxins in your body through sweating and to “consume” the energy your body has.
Now, imagine a laptop with full battery. The laptop is on stand by. If you don’t open that laptop and use most of the battery power it has, it will never use that whole energy by itself. While on stand by it still uses some energy but veery little energy.
Now you are the laptop. If you want a good night sleep, eliminate the energy during the day. Sitting in your office and doing paper work means you are on stand by - you don’t use much energy. Now, go out, play some tennis, go for a jog or simply run amok in your garden, jump, klimb trees - do something 
.
You should feel tired. But don’t get fooled by that. The body recoveres really fast from such an activity. Rest 10 minutes and do that again. Rest another 10 minutes and do it again. Now you are really tired.
Now wait for night and go to sleep. IF that doesn’t work so well lay down on the hard floor for 15 minutes without moving. You’ll hurt yourself a bit, but once you are in bed, and with all the activities you have done during the day, you should have no probs with going to sleep.
This worked for me. Some relaxing music can’t hurt - just make sure it is quiet and peacefully. Remember - all bodies are different form each other - some eliminate this energy faster some do that slower.
You know why there is this advice to not eat before going to sleep ? Because food is energy. Your body needs food and water to produce energy. Like the laptop - if you used all energy and you are preparing to shut down - don’t plug it in, because if you do you consumed all the energy for nothing. 
Have fun and I wish you a good night sleep 
!
Unfortunately that doesn’t work for me, when I’m utterly worn out I literally sleep like a log with absolutely no dream recall whatsoever. My day is always busy, so I am physically tired when I go to bed. It’s not my body that can’t sleep, cause I do enter some sort of sleep paralysis, it’s my mind that doesn’t. I wished the dreaming state would come while laying there trying for my mind to fall asleep, but nope, nothing, not even images.