Welcome to this guided meditation to help you fall deeply asleep.
As you lie in your bed,
Bring your awareness to the mattress beneath you,
To the pillow that supports your head,
To the duvet that covers you.
There may be any number of thoughts racing through your mind about the day,
The good things that happened,
The things you'd wish you'd done differently,
The things you know you have to do tomorrow.
But now is the time to let go of all of that.
There is nothing more for you to do tonight other than to relax and enjoy being in your bed.
There are no more demands that can't wait until tomorrow.
All you need to do now is simply relax and let go.
If you find yourself becoming distracted,
Bring yourself back to my voice or to your breath.
Let's just start to notice our breath.
Let's start to notice the ins and the outs of our breath.
Feel the air rushing through your nostrils.
In and out.
In as you keep breathing.
We're going to relax our bodies.
We're going to release any tension.
Release any tension that you're feeling right now that has built up over the day.
So what we'll do is we'll bring our awareness to different body parts.
We'll tense that body part,
Really,
Really tense,
And then we'll relax.
So let's start with the toes.
Spread your toes as wide as you can,
As far as you can.
Feel your muscles tensing.
Feel that tension and relax.
Bring your toes up towards your shins.
Feel that tension,
Feel that muscle,
Feel those muscles contracting and release.
Let's move to the ankles.
Bring your feet up and try and touch your shins with your toes.
Feel the tension building and then relax.
Keep breathing.
Bring your attention to your calves.
Tense your calves.
Tense them as much as you can and then relax.
Moving up to your quads and your hamstrings.
Tense your quads and your hamstrings.
Feel those muscles squeezing all the tension away and relax.
Keep breathing.
Now moving your attention to your buttocks.
Tense,
Tense,
Tense,
Tense your buttocks.
Squeeze them together.
Squeeze and get that tension and release and relax.
Moving your attention to your core.
Squeeze those abs.
Squeeze those abs as if you're posing for a photo shoot.
Tense them and relax.
Release that tension.
Now move to the hands.
Spread those fingers as wide apart as you can.
Feel the tension as you try and reach your thumb and your pinky as far away from each other as you can and relax.
Now bring your fingers into a fist and squeeze.
Squeeze as if you're trying to squeeze a tennis ball.
Squeeze as if you're trying to grind whatever you have in your hand into a powder.
And then release.
Move your attention up to your forearms.
Squeeze those forearms.
Get the tension from your fists all the way up to your elbows and relax.
Now come to your biceps.
Squeeze your biceps together.
Squeeze as hard as you can.
Two more seconds.
And release.
As we move towards our chest and our heart.
Tense your entire chest.
Squeeze those pecs.
Squeeze the muscles in your back and the muscles in your chest together.
And release.
Moving up to the neck.
Tense your neck.
Squeeze your neck muscles.
And release.
And relax.
As we move our attention to our head.
Squeeze your teeth together.
Squeeze your jaw.
Build up that tension.
Feel that tension all around your jaw.
And relax.
And finally,
Squeeze your eyes together.
Screw your eyes up.
And relax.
And keep your eyes shut.
In this state of relaxation,
Bring your awareness once again to your breath.
And I want you to visualize standing at the top of a staircase.
And at the bottom of the staircase is the most beautiful,
Snugly bed that you could possibly imagine.
There's no rush.
There's no rush to get there.
You simply stand at the top of the stairs.
Looking down.
And with every slow breath,
You can take one step down.
As you breathe in,
You breathe out and you take a step down.
So you now have your two feet on the first step down.
And we'll continue.
Breathing in.
And out and stepping down.
As we keep going.
In.
The third step.
And we can count onwards.
In.
And four out.
And in.
And five out.
And in.
And six out.
And in.
And seven out.
And in.
And eight out.
And all you need to do is relax.
Continue to breathe.
In.
And out.
And in.
And ten out.
And out.
And in.
And as you approach the bottom of the steps,
You see this wonderful bed in front of you.
But there's no rush.
Take your time.
And as you crawl into this wonderful bed,
And snuggle up with the duvet,
Keep coming back to the breath.
And keep counting.
As you drift off into relaxation.
Everything is gone.
All that's left is stillness.
And quiet.
Quiet.
All that's left is the breath.
As you drift.
