From Worried To Sleepy

In this 25 minute sleep intentioned meditation it's assumed you are frustrated or worried, possibly about how much sleep you may still get, and you are given ample time and suggestions for switching the mind into a relaxed state to either fall asleep on your own or stay in a relaxed, rejuvenating state for as long as possible.

Transcript

Another sleep meditation.

This sleep meditation is supposed to help you from an aggravated place to sleep.

So I'll start off meeting your energy with a bit of aggravation of my own.

So it's hard to fall asleep because we're aggravated right now.

Well I'm sure we have each have legitimate things to be aggravated about.

There's a lot of things that don't really make sense in when we think of things in terms of long term and taking care of each other and things that we know really matter.

It doesn't look like the world makes a lot of sense and there's a lot of frustrating things that we're all,

You know,

That we're dealing with in our lives.

So sometimes about two or three in the morning those things get really loud.

And so how I have fallen asleep in the past is what I'd like to share.

That's the first thing is to breathe and to allow the aggravation to be present in your breath.

It can be a frustrated sound.

It can be more like more like a whine.

Or even more like more like what we would think of as,

You know,

Fetching or whining.

It's like,

It can be helpful to tell your family or people you're sleeping near that you might be making some noises.

Maybe even your neighbors need to know.

Say,

By the way,

I'm going to be practicing a meditation in which I do some grunting.

So,

Starts with a bit of exhale and a bit of sound.

And a bit of connection to other people in the world knowing that you are feeling similar things that there is a group of us like that can hold each other's hands and be frustrated together for a moment.

And then we can relax into that knowingness that we're not alone.

That it's okay to be aggravated.

That there's good reasons to be aggravated.

But we still would like to relax and get some sleep.

So,

Take a few moments,

Breathe,

And then consider what it would feel like to relax.

Allow your breath to find a rhythm.

Trust the feelings in your body to guide how deep you inhale and how much you exhale based on what they feel they need.

If your heart is pounding,

Allow it to draw in some breath.

Your gut is tight,

Allow your belly to pull in the air.

We can take a sample of what we're feeling in our bodies.

Look down and allow ourselves to kind of take a sip of everything we're breathing through.

We're going to try to find peace with the parts of our bodies that are feeling really emotional.

Sometimes relaxing can mean withdrawing up into the mind or into the brain to hide from what the body is going through and we can shut down.

But sometimes our bodies are so activated we have to get our bodies in the mood to shut down as well.

We can do this through guiding our mind towards certain practices and beliefs.

And the vibration that changes in the brain,

If we pay attention and give our bodies a chance,

Our bodies can then feel and get on board with the change that's going on in our mind.

So,

If we're in a state of worry,

There's a part of us that's holding on to a fear.

We have to first accept that that part of us is there.

And that it probably has really good reasons for being worried,

If not just past experience being one of its main reasons.

But let's say it's another emotion.

You can substitute it.

If I say worry,

You can say to yourself it's anger or frustration.

But we want to try to somewhat label,

Even if it's a chaos of emotions,

So many emotions we can't feel them all.

We want to just identify that it's emotions we're feeling.

And then allow our body to start to inform our breath and our movement.

We might twitch.

We might want to get up and move around a little bit or pace.

But if we've been laying in bed with this urge and we're going a little stir-crazy,

It's okay to just slide out of the bed onto the floor.

If you have a clean sheet nearby or you have some kind of throw blanket or something,

It would be a good idea to put it on the floor at this time.

You know,

You might fall asleep down here and pull the blanket over you.

It might be a good idea at this time to get anything you need to drink that's going to be near you and just put it near you.

Also,

Something to write with and preferably not your phone to see with.

That would mean like a small flashlight or maybe a candle placed safely above the floor out of the reach of your blanket.

If you have to use your phone,

Put it on airplane mode and you can use the light from the screen or a flashlight.

Make sure you have the night filter turned.

You probably already do to have the red light more at night.

It can also be helpful to have a soft t-shirt or a blindfold,

Something to help block the light out from your eyes.

If you're cold and uncomfortable,

It might be worth putting on something warm,

Cozy.

If you're uncomfortable and hot,

It might be worth altering your clothing situation to get comfortable.

You can allow my breaths to be a cue when to breathe or you can breathe with me or you can breathe on your own.

So as we start to get in touch with what we're feeling and we're allowing our body to guide our breath and our movement,

We can reset our intention that we would like to relax and go to sleep soon.

Maybe we have a long day,

Maybe we have to get up at a certain time,

We have obligations.

If that's the case,

Focus on that time you need to get up.

It's seven o'clock or eight o'clock and realize that that's probably the last possible minute you can wake up.

So let's get realistic about when you're really gonna wake up or start to wake up and when you're gonna get out of bed.

So if 7-10 is when you're really gonna get out of bed,

When you're gonna set your alarm for 650 to press snooze for 20 minutes,

Focus on 650 the first time your alarm is gonna go off.

Now what I want you to do is ask your brain,

Ask the anxious part of it,

The personality that you know is helping run you,

Ask it to wake you up a few minutes before that.

