When I was studying my Master’s of Performance and Culture and living in East London, I experienced a very intense yet (thank goodness) short period of insomnia. Though it was then that I truly started to practice, research and appreciate the infallible, multilayered Yoga Nidra, I must confess it was not fun. However, I have discovered that a lot of writers have suffered from insomnia, and have written about it, surprisingly finding the funny side of it:

Nighttime is really the best time to work. All the ideas are there to be yours because everyone else is asleep. Catherine O’Hara

How do people go to sleep? I am afraid I’ve lost the knack. Dorothy Parker

The average, healthy, well-adjusted adult gets up at seven-thirty in the morning feeling just plain terrible. Jean Kerr

The day is my enemy, the night my friend, for I’m always so alone till the day draws to an end Ella Fitzgerald

I would like to offer a tip to beat insomnia. Begin to observe the natural flow of breath, as best you can. Once you settle the breath begin to count your breaths from 27 downwards to 0. Inhalation an exhalation count as one breath. You can say to yourself the body is breathing in 27, the body is breathing out, and so on and so forth. You can also count from 100 downwards to 0, depending on how you feel. When you lose count go back to 27 or 100. I had a friend who happened to have a book by  Swami Satyananda at his home in Norway and I was lucky enough to read this piece of advice on beating insomnia.