Can Yoga Help You Sleep Better?
Wind Down, Sleep Easier

There is a particular kind of tiredness where the body is ready for bed and the mind absolutely is not. You lie down, and instead of drifting off you find yourself rehearsing tomorrow, replaying a conversation, or doing arithmetic about how many hours of sleep you can still get if you fall asleep right now.

A short, slow yoga practice before bed will not switch that off like a light. What many people find is that it gives the evening a shape - a clear signal that the day is finishing - and that the shape itself is what helps.

Why the Exhale Does the Heavy Lifting

If you only take one thing from this article, make it this: let the out-breath be a little longer than the in-breath. Breathe in for four, out for six. You do not need a pose, a mat, or even to get out of bed. It is the simplest lever available for helping the body settle, and it is the reason a slow practice feels different from a stretch session.

Poses That Suit Bedtime

Everything here can be done on a bed, which removes the main excuse for skipping it. Keep the lights low and move slowly - the aim is to do less rather than more.

• Seated forward fold — a slow, quiet fold that naturally turns your attention inward.
• Butterfly fold — releases the hips, where a surprising amount of the day collects.
• Reclined twist — eases the back and shoulders while you are already lying down.
• Legs up the wall — the classic. Three minutes here asks nothing of you at all.
• Lying still — and if you drift off, that is rather the point.

And the Ones to Save for Morning

This is where a lot of well-intentioned evening practice goes wrong. Strong backbends, fast flows, and anything that gets you warm and breathing hard are genuinely good for you - just not in the hour before bed. They are designed to wake the body up, and they are very effective at it. Save Vinyasa for the morning and let the evening be slow.

Make It Almost Too Easy

The routine that helps is the one you actually do on a night when you are exhausted and slightly fed up. So make it small. Two poses and a few slow breaths, done most nights, will serve you far better than a twenty-minute sequence you manage twice. Support everything generously with cushions - if you are working to hold a shape, you are not relaxing in it. And practise on the easy nights too, so it is familiar on the hard ones.