I have regular cycles with insomnia. I'll have a bad week and then a good one. At first I thought it was stress, but when i started paying attention, i realized that on weeks i worked out regularly i slept better. But then my insomnia came back. I refuse to take pills (although i tried melatonin which kind of worked but works less and less over time). I was still working out (but not doing yoga, doing cardio) and i was puzzled.

I continued to pay attention as i returned to my previous workout with at least 20 minutes of low impact, flowing yoga per day, and i slept like a rock. Then, when I got busy, the yoga would fall off a day here and a day there, and those nights I'd sleep poorly.

I'm 100% convinced that yoga works for me. And I only need to do about 20 minutes of it. I do it at home using dvds, podcasts etc so it's cheap. I love it, I'm so glad that I've finally found something I know works.

My theory is that through the regular deep breathing that is in time with the fluid movements yoga actually stimulates an even flow of energy throughout the body. The stretching in opposing directions opens up the pools of energy that lay dormant in different areas of your body and are released into the overall even flow. Sounds cheesy - but that's what it feels like.