Body Scan For Sleep

Free your mind from the grasping habit and let your body sink into bed through this guided body-scan meditation for sleep. After the first 30 minutes, six hours of silence follow, till the sound of the waking-up bell.
Cat photo by Kate Stone Matheson on Unsplash

Transcript

Welcome to this guided sleep meditation. If you are not in bed already, You can start this practice also sitting or lying down on the couch, On the sofa or on the ground, Before going to bed, So that your mind recognizes lying in bed as the time to actually sleep. If you are already in bed, You can keep relaxing from there and maybe at some point just move your body when you decide that you are falling into sleep, So that again give a precise sign to the mind that now we are totally letting go and simply sleep. So you may start simply feeling the body, Maybe placing one hand on the abdomen, The other on the chest, Feeling the movement of the body with the breathing, This little wave in the chest, In the abdomen, Rising, Falling, And you might feel the buttocks pressing against the surface where you are sitting or lying down. Feel the contact of the body with the surface, Maybe the back of the legs, The sensations in the feet. You might feel the back from the base of the spine, Up till the top of the head, The shoulders are relaxed, Soft, The arms, The hands are soft, Relaxed, All the muscles in the body slowly relax, Breathing in and breathing out. Slowly let the body simply relax, The arms lying on the sides, And every time I breathe out, I can relax a little more. I can let go a little more. There is nothing to grasp now, Nothing to achieve, So we can let go that impulse that we usually have to understand to hold on to. We will have time tomorrow. Now we are about to go to sleep, So we don't need to run after thoughts, Worries, Meanings. We are simply being, Letting space to simple awareness, Knowing the in-breath, Feeling the out-breath, Letting whatever is here to simply be, Nothing to grasp, Nothing to push away. We are simply knowing, Knowing what is here in this huge, Vast space of awareness, And breathing out. And if I realize that I am tensing up, Maybe there are tensions in the body, In the mind, Breathing out, I simply relax, Let go. And go back to simply feeling the breathing. And we can do a little body scan, Starting from the top of the head. We are now shifting the attention from the breathing to the top of the head. And then we can feel the forehead, Relaxing the space between the eyebrows, And then the eyes, The eyelids. There is nothing to watch now, Nothing to understand, So we can relax, All those little muscles around the eyes can relax, Let go. And we can feel the nose, The tip of the nose, The nostrils, Maybe we can feel the air coming in and out of the nostrils as we are breathing. We can feel the cheeks, The upper lip, The bottom lip, We can feel the mouth, The tongue is loose, Soft, Relaxed. The feet, The gums, We can feel the jaw, Relaxed, Soft, The chin, The throat, The neck. And we can move down one arm, Feeling the shoulder, The upper arm, The elbow, The wrist, The hand, The palm of the hand. Feel the sensations that are here now, In the palm of the hand, Maybe vibrations, Tingling, Whatever is here, I simply acknowledge it. And I can feel the fingers, The thumb, The bottom of the thumb, The tip of the thumb. And so with every finger, From the bottom to the top, To the little finger. And I can feel the other hand, Maybe the hands are touching each other, Or they are touching the surface where I am sitting or lying down. Let's feel then this surface, With the palm of the hand, The back of the hand, And then every finger, Starting from the thumb, The bottom of the thumb, The tip of the thumb. And finger by finger, Feel the little finger. And then we move up from the hand to the wrist, The lower part of the arm, The elbow, The upper part of the arm, The shoulder. And now we can feel both the shoulders, The arms, The hands. Now through the back, From the neck, Down the back torso, Till the lower part of the back. And we may feel the chest expanding, Contracting with the breathing. And let's see where we can feel the chest, Even at the back, And in the front, And on the sides. And we can feel the abdomen as well, Expanding, Contracting, In the back, In the front, On the sides, On the hips. And we can feel the buttocks, Pressing against the surface where we are, And the legs, The thighs, Going down one leg, The back of the thigh. The front of the thigh, The sides of the thigh, And we can feel the knee, The lower part of the leg, The calf. The ankle, First one foot, The bottom, The sole of the foot, The back, The toes. And then the other foot, Maybe touching the ground, Or touching the other leg. We can feel these sensations in this foot. And then we go up the other leg, From the ankle, The calf, The lower part of the leg, The thigh, The back of the thigh. The front of the thigh, The sides of the thigh, And now we can feel the two legs. And going up, We can feel the entire body, From the tip of the toes, Till the top of the head. Breathing in, And breathing out. And we're letting the body relax. Maybe we can feel it as heavy, Warm. There's nowhere to go right now. Nothing to achieve. Nothing to push away. We're simply letting the space of awareness be as wide as it can be. So that we can simply be with what is here. Breathing in, And breathing out. Maybe there is an unpleasant experience right now. Restlessness, Irritation, Anxiety. Whatever surfaces, We're simply acknowledging it. Breathing in, We're letting everything be the way it is. There's nothing to push away. We're simply acknowledging what is here. Letting it surface, And then go away. Any process, Physical or mental, Appears. Maybe it stays for a while, It changes, It moves. But then it goes away. If we don't grasp it, If we don't get attached, Identified with these transitory states of the body and the mind, A thought, An emotion, A sensation arrives, And then disappears, Goes away. Like clouds passing by into the sky of awareness. Breathing in, And breathing out. We're letting everything flow. And letting go, The impulse to grasp or to push away an experience. Maybe there is a pleasant experience right now. Some warmth, Lightness. Tranquility, Peace. In the same way, We're simply letting be. There's nothing to grasp, Nothing to achieve. We're simply letting everything be, Just the way it is. Breathing in, And breathing out. And when the mind is spacious, The body is relaxed. If we are on a chair, We can now reach for the bed. If we are in bed, We can choose now. Then we change the posture, We change the position. We're ready now to simply fall asleep. There's nothing to do. Not even relying on someone else's voice. We have reached the point where we can let go of the thinking mind, And simply be. Lying there, Being. Till the mind and the body naturally fall asleep. And we can rest into this natural sleep for the next six hours. Till the sound of the bell. Thank you.