Yoga Nidra For Deeper Sleep (No Intro Or Mantras Version)

John's deeply restorative Yoga Nidra for Deeper Sleep is offered here without the introduction and bija mantras, perfect for those who use it regularly.

This classical practice is designed to help you drift into deep, restful sleep—or guide you back to sleep if you awaken during the night. By simply lying down and following the gentle guidance through your breath and body, you’ll access a profoundly restorative state.

In our fast-paced world, where restful sleep is becoming more elusive, this ancient practice offers a vital refuge. Sleep is essential, not only for your well-being but for your ability to fully show up in the world. You are essential. Allow yourself to rest deeply. Sweet dreams.

Transcript

Allowing yourself just to shrug down into the bed,

To make any last movements that you need to make and then just let everything go.

You're aware of your breath naturally moving in your body.

Notice if there's any judgment or criticism in your mind towards how your breath is.

And if there is any judgment or criticism from yourself towards yourself,

Just notice that and see if you can allow it to go.

And over the next five or six breaths,

The movement of your body,

The movement of your belly.

You can imagine that each breath is just a stepping down more and more into relaxation,

As if you're walking down a short flight of steps into a beautiful space where you can just rest.

And you can feel the back of your body resting against the mattress,

Sheets,

Your nightclothes against your skin or the duvet over you.

And you can hear any far away sounds,

Letting your sense of hearing radiate outwards,

Not straining,

But just allowing yourself.

And notice whatever sounds you can hear from outside in the distance or closer by,

You can also hear the space in between them.

And notice when we listen to the space in between the sounds,

How things can seem friendlier,

Just more natural,

More normal.

Gently listening to sounds that are closer,

The sound of my voice,

The sound in between the words,

The sound of your own breath.

Eyes lightly closed,

You're aware of the feeling of the walls of the room,

The feeling of the ceiling,

The feeling of the floor,

Your own body lying in the bed.

And you can see yourself lying there,

In the healing darkness,

Resting with your own breath,

Feeling of your skin,

Feeling of your hair,

Allowing your face to be soft,

Aware of the existence of your own body.

Perhaps you can feel the feeling of life in your own body,

As warmth,

As vibration,

As movement,

As life itself.

So just noticing your breath,

You can feel the breath of your abdomen,

Breath of your heart,

Your body moving without you doing anything,

Moving with the breath,

And the breath moving with the life inside you.

And notice the sense of your out-breath,

Not taking any extra breath,

But just allowing your attention to gently rest a little more on the out-breath than on the in-breath.

You're aware of the breath coming in,

Aware of the space,

Aware of the breath going out,

Aware of that space.

You're aware of the breath in the heart in the same way,

Space in your heart,

Space in the breath,

Space in your body,

Comfortable in the bed,

Comfortable in yourself.

Notice how the breath gets slower and slower as you're resting down.

And so now we use your sankalpa.

A sankalpa is a verse or a line said in first person and in present tense,

Which we plant deeply at this level of our consciousness,

So that it may flower and bring us abundance and wonderfulness into our lives.

If you already have a sankalpa,

Then just use the sankalpa that you would normally use for this situation,

For resting.

If you don't have a sankalpa,

Perhaps you could use a phrase like,

I am resting deeply within myself,

Or I am at home within myself,

Or I feel my heart,

I feel my breath,

I am present and I am whole.

Saying your sankalpa gently,

As if placing a flower on still water,

And a few little ripples go out from the flower and fade to the darkness.

We say our sankalpa three times,

And then we let it go.

I am resting deep,

I am practicing yogic sleep.

And so,

The rotation of consciousness.

Your awareness will now be systematically brought to many different points in your body,

Which match nerve areas in the brain.

And by moving around our body in this way,

As gently as possible,

It helps the body relax into a light,

Hypnagogic state.

And if you fall asleep from here,

That's absolutely fine.

Just simply move your awareness to each part of the body.

This goes a little bit quicker than you might expect,

But it's to help us switch off and come more into being.

Just let yourself feel that part of the body that is named.

There's no need to move it,

No need to concentrate your mind on it.

