Pre-Sleeping Mindful Meditation (16 Mins)

Falling to sleep is difficult for many people especially if you are going through a busy or tough emotional time. It is so important to set up a regular nighlty routine to support your mind and body in developing the right conditions to enable you to sleep a little easier or to at least develop a softer mindset when you cannot fall asleep. Here we take a mindfulness approach to noticing what is around and inside our awareness so that we might get a sense of space.

Transcript

And so already we might be in our own sleeping position in our beds and just ensuring that our head and our neck are correctly supported by a pillow or a cushion and then just take a few moments in adjusting your body ensuring that you are comfortable relaxed and so we approach this meditation in a relaxed state of mind no expectation no striving to make the meditation perfect no wanting to fall asleep bringing attention now to our whole body as we begin to notice just what's going on with us in our bodies right now no need to push anything away no need to try and correct anything we're just noticing how we are and how our bodies are feeling at this present moment so there may be some tiredness there may be some niggles or aches and pains within the body and we can allow them just to be there or maybe adjusting our posture and when we're ready we can begin to move our attention onto our breathing and I wonder if we can just imagine as if we are breathing up through the whole part of the body that is in contact with the bed so our heels the back of our legs our backs and shoulders the back of our head all the parts of body that are in contact just imagining breathing up through the bed into the body deep into the lungs so soft soothing breathing style again we're not attempting to be perfect with this just a very loose imaginary sense of breathing in from the whole of the back of the body that is in contact with the bed and on the out breath imagining how that breath again is moving down to the points of contact with the bed and imagining as if the bed and the back of the body are slowly merging together there is no exact point of contact you may notice sensations you may notice how the body can begin to slowly open and relax taking the time with your breath and your imagination to move the breathing up through the body and with the out breath letting go into the body and then deeper down into the bed and perhaps with time it's moving that breath from the bed down into the mattress through the floor in the bedroom ultimately down into the ground outside a sense of connectedness perhaps for some just notice how that is to establish a nice soft gentle breathing routine and at the moment we could say to ourselves we've got nothing to do right now and we have nowhere to go nothing to achieve so there may be thoughts from the day that appear in the mind and we must remember that it's okay for them to be there our job is not to push them away our job is not to delete or to force them out of our mind stream our attitude is to let them be there and to allow them space in the background and always remembering to come back to this soft gentle breathing routine that's in the foreground of our experience and remembering that with every out breath we can allow the body to just soften and relax into the bed with each out breath and when you're ready perhaps we can move our attention now very gently to the sensations of the the bed sheets lying on top of our body and as we breathe in and the chest and the body rises can we detect the smallest sensations of these sheets as the breathing moves up and down don't worry if we can't sense anything no pressure to get anything right here and can we sense perhaps from the top of the body all the way down to our toes any of those sensations from above so the bed sheets or the duvet the weight of our bedding on our bodies and remembering that any distractions are just to be held in the background and the sensations and the breathing we can refocus them in the foreground and taking the time to be interested on how our breathing is and how we can sense around our body different sensations of the bedding our clothing perhaps and then gently moving this attention down to our toes and our feet and I wonder if we can imagine just gently breathing up through the feet and the toes and into the legs and on the out breath just imagining a warm sensation moving down through the legs back through the feet and the toes and out into the room and so progressively moving the sensations up through the legs and the knees and the upper thighs and breathing out again down through the whole of the legs and the toes out into the room gradually following the breath all the way into the upper body and the arms and the shoulders the neck and the head taking your time no rush just opening your mind to the sensations of the whole body now just resting here in your own bed feeling the coming and the going of the breath filling the whole body and I wonder how it would be if we were to imagine that our bodies were no longer just our body but had begun to merge with the bedding and the bedroom and our surroundings opening ourselves up to this space being able to let go with every breath out into the space of the room into the space of our surroundings out into the universe and the expansiveness of it all perhaps hearing our breathing in the distance and a deeper sense that our bodies are much wider deeper and spacious and maybe for some of us we just can't tell the difference between our bodies and the bed our clothing the sheets or the duvet all becoming one resting our mind resting our bodies letting go with absolutely nothing to do not worrying about any distraction or noise that may disrupt and distract us while we prepare for sleep knowing that we can just access this space at any moment opening up from the inside of our bodies our minds into a wider more spacious experience trusting ourselves to be free relaxed letting go in this moment not even needing to listen to these words and you can allow yourself to just move around in your own mental space space within your own body letting go of the different sensations that you may feel and perhaps at some moments there's a feeling that the body is slowly drifting off to sleep and we can allow that to happen sometimes the body may jolt us slightly more awake but we can just understand that this is just part of the process and we will re-access the breathing and that sense of space within some of us we may experience thoughts in a dreamlike state or memories from the day or from the past we can allow ourselves to be absorbed by these experiences it is as if we are dreaming when we are awake just be open to what the mind does and the images that it creates and the thoughts that we pursue even feeling free to move our bodies into a more comfortable position if we are feeling ready to fall asleep or we might just remain in the same position continuing to breathe deeply and softly into the body reminding ourselves to open up to the space inside maybe discovering that there is no end we can let go we don't have to be bothered by thoughts or distractions or noises and we can take the time to enjoy this moment of warmth of safety sounds now moving in and out body soft relaxed and open just resting just breathing letting go deeper and deeper letting go you