The Mindfulness Forum

If I meditate at bedtime, I have trouble going to sleep, even though I feel calm. Any idea why this might be happening?

Hi,
I do my mindfulness meditation at night soon before going to sleep as well. Lately, Ive been having trouble waking up! I sleep very deeply after meditating and have many dreams throughout the night. Yet, in the morning I don't remember any of the dreams and wake up exhausted.

I used to be able to remember all of my dreams and wake up completely refreshed. Ever since I had a Kundalini Energy awakening about three weeks ago, my meditation has changed (I now feel a lot of energy when I meditate) and my sleeping behavior has changed. I am curious to find out what others post about this and how meditation before going to bed is or has affected them. Thank you for starting this thread!

All the best to you and yours,

Sonia Gallagher
My Meditation Garden

Interesting! I have mediated before bed with positive results. I really want to give you a thoughtful answer, but I can only speculate. I know that sound sleep usually requires quieting the mind, which can be mirrored with meditation. Perhaps during your mediation, you are keeping yourself alert while quieting your mind - focusing on breath (whatever your method might be). Perhaps when you are finished with mediation and go to sleep, you are still in a mindfulness mode - remaining alert despite quieting your mind.
-Not sure what to suggest to counteract the effects of meditation on your sleep. Have you tried progressive relaxation? It is a mindfulness technique which requires you to tense up a part of your body, focus your energy there, and then relax that area. You then let your attention progress to every area of your body. This could help you prepare for sleep by physically arousing then relaxing each part of your body. It could be that changing up the type of mediation could have a better effect on you. Let me know how it goes. I'm very curious.
-Erin