Sleep and meditation

[sleep]

I've heard of anecdotal experience and looked at a couple of studies that seem to suggest that a frequent meditation practice will shorten sleep proportional to the time you meditate more or less. I would like to know if this has been the experience for you guys who have a frequent meditation here. Some gurus suggest that this is because meditation is rest, so you have less of a need for rest in the form of sleep.

Also would like to know about other ways meditation has affected your sleep; personally it helps me with insomnia if I meditate shortly before sleep as I have a more quiet mind.

[flume]

Yes I heard similar stories and experienced something like that as well. When I spend my days in mostly meditative practices (playing instruments, gardening, hiking, etc.) I sleep very lightly and I stay much more aware during sleep and while dreaming. No matter how much I physically move, I find that the body actually needs very little rest. It does need relaxation, but you don't need to sleep for that.

When I make it a practice to connect to my breath throughout the day and consciously relax my body as often as I can, I find that I don't get exhausted/ drained/ overwhelmed at all, no matter the activities.

Technology, stress and overstimulating the senses have the opposite effect. I need a ton of sleep then and it feels like I "black out" when I go to bed.

A calmer mind quite literally slows down time, so less ravenous thoughts burn less fuel, you preserve more energy and don't need to recharge as much. Makes sense to me

[Villager Albert]

I used to meditate for couple of hours a day when the quarantine started but it didn't make me sleep any better and I had to sleep for just as many hours as usual. Maybe that's because I did challenging types of meditation, if it makes you relax it can definitely decrease your need for sleep. Either way, you will notice how your body reacts and you wanna listen to your body.