Creating sleep rituals to signal the body and mind to relax can help encourage better sleep, and recovery and repair.
A very effective ritual can be to drink a cup of calming herbal tea (such as kava-kava, chamomile, lemon balm, and passionflower) These herbs are, by their very nature, calming and relaxing, and have been used for centuries to aid sleep. The ‘act’ of making a cup of tea also becomes a pattern in which you are telling the body that it is time to stop and ‘wind-down’. This behaviour then becomes associated with relaxation over time.
So, create a ritual of stopping, calming, relaxing, and breathing, and making a cup of tea when you are ready to wind down for bed.
Remember that if you have any medical conditions, or are taking any medication, check with a qualified herbalist or naturopath to make sure you are using something appropriate to your condition.
Try a calming tea to help you sleep
From Carb-Appropriate 101 by Cliff Harvey PhD
Carb-Appropriate 101 gives you 101 daily tips to help you achieve the energy, health & performance you deserve. It includes daily tips for nutrition, movement, exercise, meditation, mindfulness, sleep, stress-reduction, and more! These tips are some of the themes that Cliff has written and spoken about over his decades in practice, in ‘bite-sized’ mini-articles.
Read the book from cover-to-cover, applying a tip a day, or simply open the book to any page to find a valuable health and performance tip to help you feel and perform at your very best.
