Welcome to this restorative yoga nidra practice to recharge your energy.
My name is Em and I will be guiding you today through a sequence that connects you to the earth beneath you and supports you to develop a grounding resource within yourself that you can return to even in your waking life.
So,
Begin to get settled and find a comfy position that works for you today.
Yoga nidra is traditionally practiced lying on your back with your arms by your side in shavasana but if that's not the most comfortable position for you today then please feel free to try whatever feels comfortable and however you want to support your body today.
Now you're settled in,
Begin to allow your senses to turn inward,
You may wish to close your eyes or take a soft gaze and begin to notice the sounds around you.
Notice the quality and the tone of your environmental sounds,
Notice which sounds are close and which sounds are further away in the distance adding to the layers of audio that surround you and cocoon you in whatever way feels intuitive.
Allow yourself to lean in to the sounds around you,
Feeling almost as if you're merging with the quality of sounds and allow the sounds around you to really drift around whilst you are merged almost as if you are basking in a sea of audio and you're simply floating on the tones,
Allowing yourself to rest even deeper as you float in the sea of audio around you.
Allow yourself to feel the freedom and the release as you give all your weight to the earth beneath you,
Feel your body getting heavier as you release all your weight to the support beneath you,
Allowing the support to cradle your body so there is no need to hold any weight in your body,
Release any weight or tension in your neck and your head all the way down to releasing tension in your feet allowing your heels to weigh heavy on the support beneath you.
And with this release of weight and the merging and floating with the tones in your environment allow yourself to drop any expectations that you have today for yourself or your practice.
These expectations may look like expectations on how you should feel,
How you should receive the practice.
As you notice these thoughts,
These expectations in your mind,
Simply notice them and allow them to float away,
Making the conscious decision that you are here simply to receive the practice.
There is nothing you need to do,
There's nothing to achieve here.
You are simply resting deeper and deeper,
Receiving the practice and allowing your subconscious to pick up on the grounding cues of my nervous system and of the environment around you.
Simply allowing your subconscious to do this automatically without any conscious input and allowing yourself,
Your nervous system to regulate as you hear subconsciously the regulation of my nervous system.
And in whatever way your intuition guides you,
Feel these expectations drop and float away allowing yourself to be free to rest deeper and deeper.
And as you rest here,
Be reminded of what brought you to the practice today.
This is your sankalpa,
Your intention for the practice and simply allow your intention to form into a supportive I or I am statement.
If nothing comes to you straight away,
That is okay.
Allow your intention to take a form of a desired feeling.
It may be settled or peace or you may wish to translate your sankalpa into language using this phrase,
I allow my mind body to deeply recharge.
And with your formulated sankalpa,
Feel into the breath,
Notice your natural in-breath and your exhale and in whatever way your intuition guides you,
Allow your sankalpa to float on your breath as you naturally breathe in and out.
As you breathe in,
Allow your sankalpa to absorb in your body with your inhale,
Almost as if you're absorbing the sankalpa as air and then on your exhale,
Allow yourself to release anything that's blocking further,
Deeper rest.
And on the inhale once more,
Inhale your sankalpa as air and then exhale anything that feels restless or not restorative and continue allowing your intuition to guide you to breathing this way,
Guiding you to inhaling your intention,
Absorbing as air absorbs into each cell of the body and exhaling anything that prevents you from resting deeper.
Continue breathing this way with your natural breath for just a moment more and now release the awareness on your breath and expand your awareness out to the rest of your body and notice what sensations in your body that your awareness is drawn to,
Notice these with curiosity and ease,
Even if they're sensations that are less comfortable,
Non-judgmental awareness of these sensations allows them to be heard and to be cared for,
It is an act of self-care,
So allow yourself to notice any sensations that you are drawn to in your body.
It may feel useful to imagine these sensations like beach waves flowing into your awareness just as the tide rolls in and then out of your awareness as the tide rolls back in and out at their own pace.
Some sensations may feel like big waves and some may feel like just tiny ripples,
So with this in mind allow yourself to rest back in the awareness of any sensations coming in and out of your awareness like waves to the shore and now drift your awareness to the toes on your left foot and take a moment to allow your attention to saturate the toes on your left foot,
You might imagine your awareness like a soft light shining on your toes,
Now shine the light of your awareness onto the toes on your right foot and now allow this light of awareness to expand onto feeling the sensations of your toes on both feet and slowly move your awareness up to the soles of both of your feet,
Feeling the sensations in both of your heels together,
Now the whole of both feet,
Drift your light of awareness now from the left of your pelvic pole all the way over to the right of your pelvic pole,
Feel your whole pelvis and hips together as they are basking in the light of your awareness,
Feel into your lower back and now your navel centre,
The back of your chest,
The front of your chest,
Allow your light of awareness to split so your awareness is split into two on both sides of your chest and now allow this awareness to come together again at your heart centre,
Now your left shoulder,
Right shoulder,
Both hands together,
Allowing your awareness to split into two as you feel into both hands as one but with split awareness and now feel into both thumbs and now all of your fingers together,
Allow your light of awareness to come back as one to your heart centre,
Feel into both collarbones,
The centre of your throat,
The inside of your mouth,
Noticing the humidity and the textures that reside here in the inside of your mouth,
The tongue relaxing it back,
Both sets of teeth together,
Allowing your awareness to expand out to your jaw,
Tracing your jaw with your awareness,
Your cheekbones,
Eyelids and any sensations behind your eyes,
Both ears together,
Third eye centre in between your eyebrows and now drift your light of awareness up to the top of your head and now allow your light to shine in the space above your head and see if you can feel into anything,
Anything in your awareness here in the space above your head and now allow the light of your awareness to saturate your whole body,
Almost as if you are being showered from head to toe in the most relaxing and nourishing light waves stardust showering down,
Allowing you to relax deeply as you rest here and feel into a sense of nourishment as you rest here listening with deep presence notice this experience that you have created for yourself in this moment,
Whatever that experience may be,
Allow yourself to feel gratitude for practicing and allowing yourself to experience what your body and your mind needed to express during this time during this practice today,
Feel into a space in your body where you notice this thankfulness and gratitude and intentionally place your light of gentle awareness at this space in your body allowing it to nourish wherever you place this grateful,
Open space,
It might be your heart centre,
It may be your third eye centre,
Wherever feels intuitive for you,
Simply allow your awareness to drift here and wherever your light of awareness is placed,
Your space of gratitude,
Allow your intuition to extract your sankalpa from this space,
Becoming aware of your intention once more and repeating it in your mind's eye,
I am resting to recharge deeply and allow yourself to rest for just a moment here in this experience of gratitude and intention that you have created for yourself,
This restful experience
