Lincoln Stoller

The Path To Sleep, Exercises for an Ancient Skill Lincoln Stoller

If you have trouble falling asleep, staying asleep, or waking up rested, this book will teach you what sleep is all about. We do not intuitively know how to sleep and our doctors can't tell us. Like three blind mice describing an elephant, sleep professionals will describe and diagnose sleep issues as dysfunctions. Sleep problems are a literal wake-up call, an opportunity to repair one's life. You'll never a get the story straight unless you understand what your sleep issues are telling you. Sleep is not just chemical, neurological, mechanical, or psychological, it is all of these combined. Sleep is a whole-body, psycho-somatic experience. Everything that's blocking sleep, or causing distress around sleep, is an opportunity to deeply encounter and repair the body's function. Sleep is a process of whole-body-mind repair and invigoration. The Path To Sleep consists of written and spoken words. It contains twenty-four guided visualizations--MP3 audio files on the internet-that carry you in thought, image, rhythm, and frequency into other states of mind. These are not simply different ideas or perspectives, they are different realities. We are different people in these different states. Many people--especially those who have trouble sleeping--do not, are rarely, or cannot even imagine being someone other than who they are. This inflexibility is why you're stuck; you'll find the training in this book essential. The Path To Sleep, and the workshops built around it, focus on five aspects of sleep, most of which are overlooked, misunderstood, or simply ignored. They are:
- control of the rhythms of mind and body,
- discovery and resolution of the issues that underlie stress,
- day-time coping habits that undermine sleep,
- ability to understand, participate, and aid the subconscious,
- building a working relationship with dreams.

"This book-it is actually a training tool-views sleep as an activity controlled by your higher mind. Your higher mind is an elusive thing that resides in all things connected to you, sometimes conscious and cerebral, but more often chthonic, celestial, implicate, or ancestral. It is always present and listening, but hears many voices besides your own. Many you would not recognize as having any language at all, such as your body.

"This book speaks to your higher mind, and that's why it should be read to you. Do not struggle to understand the material in this book and-to a large extent-I do not want you to understand it.

"This work trains your subconscious. You must be able to lose consciousness in it. Your consciousness exists to orient you, but it cannot perform healing. The limitations of your understanding are the sources of your problem; you cannot fix these limitations, you must move beyond them.

"Your consciousness has brought you to this book, but it cannot learn what is in it. This book is best understood when you are in a trance state and your conscious mind is relieved. In this state your sensible mind is free to leave, and you will not mind this book, which works to avoid making sense.

"Those who need this book the most may find it makes no sense. In that case, do not try to understand it, experience it. Experience yourself in terms of rhythm, frequency, and resonance. This is the consciousness you need for sleep." - from the Preface of Path to Sleep