The Pot In The Ruins: Bedtime Story

This sleep story begins with a woman waking up in a tent in Savannah. She and her friend, camping nearby, decide to explore the area. Their adventure leads them to a river, where they hike and canoe, eventually camping on the opposite bank. The next day, they discover ancient ruins with walls covered in symbols narrating stories of love and collaboration. Touching a mysterious pot in the ruins, they're transported to a bustling village, where a local imparts wisdom about finding passion and curiosity. They experience soaring like eagles above the village before returning to the pot and leaving the ruins. The story concludes with them returning to their starting point, heading home, and drifting into a restful sleep.

Transcript

Okay,

Take a moment to allow yourself to get comfortable and close your eyes and begin to relax.

And as you begin to relax,

I'm just going to tell a story in the background.

And I don't know whether you'll relax deeper to the sound of my words as I tell that story or to the spaces between my words.

And as you listen to this story and relax and drift and dream asleep,

You can just follow along comfortably in your own way.

And one evening,

A woman drifted comfortably asleep in a tent in the middle of a savannah.

And as she drifted comfortably asleep,

She could hear the sounds of animals in the distance outside the tent.

She could see the slight glow of the campfire a little way away from the tent.

It was just burning along as embers,

Making a slight glow outside the tent.

And she could see that glow as it flickered on the sides of the tent.

Just a calming orangey glow.

And the way the breeze made the sides of the tent move and rustle.

And she wrapped herself up in her sleeping bag and felt so calm and peaceful out here in nature as she comfortably drifted asleep.

And then in the morning,

Feeling rested and refreshed,

She awoke.

She unzipped the zip of the tent,

Breathed in that fresh air,

Saw the sun rising,

The blue sky,

Sounds of birds.

Could feel the ground beneath her feet as she stretched and walked from her tent over to a tent the other side of the fire that a friend of hers was in.

And she knocked on the tent,

Making a knocking sound as she did,

Asking if they're awake.

And their friend,

Lively,

Unzipped the tent and poked their head out.

And the two of them prepared some food and sat and ate that food in the morning.

Curious what they were going to do for the day.

And while they sat there,

They began to discuss their plans.

They decided that after they pack away their tents,

That they would get into their jeep and they'd go exploring.

They'd heard that there's a river off in the distance that they can go to.

They thought it could be interesting to hike along the side of the river,

Maybe head into some nearby hills just a few kilometres away.

That they could end up going into those hills,

Perhaps camping,

Overlooking that river,

Overlooking the savannah and maybe exploring what's over the other side of those hills and hiking across the hills perhaps tomorrow.

And so they pack away their tents,

Cover over the fire,

Clear everything away and get in their jeep and start travelling in the direction of the river.

And as they travel,

They can see different animals across the savannah,

See herds,

Birds flying in the sky,

So gracefully against that blue sky,

Just gliding by and hovering.

And some parts of their journey are a bit bouncy and rickety and other parts feel smooth and calm.

And after a short period of time,

They arrive by the river.

They decide to leave the jeep here,

Take their camping gear,

Other bits and pieces,

And hike along the side of the river and a bit further down the river they'll cross over and climb up the hills the other side,

Where they'll camp for the night and maybe go exploring over the other side of the hills in the morning.

So they hike down the side of the river,

Smelling that water as it flows,

Hearing the way it bubbles along,

Enjoying their hike.

And after a while,

It gets harder and harder to walk along the side of the riverbank,

As trees and shrubs get denser and denser.

So they decide that what the best course of action would be,

Would be to inflate their inflatable canoe and both jump in that and use that from this point to start travelling further down the river.

And the river's just calmly bubbling along and they inflate the canoe and they both climb into it,

Feeling it bobbing in the water as they get in.

And having an oar each,

The woman pushes off from the side and they row out to the middle of the river and gently row down the river with gentle strokes,

Just relaxing back in the seats in the canoe,

Occasionally talking to each other,

Not saying much,

Just a little bit from time to time,

While they mainly just travel down that river,

Listening to the sound each time the oar passes through the water,

The sounds around them,

Taking in the sounds of nature,

The warmth of the sun.

