Evening Gratitude Practice

Gratitude is the gateway to joy and by cultivating an evening or bedtime practice that helps us to reflect on the gifts and opportunities that have come our way, we deepen our awareness of the many ways in which life supports us. In this gentle end-of-day practice, we're training the mind and heart to focus on all the components that nourish our wellbeing in order to bring us back to presence and a state of deeper connection and wakefulness. A beautiful way to cultivate a daily gratitude practice.

Transcript

Welcome to today's meditation.

We're going to be practicing an evening gratitude practice.

So I'd recommend finding your way into your bed or onto your bed.

Perhaps lying flat on the back.

Making sure that if you need a pillow underneath the knees or underneath the back of the head that you've got those things.

And just spending a couple of moments adjusting the body so you're bringing a bit of space between the shoulders,

Wriggling them away from each other.

And then laying the spine centrally down the bed.

Softening and relaxing the hips.

And bringing some space between the legs so that the ankles just get to roll out to the sides.

Let's just take a nice deep breath in as the eyes close.

And letting that breath go either through the nose or through gently parted lips.

Taking a couple more in that same way,

Just feeling the body rise.

And letting everything go,

Including the breath.

You're exhaling out the remnants of the day.

One more.

Exhaling.

So you might find that this meditation makes you sleepy and even that you drift off into sleep and that's fine.

Hopefully you're doing this at the end of your day and you're ready to move towards bed or sleep.

And you're winding down.

In these moments just noticing the backside of the body beginning to soften.

And mentally scanning through the body,

Noticing the touch of the bed underneath you.

Either noticing the coolness or the warmth of the sheets.

The texture of the fabric against your skin.

And feeling yourself cradled here and completely supported from underneath.

So as your body continues to relax,

You're just vaguely conscious of this deepening,

Darkening,

Earthy sensation that's rooting you,

Drawing you down through the backside of the body,

Through this shadow side of the body.

And you're allowing the weight of your body to continue to relax in this way,

Trusting that the bed is supporting you.

And the earth beneath the bed is supporting you.

Every breath out,

The body and the muscles through the backside continue to release as you feel yourself getting heavier and heavier and heavier.

And maybe the mind is still swirling from the day.

Starting this way and that to all the unfinished work and tasks,

The conversations,

All the has-been events.

You can just notice that.

And perhaps bring the attention to the backside of the head.

Just notice that connecting point between the skull and the pillow.

And release the weight of your head entirely,

Allowing all the muscles in the sides of the neck to relax.

Continue to bring awareness through the body.

Let's bring that attention to the shoulders.

And as if you were shrugging off a heavy coat,

Just allow the shoulders to melt down,

Softening,

Releasing.

The arms as well.

Maybe even feeling a little tingling or aliveness,

A pulsing through the wrists or the hands or the fingertips.

And giving thanks as the body begins to settle down.

Giving thanks to this body for having moved us through the day.

For having carried us,

All of the systems of the body working on our behalf,

Supporting everything that we've done.

And the same settling down can be felt through the spine and the muscles of the back.

The hips and the pelvis relaxing.

The belly relaxing and the waist softening.

And as we bring our awareness into the hips and the legs,

We allow the full weight of the legs to let go.

Relaxing down into the ankles and the feet and the toes.

And as we give thanks for the bed beneath us and for this body softening and the heart relaxing and the brain slowing and the mind clearing.

We can give thanks also for the day that was.

No matter what happened,

Whether your day moved in the direction that you were hoping for or whether it careered off on quite a different trajectory.

We can use this practice of giving thanks as our head hits the pillow every night.

To become aware of all the things that have been good and nourishing and fortifying.

Some days are easy.

Some days aren't.

And on those difficult days,

Finding one thing to be grateful for can be a Herculean task.

So just let's bring to mind whatever it is that you want to place your attention on and it might be a handful of things.

A conversation with a friend.

The kindness of someone passing by.

A meal that you've eaten.

A go ahead for something that you were waiting to hear about.

Whatever it is.

It might be small,

It might be large.

It doesn't matter the size,

It just matters the attitude.

And if you've had a really hard day then perhaps your thankfulness is quite simply for being warm and dry in this moment.

For being supported by the mattress and the bed and the earth beneath you.

And knowing that those things are more than enough.

That feeling of safety.

Of being nestled somewhere.

And of the day being done.

And just let whatever it is that you've conjured in your mind bear its own fruit by bringing the images and the associated feelings right up to the mind's eye and to the heart.

Rather than let the mind trail off and think about all the things attached to this incident or event.

To see if you can hold the warmth of that feeling of thankfulness,

The warmth of gratitude towards all the things that have gone well and gone right today.

Continue to let any images associated with them flourish in your mind's eye.

