Meditating in bed

if you don't want to fall asleep you can hold one lower arm up (as if holding a book to read). every time you start to fall asleep you arm will fall, waking you back up.

Same problems here. I end up reading, which is not a good thing, but it's a bad and well-entrenched habit. The combination of restlessness and lack of focus is fatal for concentration in my case. I could note all of it if I were diligent, but by bedtime my self-discipline is nil.

I have been playing around with this as well recently. Trying to do a few minutes before sleep and then some when I wake up during the night and first thing when I wake up. I usually sleep on my side, so to meditate in bed I lay on my back with arms to my side or folded across my chest. For some reason this works for me. The moment I roll on my side I am out cold. I will sometimes fall asleep while lying on my back but then start snoring and get a kick or a elbow. Anyhow, noting sometimes works but I am finding that body scanning for some reason suits me in this setting. Still exploring.

I've asked a young Thai monk who runs a small local Thai tempel with another senior monk in my town
(to cater for the rituals & spiritual needs of expatriate Thais, mostly women married to German men)
for some advice regarding my meditation practice.
We couldn't really talk much due to language barriers and his other obligations at that time,
but he recommended to extend my "watching the breath" practice by also doing so when in bed,
as the last thing before falling asleep.

I've found this to be quite valuable,
especially since i now often when waking up at night find myself quickly "watching the breath" again automatically,
it has also helped me to more often find back to that focal point during everyday practice outside of formal sitting.
I have not yet actually dreamt being meditating, but i've heared this also can happen, and is generally taken as an auspicious sign.

I don't have much experience with advanced or complex "noting" practice,
but i assume a more "simple" concentration practice such as watching the rise and fall of the abdomen, or the breath at the tip of the nose,
may be a bit easier to retain for a while when in bed and already tired.
Also regular formal sitting before bedtime can be less strenuous than one may think;
and for all these situations: falling asleep is the most natural thing to happen at that time of the day, and imho nothing to worry about.

Dan wrote: I have been playing around with this as well recently. Trying to do a few minutes before sleep and then some when I wake up during the night and first thing when I wake up. I usually sleep on my side, so to meditate in bed I lay on my back with arms to my side or folded across my chest. For some reason this works for me. The moment I roll on my side I am out cold. I will sometimes fall asleep while lying on my back but then start snoring and get a kick or a elbow. Anyhow, noting sometimes works but I am finding that body scanning for some reason suits me in this setting. Still exploring.

Not to be a tattle-tale, but my husband pulls the same stunt, "meditating" on his back, and when the snoring gets to be too much for me I turn him over. Often he insists that he was awake and meditating the whole time.

My wife and I have the same routine... I'm absolutely sure I'm conscious and aware of the mindstream, but my body is snoring. The thing is I'll "wake up" completely alert, at the slightest touch, or the most quietly slightest wispered word (she used to test me!), as if I was indeed awake the entire time. I always respond as if I'm awake... yet I don't hear myself snoring. Strange. It's become a joke between us.

I recall noticing in several documentary or historical films how people in other times and places often slept "puppy pile" style: everyone in the group shoulder to shoulder in a small area (igloo, tent, yurt, hut, farmhouse, etc.). Even my parents and my in-laws recall sleeping crammed together: all the boys had one room, all the girls another, which often meant 3-5 kids in a bed. I wonder how they dealt with the snorers, kickers, blanket-hoggers, insomniacs, etc?

They were all really, really tired.

I always meditate before going to sleep: if I don't fall asleep, yeah, I get some more meditation time. If I fall asleep, that is good as well. If I really want to meditate instead of sleeping, I sit up very straight in my bed and put in real, intense effort. As if I have a deadline to catch, very firm. If I am truly exhausted (having two dogs, one of them a very old, severely incontinent shepherd dog who wakes me around 4.30 or something), I nod off. But if I’m not dead tired, this helps.

Lost and Found wrote: I always meditate before going to sleep: if I don't fall asleep, yeah, I get some more meditation time. If I fall asleep, that is good as well.

This is may favorite way to easily fall asleep. With an attitude verging on "I hope I don't fall asleep too quickly, I'd like to enjoy some meditation first." Knocks me out much of the time. When it doesn't, sleepy meditation can be interesting.

I have gotten into the habit of waking up in the middle of the night, having a cup of coffee (go figure) and going meditating for 30-40 minutes. For some reason, these meditations are the "deepest" I have. Then I go back to sleep, coffee or no coffee.

So, you drink coffee in order to be awake enough to meditate? LOL, funny!

I remember the first year or so of meditating, it felt like a chore. But now, as you point out, I really like doing it. It's like a party for one person. It's always interesting.

I meditate to sleep all the time...I do short naps in the lazy boy starting with meditation...I usually don't note. I do concentration meditation and rise up the jhanas to third and more often than not fall asleep there before hitting EQ. I wake up and I am usually vibrating ala third jhana quite a bit. The intensity of it usually fades fast. I figure this is some free practice time while sleeping and try to do it a lot.
Since meditating asleep I tend to move into the reclining Buddha pose in my sleep with my hand propping up my head on my side. I sometimes wake up in this pose....some times my wife wakes up and pushes me back onto my back as she finds it somewhat disconcerting.
During retreat I fell asleep and continued to be aware and meditating while a dream played out with me just being aware of it but not caught in it. That was a cool experience. It only happened once.

I meditate in bed everynight - usually after sitting, I then go to bed and continue till sleep getting into whatever jhana suits (usually 4th) and also do Metta (usually starting with metta to then get into 4th jhana or whichever one suits my level of concentration and then working through them). I also wake up in the middle of the night routinely and use that hour or 2 or more to meditate as well - sometimes just stillness, watching thoughts, watching breath and/or jhanas. I have been doing that pretty much since starting practice - a good use of time and if sleep occurs, I usually wake up very calm and pick up where I left off. Was very useful in developing momentum. It used to be pretty disciplined, but now more casual as the searching and drive are not there anymore.