As they continue canoeing down the river and as the sun reaches its peak in the sky,

They decide to canoe over to the other side of the river.

They find a bit of bank that they can canoe slightly up onto the shore.

They canoe over,

Canoe slightly up onto the shore.

The woman gets out the canoe first and then her friend gets out second and they drag the canoe up onto the shore.

They get their belongings out of the canoe,

Do they?

Gaze out into the river and watch birds landing on the water,

Some birds diving in the water,

And other wildlife around that river,

Sometimes different animals coming down to drink,

Suddenly appearing out of the overgrowth,

The other side of the river,

Having a drink and then disappearing back in among the shrubs and trees.

And they cook themselves some food,

Can smell the smell of that food cooking,

And they talk about the journey so far.

They talk about what they might expect to find over the hills and they decide that once they've finished eating,

Having a bit of a rest by the river,

They'll hike a little way up the hills,

Away from the water,

Where they can set up a camp that they'll spend the night.

And once they've set up camp,

They'll leave most of their stuff at the camp and go exploring a little bit,

To try and work out from the top of the hills where would be a good place to explore tomorrow.

And so they finish eating,

They clear everything away,

They hike up the hill,

They set up camp,

And then early afternoon they set off from their camp to explore over the other side of the hill a little bit,

To work out where they should go tomorrow.

And over the other side of the hill,

The ground is flat in all directions as far as you can see,

And they can see way off in the distance,

Large herds of animals grazing in the distance,

The occasional tree,

Different grasses,

And off in one direction,

They notice what looks like some ancient ruins,

And it's too far away for them to see clearly,

Even through binoculars.

So they decide that perhaps that's the best place to go and explore.

It's not something that's on their map,

So perhaps it's something previously unexplored by people.

And as the afternoon draws to a close,

And twilight begins,

And they can see the first few stars in the sky,

They decide to head back to their camp,

And they create a campfire,

And sit around that fire,

Listening to the crackling of the fire as the sun sets,

And they have themselves a camping light they hang on one of the tents,

In the entrance to one of the tents.

