Insomnia is defined as being a sleep disorder in which you have trouble either falling and/or staying asleep, and it affects many people at some point or another in their lifetime.
While you may resort to the use of sleeping pills, it is always best to try to get to the root of the problem since these medications could have some side effects and are somewhat toxic to the liver, as all medications are.
When I was seeing patients with my teacher and mentor Vaidya Rama Kant Mishra, he made over 500 formulas based on all the health problems we were seeing in our patients. He told me he was going to make a lot of remedies for insomnia since it is a difficult problem to overcome. The reason it can be difficult to treat is because there are so many reasons for the insomnia, some of which are caused by the patient’s daily routine, and some of which may involve teaching the patient how to balance their Vata, Pitta and Kapha throughout the day, which is not always easy to do, especially if the patient has an extremely busy lifestyle.
So let’s look at some of the imbalances that can cause insomnia so we can try and have a better night’s rest. Besides a healthy diet, exercise and getting out in the sunshine, a good night’s sleep is one of the most important factors to create radiant health. And it is through good quality uninterrupted sleep that the body can truly heal itself at a deep level.
First, it is important that you keep your hormone levels balanced. It’s normal for your glands to gradually produce less hormones with age, but your skin actually takes over and makes up for the lost hormones, if you give it a drink of oil several days a week. That’s why Ayurveda has always been recommending a daily oil massage, throughout life, but especially in what is known as the Vata stage of life, where the elements of Vata, which is quick, dry, light and rough become more pronounced in one’s physiology.
Think about it this way: in the Vata stage of life we literally dry up. Our hormones, which are made out of cholesterol and have a lubricating action in our bodies become less, therefore creating more Vata. So if you put oil on your skin, which is the largest organ in the body, it can go to work for you and not only help you produce more hormones, but also help you to overcome this drying tendency we experience later in life, as our mouth, eyes, vaginal tract and sinus passages dry out, and our joints become painful as they also lose their lubrication.
So also think about this: a daily oil massage — which means you rub oil on the skin, leave it on for 20 minutes and then wash it off — not only helps your hormone production, which alone can help insomnia, but it balances this dryness or Vata.
It has been said in the ancient texts that difficulty falling asleep is due to high Vata. So the oil massages can counteract the Vata, making you less dry and more unctuous, in addition to eating a diet with good fats, such as boiled whole cow’s or goat’s milk, ghee, olive oil, avocados, nuts and seeds.
But here’s the other thing — you have to learn how to keep your Vata balanced as you go through the day, because if it becomes aggravated it will be difficult to fall asleep that night. The Western way of saying this is that if you become too revved up during the day, releasing cortisol, adrenaline and epinephrine, by rushing through the day, having one too many long telephone conversations, becoming hyper or agitated, talking fast, moving fast, then these stress hormones that you produce during the day will prevent you from falling asleep at night.
And also remember that since Vata is light, dry and cold, the diet must be the opposite: heavy, unctuous and warm. Which means warm cooked foods using the high quality fats just mentioned over low fat diets with lots of salads, cold smoothies and raw vegetables. Keep in mind that lightness is one of the properties of Vata, so this means that if your diet is too light your Vata will go high and your sleep will become light and interrupted.
We use several types of specific oils for daily oil massage in my practice, but in general if your skin is fair and light try using almond oil in the cooler months and coconut oil in the summer months. If your skin is more dark toned you could probably tolerate sesame oil for your oil massages.
Many people take melatonin, a hormone that your pineal gland produces which helps you to become sleepy and fall asleep. We actually don’t recommend the use of melatonin, even though it may sound like a more natural way to overcome the problem.
In general you don’t want to take a hormone that your body already produces as your own gland will then have no need to make it now, so it will shut down its production of the hormone, making your original problem even more difficult to resolve. Many people who take melatonin for sleep describe a long period of time weaning off it as they try to encourage their own pineal gland to make it again.
When it’s dark melatonin is slowly released telling your body it’s time to go to sleep. So, to maximize the amount of melatonin to be released at night it is good to increase your bright light exposure during the day, especially if you can walk in the early morning sun for about a half hour each day. But then at night, don’t read your phone once you get in bed. The blue light from the phone will trick your pineal gland into thinking it’s daytime, which will then decrease the melatonin output causing you to stay awake since your body now thinks it’s daytime.