Simply rest your awareness there for a brief moment.

And so we begin with the right hand side.

Your right hand thumb.

First finger.

Second finger.

Third finger.

Little finger.

Palm of the right hand.

Right hand.

Back of the right hand.

The whole hand.

The wrist.

Forearm.

Elbow.

Upper arm.

Shoulder.

Armpit.

Right waist.

Right hip.

Right thigh.

Right knee.

Right calf.

Right ankle.

Right heel.

Sole of the right foot.

The top of the right foot.

Right big toe.

Second toe.

Third toe.

Fourth toe.

Little toe.

The left hand thumb.

First finger.

Second finger.

Ring finger.

Little finger.

The palm of the left hand.

The back of the left hand.

The whole hand.

The wrist.

Forearm.

Elbow.

Upper arm.

Shoulder.

Left armpit.

Left waist.

Left hip.

Thigh.

Knee.

Carve.

Ankle.

The left heel.

Sole of the left foot.

The top of the left foot.

Left big toe.

Second toe.

Third toe.

Fourth toe.

Little toe.

Now we move to the back of the body.

The right heel.

The left heel.

The right calf.

The left calf.

The right thigh.

The left thigh.

Your right buttock.

Your left buttock.

The lower back.

The middle of your back.

Your upper back.

The whole spine.

Your right shoulder blade.

Your left shoulder blade.

The back of your neck.

The back of your head.

The back of your head.

The top of your head.

Forehead.

Right temple.

Left temple.

Right ear.

Left ear.

Right eyebrow.

Left eyebrow.

The middle of your eyebrows.

The right eye.

The left eye.

The right nostril.

The left nostril.

The left nostril.

Your right cheek.

Left cheek.

Upper lip.

Lower lip.

Both lips together.

Chin.

Jaw.

Throat.

Your right collarbone.

Your left collarbone.

The right side of your chest.

The left side of your chest.

The upper abdomen.

The navel.

The lower abdomen.

Your right groin.

Your left groin.

Your pelvic floor.

Your whole right leg.

Your whole left leg.

The whole right arm.

The whole left arm.

Your whole face.

Your whole head.

Your whole torso.

Your whole body.

Your whole body.

Your whole body.

I am resting in presence.

I am practicing yogic sleep.

Awareness of the inner space of the body and the inner life.

So here,

You just meet yourself and recognize yourself at the level of your own life energy.

You experience the space inside you in which all of your life,

Your love,

Your imagination,

Your creativity,

Everything that you are,

Is held.

And so you just allow yourself to experience the space in front of your closed eyelids.

You're aware of the feeling of the transparent screen of your mind.

Just feel your mind as energy.

And just notice how that energy moves as your thoughts move.

And notice that you notice this feeling of energy,

This feeling of movement.

Rather than judging or criticizing or getting caught up,

You just rest into yourself and simply allow that feeling of energy and movement to be there.

We don't enter the thoughts.

We just notice them coming and going.

And if any images arise,

We just simply notice them too,

Without getting into directing the images,

Without pushing them into a certain direction.

And we just begin to feel the space between our consciousness and our thoughts.

The space between our thoughts.

And the space between our awareness and that energy field of thought.

You can feel the space inside your own body.

Aware of the solid feeling of your body.

And aware of the space within.

Space between your cells.

The space within your cells.

And the light and the life is simply there.

You're aware of that sense of life that occupies all the space within you.

So bright.

So beautiful.

Resting.

In your bed.

In yourself.

In your wonderful room.

The breath moving of its own accord.

At both abdomen and at your heart.

The space in the breath.

The space in the breath.

Space behind the breath.

The space at your heart.

Space between the emotions.

Space behind the emotions.

Space within your whole being.

And your whole being in space.

Resting in the space of your own life.

Gently aware of the feeling of wholeness that is your own life.

Fatality.

Peace.

Kindness.

Love.

I am resting in presence.

I am practicing yogic sleep.

And so now the sensation of opposites.

And for this nidra,

We're going to feel the sensations of lightness and heaviness.

And heaviness.

So allow yourself to feel your whole body becoming light.