And let a gentle smile radiate through the face.

Noticing how that affects the feeling in the body.

And allowing the cells of your body to receive that feeling of warmth and of expansion.

It's like you're creating a bath for yourself.

And you're turning the tap on and gratitude runs really from the tap.

And you just get to sit in that bath and soak and bathe.

And deepen your sense of relaxation and deepen your opening to receiving more.

Continuing to allow the body to soften in this warm bath.

And this feeling that's been generated through memory and association and a heartfelt connection.

And continuing to open the body and the mind to receiving this wash of positive energy.

And reminding ourselves here as we prepare to move towards sleep that we have done the very best that we can do in our day to day.

Even if you didn't achieve the desired outcome.

You can say to yourself out loud or in your own mind,

I gave my best today.

I gave my best today.

And remembering too that the more we practice an attitude of gratitude,

The more we're practicing seeing what's good in our lives.

Training the brain to focus on the positive,

To see what's working,

What's bringing us joy and pleasure and success.

So that we can continue to do those things and continue to attract more.

Gratitude is a high vibration emotion.

Meaning that when we enact it and feel it,

Our bodies,

The cells in our bodies vibrate at a high vibration higher than any other emotion.

And it's our thankfulness and our recognition of that which we're grateful for that helps attract more high vibration experiences.

And the key is to start small for those days when we really struggle to find something good.

And the other key is to practice often.

So giving thanks for our food,

Giving thanks to the person who served it or made it for us.

Giving thanks to ourselves for having prepared it with love.

And to be mindful as we go through any of these daily rituals and daily necessities for life which can be quite mundane.

Just to be mindful and grateful as we go through them.

So in this way it starts to come easily,

The practice of giving thanks.

We see opportunities for it everywhere.

And it begins to light us up from the inside out so that we can share that with others.

They sense it,

They step towards it,

They want to be a part of it too.

Remember,

You don't have to think of anything large,

It can be small and simple to begin with.

But the practice is really about allowing that seed to fertilise in your heart.

And to continue watering that seed regularly so that it grows and blooms.

You're noticing this smile that's still softly on the lips and this warmth in the heart and through the rest of the body.

You might from here just roll over and find a comfortable position from which to begin your night's sleep.

Or if you're ready to sit up,

Maybe you join in bringing your hands together at the heart and giving thanks for giving thanks.

Taking a final breath in together.

And then a breath out,

Bowing the head towards the hands.

Namaste.

Reviews

Beautiful soothing and peaceful end to the day with a lovely gentle voice. Thank you. 🙏🏻

So wonderful felt so relaxed, so peaceful, so grateful

You have such a relaxing and comforting voice! Thank you!

Everything about her (voice, volume, pacing & content) is perfect. I just wish she had more for helping us fall back asleep in the middle of the night. Hint. Hint. Thank you!

Very well done. Perfect . Loved the attitude and the energy- recommended to my husband and daughter.

in June of 2023, I wrote: This is quite beautiful. Gentle voice, wonderful pace. I will definitely listen to this again. Namaste for creating this beauty. December 2023: It's simply wonderful.🌿

That was very good and I will try to do this more often at bed time. Thank you!
Peace and light to you,
Peter B 🙏🙏🙏

Very sweet and relaxing the volume could have been a bit louder but it played back well.

Oh I really love your work. The way you are talking, your voice and your choice of the background music - all that takes me for granted to a place where I feel so much better than before. So listen to your meditation is like putting a wonderful cream on my soul and body and feeling wonderful grace to this.
Thank you so much for this experience!

Ellie, your voice is such an amazing gift. Thank you for sharing your thoughts, your reflections and your spirit by way of this vehicle. Your meditations are consistently wonderful.

Wow! One of the best evening gratitude I’ve listened to. Thank you so much for this 💙✨

Thanks so much for your lovely meditation. May the joy be with you. Nàmaste

This is a lovely meditation. I look forward to doing it again. Thank you🙏

Relaxing. It helped to quiet my mind & be present. I highly recommend listening when you need to destres. Thank you.

Lovely meditation to drift into a good night sleep 😴 thank you for sharing this beautiful gift 💝

So peaceful and relaxing. And such a soothing and melodic voice to lull me into bedtime reflections of gratitude. This was divine.

Her voice is beautiful and the simplicity of her words are comforting. I fell into a very restful sleep.

Thank you so much for this beautiful reminder of the value of gratitude. I’ve fallen away from writing in my gratitude journal and now feel the importance of beginning again to write down my gratitudes. Namaste 🙏❤️

Ataahua (beautiful in NZ Maori). Thank you for this gift of meditation you have created x 👐💙

Love this meditation topic, tone of voice, pace, music. I go right to sleep about midway. ✌️💐🙏