I seriously wish I’d learnt about meditation years ago. That is to say, if I’d know then what I know now about simple meditation techniques to help my son get to sleep, then I’m pretty confident that I wouldn’t have spent all that time sat by my son’s bed willing him to sleep.
But, before I delve into the “best sleep meditation tool for kids” I want to share with you what a research review says about meditation and sleep.
According to a research review in 2012, Meditation and Its Regulatory Role on Sleep noted and concluded the following:
By considering the role of melatonin* in sleep maintenance, it might be concluded that meditation practices enhance melatonin levels and hence the quality of sleep.
It has been proposed that sleep is an autoregulatory global phenomenon (Kumar, 2010). It’s also true that meditation influences sleep and its functions. It appears that various components of sleep generating mechanisms can be altered with meditation. Meditation, with its global effects on body and brain functions, helps to establish a body and mind harmony. Thus meditation practices as an autoregulatory integrated global phenomenon opens a wider scope for understanding the unique aspects of human sleep and consciousness.
Meditation and Its Regulatory Role on Sleep Ravindra P. Nagendra, Nirmala Maruthai, and Bindu M. Kutty,
2012 research
*sleep hormone
However, a nighttime meditation isn’t just about getting your kids to go to sleep as quickly as possible. It’s about them having a good nights sleep so the body has time to repair itself. If your child has challenging sleeping patterns then this will lead to stress, bedwetting, unable to focus, and general fatigue.
In an article on the Johns Hopkins All Children’s Hospital website, Medical Director of Pediatric and Adolescent Medicine Clinic, Rachel Dawkins, M.D., talks about the importance of sleep for kids:
Studies have shown that kids who regularly get an adequate amount of sleep have improved attention, behavior, learning, memory, and overall mental and physical health. Not getting enough sleep can lead to high blood pressure, obesity and even depression.
Rachel Dawkins, M.D. Johns Hopkins All Children’s Hospital
Calming and Relaxing Techniques
If your child has had an intense few hours before bed, they’re tired because of all that running around. You hope as soon as their head touches the pillow, they will be off in the land of dreams. Unfortunately, this isn’t always the case. Their brains are wired and fired, and they need to calm down.
Simple breathing exercises such as finger breathing or belly breathing can calm children quite quickly. Yoga poses such as the Tree Pose & Child’s Pose are equally suitable for grounding and relaxing. One of my favourites is to ask your child to stand up tall and see if they can imagine their legs are like tree trunks with roots growing out the soles of their feet. The idea of Tree Trunk Legs is that the imagery roots are placed firmly in the earth to keep them grounded.
Now you’ve got your child in a relatively calm state, what next? There are hundreds of different types of meditations and mindfulness activities you can do with them. There are meditation apps, guided meditations on YouTube and podcasts, meditation scripts, meditation music – the choices are vast. It might be a case of trial and error to find your child’s preference. If you don’t like the idea of having a device in the bedroom whilst your child is trying to sleep, an alternative way is for you to guide the meditation yourself.
The Body Scan
My go-to sleep meditation, the one that gets my son off to the land of Zzzzz quicker than he can put his shoes on, is a body scan (a variation of Yoga Nidra). I was, and still am, so impressed with the body scan that I had to share. The premise behind a body scan is to allow the child to focus on different parts of their body. As they focus on their body, it brings their mind to the present letting go of all the thoughts from the day. As the mind and body calm, the brain is triggered into thinking, “Hey, I’m tired, and it’s bedtime. Let’s go to sleep”.
There are different variations to a body scan, so you can adapt it to what feels comfortable with you.
Let’s begin…
- Let your child lay on their back if possible. If they don’t want to be in that position then whatever is the most comfortable.
- Ask them to take a deep breath in, hold it for a count of 2 and breathe out slowly. As they are slowly breathing out, ask them to imagine sinking into the bed. Repeat 3-4 times.
- I usually begin the scan on the right side of the body. My session typically starts like this “notice your right thumb, index finger, middle finger, ring finger and little finger. Notice your palm. Take your attention to the back of your hand, your right wrist…”
- Go through various points of the body in a calm and soft voice. Vary the pace from one point to the next. It doesn’t have to be perfect, as long as they can focus on the different points. For a step by step guide/transcript and tips, click here.
- There isn’t a particular order or right or wrong way; I tend to do right hand/arm, right leg/foot, left hand/arm, left leg/foot, front and back torso, and finally the head. Most of the time I never get past the left side as he’s fallen asleep. There are other times when I have to repeat the scan because he’s been too distracted, but that isn’t very often.
- The most important thing is to be calm, have an open heart and enjoy the moment together.
Let me know in the comments below how you got on. If you’d like to receive up-to-date information, tips, and tools about kids meditation, subscribe to my mailing list here.
Judy 
PEACE | LOVE | KINDNESS