Almost as if your body can float up from the bed and away towards the ceiling.

Your head is light and weightless.

Your limbs are light and weightless.

Your torso.

Floating.

Whole body.

Notice there is no feeling of gravity operating on you.

Space in the bones.

Space between your bones.

Full of space and light.

Rising higher.

Higher.

And higher.

And then just gently letting that go.

And feeling yourself in the bed.

And you can feel the sense of heaviness.

Heaviness in the legs.

Heaviness in the hands.

Perhaps one hand more than the other.

Heaviness in your arms.

Heaviness in your head.

This heaviness is coming from within you.

The solidity and denseness of your body.

Heavier and heavier.

All your limbs heavier.

Pressing down into the bed so heavy.

So heavy.

As if you are just complete and utter solidity itself.

Pure gravity.

But from within.

From within.

And then just letting this go.

Letting this go.

Letting this go.

I am resting in presence.

I am practicing yogic sleep.

And so now the chakra sequence.

Here you are going to be guided to meet the seven main energy centers in your body.

This wonderful part of the practice brings energy and balance and the deepest rest into your life.

And it helps remove physical,

Emotional and spiritual blockages.

So just as when we moved around your body.

We simply just touch each chakra point as it's named.

We are going to go through the chakras a couple of times.

Moving from the bottom to the top and then back down again.

And so bring your awareness to your perineum.

And then move from your perineum an inch inside your body.

And here we have Muladhara chakra.

And then we move our attention to your pubis.

And then moving back through your body to the inside side of your spine.

Swadhisthana chakra.

And then to the navel.

And moving back to the inside side of the spine.

Manipura chakra.

To the heart.

And then back to the spine behind your heart.

Anahata chakra.

To the centre of your throat.

And back into the spine.

And there,

Vishuddhi chakra.

The third eye and then moving back into the middle of your brain.

Ajna chakra.

And then the very crown of your head.

Saraswaha.

And so coming down.

Crown chakra.

Middle of the brain.

Throat.

Heart.

Navel.

Pubis.

Perineum.

Coming back up.

Perineum.

The pubis and back to the spine.

The navel.

Back to the spine.

The heart.

And back to the spine.

Throat.

Third eye and into the middle of the brain.

And the crown.

Moving down.

Crown.

Third eye.

The throat.

The heart.

The navel.

Pubis.

The perineum.

I am resting in presence.

I am practicing yogic sleep.

And so the visualizations.

These will help you engage with your inspiration,

Your imagination.

It will take you deeper into rest and help you communicate with your deeper mythic self.

I am going to place before your awareness a number of images.

Just allow yourself to meet them on the level of emotion.

Or image.

Or memory.

Not holding on to the image.

Not even trying to visualize them.

Just allowing them to light into the mind.

And then just move away with kindness.

A green light in the space of your heart.

You can feel your breath moving at your heart.

Space within your heart.

There.

A gentle and perfect green light.

In the darkness outside of your window.

A large moth flying away towards the woods.

It's as if you're flying next to the moth.

And you can see the patterns of its wings,

Its scales.

You're aware of the starlight,

The darkness.

The moon.

The other people asleep in nearby houses.

You fly with the moth.

Into the night.

A crescent moon above two tall trees in the night.

The night is always mysterious.

Sometimes we mistake the mystery for fear.

But you allow yourself in your flight.

To fly towards the two trees.

Pulled on by the mystery,

By your own curiosity.

You see the moonlight on the branches.

The space between the branches.

The space between the trees.

A beautiful barn owl sitting in the branches of one of the trees.

You see the stars behind the owl,

Almost as if they're a halo.

You see the incandescence of the night.

And the owl looks at you,

And you look at the owl.

And there's a sense of beingness and peace between you.

A sense of your own wisdom.

You notice how the tree branches lead up like a ladder.

To the owl.

The ladder of wisdom.

The bird of yourself.

Surrounded by the space of the night.

Haloed by the moon.

The beauty of the scene.

All taking place within yourself.

The silhouette of another tree.

Seemingly lit up from within itself.

A reddish,

Pinkish light.

Touching around the edges of the leaves like an aura.