They turn on that camping light,

Making a soft glow that complements the light from the fire,

And as the temperature begins to drop,

They feel the warmth of the fire,

And appreciate that warmth from the fire,

And while they sit there together,

Talking,

They decide as the sun sets early around here,

That they'll have a game of chess,

And they enjoy a strategic game of chess with each other,

While drinking a warm cup of tea,

And eating some homemade cake,

And just really enjoying the experience,

And then after playing chess,

Finishing their tea and cake,

As the fire begins to burn down to embers,

The two friends lay some rugs down on the floor,

They lie back on the rugs,

Gazing up at the stars,

The last tinges of red disappear over the horizon,

And they look up at the inky blackness,

The twinkling stars,

The sight of satellites passing overhead,

Of shooting stars,

That they can swear they hear crackling and popping across the sky,

And the way the Milky Way stretches through the darkness,

Arching overhead,

Noticing the different constellations and planets,

And feeling in awe of the scale of the universe,

Knowing that everything they can see,

Is such a tiny part of the whole,

And that they're just lying here,

Even tinier still,

Just a small part of something grand,

And expansive,

And they enjoy just relaxing there,

Gazing up at the stars,

Hearing just the final crackling,

Of the embers of the fire,

The occasional sound of shifting wood,

Before both heading off to their tents,

To sleep for the night,

And after another comfortable night's sleep,

The two of them get up,

Have something to eat,

Pack their stuff away,

And continue hiking up over the hills,

Down the other side,

And off towards those ruins,

And as they get closer to the ruins,

They realize the ruins are larger than they'd at first suspected,

And it didn't look like anyone had ever been here,

At least not any time recent,

There was no car tracks,

There was no signs of footpaths created by people or animals,

It was just like these ruins perhaps had been lost to time,

And they headed into the ruins,

And most of them were just the sides of buildings,

No roofs,

Just the sides of buildings,

Broken and crumbling,

But as they continued exploring,

They discovered in one of the ruined buildings,

What looked like steps,

Leading down underneath whatever was stood here,

And some of the rubble had fallen in,

And filled part of the hole,

As they walked down the steps a little way,

And they cleared out some of that rubble,

Carrying it up the steps,

Placing it outside the gap in the floor,

And this was hot and heavy work,

And after a few hours,

They'd cleared enough to be able to find their way into a tunnel,

And they turned on their torch,

And both of them walked into the tunnel,

And they flashed the torch around the walls,

As it illuminated stonework,

And they walked deeper down the tunnel,

Hearing their footsteps echoing more and more as they went,

Feeling the coolness in the tunnel,

And exploring deeper,

Curious about what they would discover,

And after a few minutes of walking deeply down this tunnel,

They realised they'd walked so far,

That when they turned and looked behind themselves,

They couldn't see any light from the entrance,

And they felt excited and curious,

And they found a door,

And they pushed the door open,

And walked into a room,

And inside this room was writing all around the walls,

And they found a point where there were two thick straight lines going straight down the wall,

And they decided that that seemed like the starting place,

And they started looking at the symbols,

And trying to work out the story being told,

And they couldn't understand the writing,

And so they just focused on the symbols,

And it looked like some symbols telling an origin story,

Perhaps of how these people came to be here,

And it looked from what they could work out,

Like it was all about love,

Working together,

Being collaborative,

And supportive,

And that that's how they'd built their civilisation,

And when the symbols and the writing ended,

They found that just after where it ended,

Was another door,

And they walked through that door,

And inside this new room was a pot,

A clay pot on a plinth,

And they walked over,

And the two of them together touched the pot,

And just as they did,

So they both started to have visions,

As if they were both transported to another time,

Another place,

A time and a place where they were both handling this pot,

But they're in the middle of a village,

They could hear people talking,

Hustle and bustle of a village,

They both looked around each other,

Looked around where they were,

And it was as if they were somewhere outside these ruins,

But in a place that had far more lush green grass,

Cattle,

Marketplaces,

People bustling everywhere,

Coming and going,

Traders,

And both holding on to the clay pot,

They walked around and looked around,

And explored this village,

And they could recognise that in the distance were the hills that they came from,

And that somehow they'd been transported to this place and time in the past,

And someone came over to them,

And started speaking to them,

And somehow they managed to understand the person,

And they told them about finding your passion in life,

Finding things that make you curious,

And following your curiosity,

And they found this a really interesting and curious experience,

And then the person told them to trust,

And to put the clay pot down for a moment,

And close their eyes,

And as they put the clay pot down and closed their eyes,

The person rested his hands,

One on each of their shoulders,

And they instantly felt themselves to be like birds in the sky,

Soaring high above the village,

Hearing the wind in their ears,

Flying like eagles soaring above the village,

Gaining a new perspective on the land,

As it was back then,

The way that a branch of the river veered off from the main part of the river in the direction of this village,

And the village was in the edge of that bit of river,

And they could see fields,

Farmers,

Cattle,

And they could see how that village fit within its landscape,

Within the wider picture,

And they felt themselves as birds hitter an updraft of warm air,

And feel even more weightless and effortless,

Rising higher and higher,

Gaining greater perspective,

And then the man removed his hands from their shoulders,

And they opened their eyes,

Finding themselves back,

Stood in the village,

He suggested they pick up the pot,

And turn around,

Walk back the way they came,

And place that pot down where they found it,

And they go and do that,

Placing that pot down where they found it,

And then as they remove their hands from the pot,

So they find themselves back in the ruins,

And they find their way calmly,

Comfortably,

Out of the ruins,

Back outside,

And in deep discussion about their experience,

They hike their way back to the hills,

And they spend another night on the hill,

Enjoying camping out another night,

Curious about how they'll share their experience with others,

Heading down to the river the next day,

Canoeing back up the river,

And then exiting the river,

And hiking their way to their jeep,

And then traveling in their jeep,

Back the way they came,

And they camp one more night out here,

Gazing at the stars,

Knowing that in the morning,

They'll go home,

Gazing at the stars,

Taking in this last night,

Before drifting,

Comfortably asleep,

Into the most beautiful dream,

And then in the morning,

Packing everything away,

Ready to leave the savannah behind them,

Heading home,

Where they can settle down,

And have a comfortable sleep,

In their own bed,

Drifting,

And relaxing,

Asleep.