Common sense also tells you that if you have a difficult time falling asleep at night you should totally avoid caffeine. Which means avoid both coffee and tea, as well as chocolate and cacao. Even green tea contains some caffeine.
It’s also good to understand that Vata is the element of space and air, so again, too much of that very light element gives us light sleep. But Kapha is the element of earth and water, which means it’s found outside. So one of the very best antidotes for high Vata is to get outside during the day, especially to get onto the beach or for a walk in nature to immerse your body in the calming slow kapha elements. Remember, while Vata is quick, light and dry, Kapha is slow, heavy and unctuous, the exact opposite qualities of Vata. Almost everyone knows how much better their sleep is after being out in the sunshine and fresh air all day.
And if hormonal issues are creating your insomnia, then try the various herbal formulas Ayurveda offers to help you make your own hormones. We don’t recommend the use of the synthetic hormones as they have been known to cause heart disease and breast cancer.
Keep in mind too that if progesterone is low, then that might cause insomnia as well. We have many herbs in Ayurveda to help you increase your progesterone levels. This is a huge problem I encounter in many of the women in my practice because there are many reasons during a lifetime which will cause progesterone to go low. One of the reasons is if your thyroid is low, which is at epidemic levels not only in the United States, but around the world. Other reasons could be from the cortisol you release during the day when under stress and also if you are on the birth control pill. So just these three factors alone, low thyroid, high stress and birth control pill use can cause a tremendous amount of the insomnia we see by causing low progesterone levels.
Now, the ancient texts also said that if Pitta, the element of fire and water, goes high, then it will wake you up at night once you have fallen asleep. So this means you must first learn what Pitta is and how to counteract it. The liver is a pitta organ, home to five digestive fires to extract the 5 elements from the food you eat: space, air, fire, water and earth. So you must always keep the flames of the liver satisfied with some food to burn up. Therefore you should never skip or delay meals. If you do, the liver will become agitated looking for food to digest, and if you continually skip and delay meals the heat from the liver will spill out Ito the whole body waking you up in the middle of the night. This is why it is good to avoid onions and garlic, which also heat up the liver.
Fortunately, in Ayurveda we have many foods, herbs and spices to cool the heat in the liver, giving relief to those who tend to wake up at night and not be able to fall back to sleep.
Anger can flare up the heat in the liver and vice versa, which means that if your liver gets too hot you could become angry, which is what PMS is — the liver overheats right before the menstrual cycle, which is why many women become angry during that time. But once the cycle is over the blood cools back down and the anger goes away.
Drinking a warm cup of milk, if you aren’t lactose intolerant, is one of the best sleep-inducing aids, since it is so calming and Vata-pacifying.
White poppy seeds are famous for inducing deep sleep. Here’s a recipe for insomnia from my book, Healing the Thyroid With Ayurveda. It’s called “Poppy Seed Chutney.”
Mix 1 tsp of white poppy seeds with 1 tsp of coconut (shredded fresh coconut is best, but dried is fine). Melt 1/2 tsp of ghee in a small pan over a medium low heat until it becomes clear, then add a pinch each of ground cumin and ground turmeric. Remove from the heat immediately, add to the poppy seed mixture and mix well. Let stand for 5 minutes, then add a pinch of salt and eat this right before going to bed.
It’s not recommended that you use this recipe if you have to get your urine tested for drugs as the poppy seeds contain small quantities of psychoactive opiates, primarily morphine, which can be detected in the urine up to 48 hours after the ingestion of poppy seeds.
Magnesium is also a good to induce sleep. We recommend the use of magnesium chloride and give it transdermally through the skin, since taking it orally might induce diarrhea. We have various versions of magnesium chloride in the forms of oils, creams, lotions and baths for our patients to use to prevent both insomnia and a whole host of other problems which can happen when magnesium goes low.
And last but not least, we have a huge arsenal of herbs to use for treating insomnia. For example, we use Jatamansi, which is an herb that balances the neurotransmitters in the brain for better quality sleep. We give Jatamansi in several different forms, depending on each person’s unique physiology. But again, we have many other formulas both based on this herb as well as many others to help insure a good night’s rest.
So I hope you have benefited from the knowledge given here and understand that it’s best to treat insomnia by looking at all the various underlying reasons which cause it and THEN use the herbs to help you sleep. If you just resort to using the herbs and ignore all the underlying problems which are causing it in the first place your results will be minimal and somewhat ineffective.
Thank you.