Magnesium reduces anxiety and relaxes muscles. Because it's involved in energy production as well as muscle relaxation, it's able to energise and calm at the same time. ag-guys.com

It is important to drill good sleep habits. In particular, persons with sleep difficulties should repeat preparatory rituals every night. These include a fixed time for going to bed at the first sign of fatigue so the organism becomes accustomed to a regular hour for retiring. The regular habit of getting into a comfortable sleep position is also important. Most people prefer to lie on one particular side for falling asleep, and they frequently resume the position during the night. Sleep postures are attitudes that have been practiced for decades and have been drummed in through regular repetition. The mechanism that couples getting into the accustomed sleep position and then falling asleep is therefore important as a measure conducive to sleep. Especially when there is a change from familiar surroundings, as occurs for example while traveling, the practice of consistently retaining practiced sleep preparations aid in avoiding the threat of an exogenous disturbance to falling asleep and also helps, overcome a new obstacle to falling asleep. The same time for going to bed, the same position, the same external sleep conditions (in the era of the car, many people even carry their own blankets), the same pre-bedtime habits such as reading, going for a walk, or hearing a little music are all devices for reinforcing and maintaining the sleep-wakefulness mechanism when it is subject to being undermined by external factors. If you are riot immediately successful, just keep in mind that the body manages to get its necessary quantity of sleep and that little or no sleep for a night is not a danger to health. Rest is the most important thing. This statement, of critical importance in autogenic training, can be an important aid if remembered and really understood. The statement, though, is important in two respects. For one thing, rest is the most important aspect of sleep; the second consideration is that if it has been possible to rest, the sleep pacemakers in the brain (pacemaker neurons) can exert their influence on the sleep-wakefulness mechanism and thereby set in motion the organism's active achievement, which is sleep.

The difficulty in adjusting to new surroundings is measurably increased if, as is the case on long plane trips, the biological clock also has to make an adjustment. If so, an adequate period of time should be allotted if at all possible to permit the organism to adjust gradually to the new local time.

As already mentioned, many people have the habit of reading before falling asleep, and it is repeatedly recommended as an aid in falling asleep. Well-intended suggestions of what to read range from the Bible to mystery stories. Mysteries, in fact, are praised as being especially effective as a soporific. And they probably are for normal sleepers, who anyway are not impeded by anything from falling asleep and are usually emotionally stable. Problem sleepers, however, should be careful in their choice of reading material. It should be something cheerful, contemplative, and preferably not exciting. For this reason, travelogues, short biographies, aphorisms, or reading material that can easily be interrupted with the first wave of fatigue are particularly suitable. It should not be such exciting fare that the reader is driven to continue beyond the point of physiological readiness for sleep, and it should not involve his interest to the point that he cannot resist following the plot.

*20\340\2*