So if your alarm is set for 650,

Ask it to wake you up at 647 or 646.

Then start to get in touch with how much rest am I able to get right now.

If it's only a couple of hours,

That's fine.

You can do some really deep processing and deep relaxation,

Deep meditation for two hours and still be reset quite a bit.

By practicing progressive relaxation,

Deep body relaxation and shutting down the nervous system into rest and digest mode,

We may not get all the sleep we think we need but it meant if we're not sleeping that we have a lot to process.

And so sometimes deep relaxation can be the best possible way to actually process what we're avoiding processing,

Is to relax in the face of this thing rather than being in the fight in our minds.

So with a few deep breaths and an acknowledgement that we may not know exactly what we need in our bodies to process into relaxation from this place.

But from this place of aggravation,

There is a path back to relaxation.

And breathe in knowing that within you there is a road back to being relaxed.

And that somewhere in the universe there's a road back.

And then as you relax,

Your subconscious can tap into the greater wisdom of how to let go and relax,

Become healthy.

And relax into the knowledge that's around you,

Like the knowledge itself is a blanket that can encompass you in transformation.

Now if you can find a place of acceptance that this is emotion you're feeling and that there's good reasons and that many of us are feeling it together.

And as you start to relax,

You can start to tap into your subconscious wisdom.

Now if you're still having a hard time getting out of fight-or-flight mode,

What I want you to do is the following.

If you're not having a hard time getting out of fight-or-flight mode,

Just relax and maybe listen to the advice that's given to someone who it may not apply to you in this moment.

But the advice may serve you in the future.

If you're still feeling a lot of anxiety and in fight and you're having a hard time relaxing,

Maybe you're aggravated at the pace and the tone I'm taking by now.

We're gonna practice using gratitude to shut down fight-or-flight mode because it would seem that the two states can't really exist together.

It's very hard to be grateful for a lion as it's chasing you.

So we're gonna find something really stupid simple to feel grateful for and we're gonna focus on it,

Kind of geek out on it,

Until some of the chemicals of gratitude start to be secreted in our body.

Then we're gonna direct those to the part of us that is on alert and has been on guard because it's been doing a hard work and keeping us safe.

So we're gonna send a little gratitude to it.

And we're gonna practice letting that gratitude soften the place of aggravation and the place that is on alert.

So start with something really simple we're grateful for.

I'm talking about things as simple as a color or a blade of grass or a view of a mountain or the ocean or a memory of a swim or some reaction,

Some moment that you're,

You know,

But don't make it complicated.

If there's,

If it's too complicated it'll take you down the road to the people involved in it.

So you were all,

Some of us are very grateful for our children and yet if we focus on them it's gonna bring us into a bigger story about things that might not,

We might not be grateful for.

So in this moment it's important to practice being grateful for something really simple,

Really simplistic.

The taste of some food,

Something that is a simple sensory experience,

The warmth of the Sun,

The color of the moon,

The color of a sky at a certain time of day.

One simple thing that you do feel grateful for.

And to fixate on that thing and to tell yourself the words something like,

I am really grateful for that.

I am.

It's like really true,

I actually am grateful for that.

And then as you start to feel a little bit of gratitude for it,

Think about how we're also grateful that we've gotten this far in life and that whatever it is that's keeping us up right now is a pattern of us that has also kept us quite safe for a long time or has tried to.

It's tried really hard to.

So now to also just have a moment of gratitude for all the hard work that we've put in.

Now that we're in a place of gratitude,

What else are we grateful for?

And then go back to the thing that's really beautiful that we're grateful for as well.

The color,

The wind,

Whatever it is.

And as we breathe,

Try to place our body out in a place in nature,

In our minds that has this thing that we're grateful for.

Take yourself out and imagine what the laying in the grass would feel like or the sun on your body would,

How it would warm you.

Or if it's a color,

Imagine the color surrounding you.

Maybe it's a rainbow of colors.

Maybe it is a rainbow that you're grateful for.

You can allow yourself to bathe your imagination,

Your body,

And just try to feel and breathe as if you are there.

Now take a moment to remember your bed is under you or the floor is under you or you're walking in that place.

Connect that place to where you are now physically.

Allow yourself to feel relaxed in the room you're in because you're also in your mind in this place,

In nature.

Or for some people it might be in outer space,

Which is nature.

Okay.

Now I'm gonna leave you to play with being relaxed between there and here.

Write anything you need to down and go back to this process.

If you need to,

Listen to this again,

Just knowing that the intention is to bring some awareness and gratitude into the parts of us that are fighting and to spend time out of the fight and in gratitude as much as possible and to relax in the moment.

To just be in this space.

Get comfortable,

Pillows,

Do whatever you need to pass the time.

Just be in this space.

And I'm gonna leave you to play with being relaxed between there and here.

To just be in this space.

Get comfortable,

Pillows,

Do whatever you need to pad yourself and to allow yourself to fall asleep.

Sleep well.

Reviews

Loved it, really helpful for sleep and reframing the process of being awake