Aloha Lynn,
As sleeping is natural meditation, and meditation can be like an extended sleep for the body, you can't go wrong with either.
There may be times when your body needs "Sleep." As you said, listen to it. Even in these situations you could either follow what Master Lin suggests about Sleeping Qigong in the Level one class/course, or start one of his meditations and at the beginning, say in you mind "I will continue this meditations through my sleep, and my channels are open, completely healed."
I tend to put the Small Universe which I've removed the intro and outro, so it's all Ohms and Muahs, on repeat for the night.
I'll have this running in Zaiah's room is he's knocking on the door of a cold, or has some puffiness under the eye telling me he's working with an infection.
This Ohm-Muah Only mix can easily be made with the iTunes application on your Mac or Windows machine.
Much Love,
Shawn
