Singer's Wellness: Sleep!

There is no question it can be challenging to get enough sleep in today's world. Our schedules as performers may keep us from getting to bed at a decent hour (hello, late rehearsal after working at multiple jobs all day to make ends meet). Sometimes we have things like sleep apnea that keep sleep from being high quality and many, many, many of us suffer from insomnia.

Image courtesy of David Castillo Dominici/ FreeDigitalPhotos.net

However, the importance of sleep can not be underestimated. Adequate sleep helps to regulate our endocrine system (hormones), boosts immune system function, keeps fat accumulation at bay, staves off depression and keeps our hearts healthy. We have fewer accidents and work-related injuries when we are well rested. In terms of our voices, cellular repair happens while we sleep. When you've exercised your voice, it needs time to repair itself and time to renew the layer of mucous that covers the top of the vocal cords (this layer serves, in part, as protection to the cords). Sleep is a big part of what helps that to happen.

A survey conducted by Keith Saxon and Pamela Harvey (reported in Vocal Health and Pedagogy: Advanced Assessment and Treatment, Vol. II) looked at a small sampling of singers and found that the most frequently reported problem by singers in nonperformance times is staying asleep (44% indicated this was a problem). During performance time 96% indicated they didn't get enough sleep and the most frequently experienced problem was falling asleep. This same group listed the following as the results of poor sleep:

• trouble with breath support, 
• reduced vocal endurance, 
• huskiness/roughness of the voice
• needed more time to warm up

Do those sound familiar to you? Are you skating by on 6 hours a night when you know that isn't enough sleep, but you have trouble staying asleep and when you're in performance mode, trouble falling asleep?

Yoga can help! I have dealt with my fair share of trouble sleeping both in terms of staying asleep and in terms of falling asleep after a late rehearsal or performance. Here are some tips from yoga that have helped me immensely:

Yoga journal lists these poses as having a theraputic focus of dealing with insomnia. In general, forward bends will help relax you because they encourage a longer exhale and a longer exhale triggers the relaxation response (in other words it turns off the adrenaline that got you through the concert!). I would add the restorative pose of legs up the wall as one that settles the body and mind. Simply sitting or lying down and breathing consciously to extend your exhale will help too, if yoga poses aren't your thing.

The practice of Yoga Nidra, which means yogic sleep, has been enormously helpful to me. I have a recording on my ipod and iphone and if I am awake in the night, I pop in my ear buds, lie on my back in bed and turn it on. I'll be honest, if I'm really stressed out, sometimes it takes listening to it two times to get me to go back to sleep, but it is hugely helpful. There are lots of yoga nidra options out there, but the one I use is from the CD Relax into Greatness by Rod Stryker. I've been fortunate to do a few weekend intensives with him as part of my teacher training and his genius is not to be missed!