You really make usa guess a lot by not giving ANY info that would be needed for answering..
What Greg asks is usually necessary info whenever you ask a technical question.
Assuming you are recording something with microphone, your description sounds like a feedback loop. How do you monitor? If you record with a microphone, you must not have any loudspeaker monitoring on. Or do you have a laptop integrated mic that's left on?
The level of the recorded signal is adjusted in the soundcard, SONAR has no role in it.