Whenever you have flown over several time zones you will feel the effects of jetlag more or less severe. You feel fatigued, sleepy, less alert and may have difficulties with your digestion.
Your circadian rhythm has been misaligned with your physical environment – your body is thinking it’s in a different time which will also affect your food intake. While you can do a few things to lessen the effects of jetlag, you need to allow time for your body and internal clock to adjust to the new time zone. After all, we are not machines that can be easily programmed.
So how can we ground ourselves, digest the impressions and stay connected to where we are right now?
My Yoga practice really helped me here- it stretches out the tired limbs and release some sore and blocked areas in my body. The physical aspect of the practice invites me to sense and feel the ground underneath which grounds me. Sitting in silence and allowing all those accumulated impressions to be digested is also a valuable tool and brings calm into a scattered mind.
My first aid pose after a long-distance flight is Viparita Karani: legs up the wall pose.
The benefits of this nourishing pose are manifold, for our purpose here I only list a few:
relieves swollen ankles, calves and varicose veins
restores tired feet and legs
deeply relaxing pose that calms the nervous system
improves digestion.
You can do this in any hotel room on the floor, place a cushion underneath your sacrum if you like. Once the legs are up, circle the ankles, then point the toes & flex the feet. Feel the weight of the body descending.
Stay with legs resting up against the wall for a couple of moments, closing the eyes, tuning in with your breath.
Viparita Karani pose
There are so many more poses that help alleviate your body after a long-haul flight and lovely sequences on YouTube that you can try.
If you feel tired and sluggish, I can highly recommend a Yoga Nidra practice as a wonderful way to restore. Quite often we cannot sleep when we are supposed to as our body is still awake, so using Yoga Nidra can help to find relaxation and rejuvenation- give it a go!
It is a guided form of meditation where you are taken on a journey through the layers of the body (called koshas in Sanskrit), thereby inducing the relaxation response and dropping beyond the thinking mind. Yoga Nidra is used for many therapeutic applications and insomnia.
More tips to alleviate the effects of Jetlag:
Adjust your bedtime by one or maybe two hours each night before you leave on a big trip. This way you are coming closer to the intended time zone that you travel to
Expose yourself to daylight, preferably sun light. First of all it tells your brain its daytime. And it will induce the production of sleep-inducing hormone melatonin in your pineal gland, needed to get sleepy when its downtime. Studies suggest that without your daily dose of sun exposure, you do not produce optimal levels of melatonin!
Move your body by walking out in daylight, breathing fresh air and use your Yoga/Pilates/whatever practice to stretch out heavy limbs and get the blood flowing
Meditate so your mind gets a break and can digest your impressions.
I hope you find your rhythm soon.
Look after yourself and be well :-)
Simone