Is it the moon?

Is it the tree itself?

And you find yourself standing on the ground as yourself.

In front of the tree.

You're not cold.

You see the space between the branches.

Space between the leaves.

Space between yourself and the tree.

The space within yourself.

And within yourself,

The same as the space within the tree.

The light around the tree.

The light around yourself.

Your beautiful stag standing in the night.

His antlers rainbow coloured.

The strength and beauty and the stillness.

And you are not afraid of him.

And he is not afraid of you.

You walk over to the stag.

You place your hand on his head.

You feel the warmth of his life.

You put your hand on your own heart.

You feel the warmth of your own life.

You feel your roots going down into the ground.

As if you were a tree.

You.

In your incredible individuality.

Fully part of the world.

Your roots going down into the earth.

Your branches rising up into the night sky.

Separate but part of everything.

Part of everything yet fully yourself.

You feel that you are surrounded by love.

And you notice a single star.

Just a single point of light.

Brighter than all the other stars.

You feel that starlight within your heart.

Within your being.

Illuminating your whole self.

The space of your life within yourself.

Lit up by starlight.

And within the space of yourself.

An image of the whole world.

The earth from space.

And the earth itself as part of the totality of the universe.

And all of this inside yourself.

I am resting in presence.

I am practicing yogic sleep.

And so now,

At this deep,

Deep level.

Allow yourself to repeat your sankalpa three times.

Your present verse.

Just dropping it into your consciousness.

Where the seed will break open and surely bloom into your life.

And letting go into the night.

Letting go into yourself.

You may have slipped into sleep by now.

And so there will be no ending bell.

Nothing to disturb you.

Just the feeling of your body.

Feet.

Legs.

Buttocks.

Back.

Shoulders.

Back of your head.

Right leg and left leg.

Right arm and left arm.

Your torso.

Your whole head.

Your face.

Your whole body.

Your whole body.

Lying quietly.

In deep awareness.

And restful sleep.

Goodnight.

Sweet dreams.

Reviews

The best meditation / yoga nidra I have ever done. I return to this one over and over. It is so helpful for waking in the night and general anxiety relief.

Zonk 🥱😴🛌😌🙏🕊️
.

Thank you 🙏

Gentle and soothing. This was perfect to return to sleep after waking too early. Thank you.✨🙏🏼💜💜✨

Thank you John your a blessing in the wee small hours.

A beautiful yoga nidra that is thorough, gentle, and intentional. I found myself wanting to stay awake at 4am so I could enjoy this meditation. I feel rested. Adding to my favorites and returning often. Recommended

Ahhhh 🙏💫💓 like a warm hug.
This is a wonderful and peaceful nidra . I know I must’ve listened before ,maybe it was the other version …because I surely would have rated , commented and bookmarked! Dear John , thank you so much for being a calming energy in these turbulent,unsettling times. 2025 has been challenging to say the least . I miss you on lives here. Please visit …I’d love to visit London! Best,L.💓

Very restful. Thank you.

Lovely Nidra practice 🙏❤️

Thank you!

A wonderful Yoga Nidra practice to achieve a state of deep relaxation if not sleep.

With so much thanks and appreciation for this most beautiful nidra practice. John, I loved how you incorporated the chakras into this and your creative visualizations. 🙏🏻❤️

Lovely voice and silent background make this an easy keeper for any time of day or night. 1/1/25

Love your voice John, so soothing 🙏

Thank you, well paced and calming

Beautiful! Thank you John!

Great!!!!!!!!

I fell asleep - excellent!! 🙏🏼❤️

Seeking rest? Try this guided meditation to deepen your cellular level sleep with this yoga Nidra. Nothing compares to the work your body does and relaxation your mind desires when you receive a good sleep day or night. Experiment if you have not yet tried yoga Nidra with this shorten version. I began listening to John 6 years ago when Peri Menopause hormonal fluctuations disrupted my thoughts, body and nightly rest, which is desperately needed to function. I highly recommend giving this a try on repeat. Sleep is a necessity, rest is essential to calm, relax and restore your being. Enjoy!

Fabulous