So,
To begin,
I'd just like to invite you to settle into your space,
Checking in with your body,
Making sure there's nothing digging in,
And on your next exhale,
Just land completely in this space,
In this moment,
Right here,
And as you lie yourself back,
You can settle down,
Begin to relax,
And just make yourself feel nice and comfortable.
Notice the weight of your body,
Wherever it meets the surface beneath you,
All the places where you are fully held.
Your head,
Your shoulders,
The length of your back,
And the backs of your legs,
All of it fully supported.
You don't have to carry a single thing right now,
Because now is the time for you to do nothing.
You don't have to be anywhere,
You don't have to do anything.
Your mind can drift and wander as you hear whatever sounds exist around you,
Near or far.
None of them need disturb you or pull you back.
They're simply part of the world turning quietly and safely,
Without any effort from you.
And you can allow yourself this moment,
To just rest back,
Relax,
And let go.
And just pay attention now to your breath,
With that gentle rise and fall that happens all by itself.
And with every breath you release,
You let go of a little more,
And with every word I speak,
You can simply let go.
And in a moment,
I'm going to guide your awareness gently through your body.
And it doesn't matter at all if your mind drifts as I do,
Just the sound of my voice will continue to carry you deeper.
And very soon now,
You will find yourself more relaxed than perhaps you have ever been before.
I'd just like you to bring to mind that feeling when you're outside on a bright day,
And the large cloud moves slowly across the sun.
The light doesn't vanish,
It simply quiets.
Everything softens at its edges,
Colours settle.
And there's a quality to that moment,
A stillness that drops over everything all at once.
It is almost like a held breath,
The world not gone,
Just resting.
I'd like you to bring your attention now to the very top of your head,
And imagine that cloud beginning its slow crossing.
And as it does,
That quieting crown of your head,
A soft dimming of sensation,
Not coldness,
Not numbness.
It's more like the way a room feels when someone draws a curtain across a bright afternoon light,
Still and comfortable.
And the muscles there,
Which you didn't even know were holding,
Will simply let go.
That soft dimming now moves across your forehead,
And behind your eyes,
Which grow heavier as the light quiets there.
The tiny muscles around your eyes relaxing completely.
Your eyelids settling like they are made of something heavier than usual.
Too comfortable,
Far too settled to even think about lifting.
And the dimming moves into your cheeks,
Your jaw.
Your teeth part slightly,
So that long held tension simply switches off.
Your face becoming still and quiet,
At rest.
The cloud continues its slow crossing now,
And that quieting sensation moves down through your neck.
You feel the muscles either side of your throat,
The ones that hold your head,
That brace and carry.
They simply darken into stillness.
And your head sinks just a little further into whatever supports it.
And the dimming spills out across your shoulders.
Your shoulders,
Where so much is silently held.
And right now,
As that quieting settles over them,
Something releases that perhaps hasn't released in a very long time.
They drop,
And they let go.
And the sensation pours down through your upper arms,
Your elbows,
Your forearms,
And your wrists.
All the way down into your fingers,
Your hands.
Each finger growing still and heavy.
The sensation quietly dims there,
As if each one has simply switched off.
No longer needed.
Perfectly at rest.
That gentle darkening now moves into your chest.
And with every breath in and out,
You feel it settle a little deeper.
Your ribcage rises and falls with less and less effort.
And somewhere at the centre of your chest,
There is a quality of quietness.
Like a room after a long day,
With the lamps dimmed,
And the sounds of outside grown distant.
And all the held tension there simply softens into stillness.
And it moves into your stomach now.
And all those muscles across your abdomen,
Which are so often braced without you even knowing,
They receive this quieting and release completely.
Your breathing low and slow in your belly.
And the dimming spreads into your lower back,
Moving along that corridor of muscle beside your spine.
Vertebrae by vertebrae.
Each one surrendering into the surface beneath you,
Until your whole back is heavy and still.
Switched off.
Perfectly at ease.
And now the darkening reaches your hips,
And your pelvis settles and sinks,
As it moves down through the long muscles of your thighs,
Front and back.
Those powerful muscles that carry you everywhere through your day.
And right now,
They are asked to do nothing at all.
And they accept this.
And they dim and grow heavy.
Impossibly heavy.
Your knees soft and still.
And the quieting pours down through your calves.
Those muscles loosening completely.
Almost liquid in their stillness.
Down through your elbows now,
And into your feet.
The arch of each foot releasing,
Each toe settling.
The sensation dims there gently,
Quietly,
Completely.
And now your whole body,
From the crown of your head,
To the tips of your toes,
Rests under that soft still cloud.
Every region quietened.
Every muscle switched off.
And so your body has been gently and carefully set down.
And as you rest here,
In this extraordinary depth,
You may notice a thought that perhaps you should move,
Or shift a little.
And yet,
When you turn your attention toward your body,
You find it has grown quite unfamiliar with the idea of effort.
Your arms belong entirely to the surface they rest upon.
Your legs too settled,
Too still,
And too deeply switched off to contemplate lifting.
And this is not something to push against.
It is simply what it feels like,
To be this deeply,
This completely,
At rest.
Your body knows that it is perfectly safe to release all control right now.
And it has done exactly that.
Every system slowing to its quietest,
Most efficient rhythm.
Your mind calm and clear,
Like the sky when the bright glare has softened.
And the blue beneath becomes deeper,
Richer,
More itself.
Thoughts may drift somewhere at the very edge of awareness.
And they simply pass by you,
Without you needing to follow them anywhere.
You begin to understand that this stillness is not absence.
It is presence without noise.
This is what you are doing when nothing is being asked of you.
And it has been here all along.
This quiet place inside of you.
Waiting.
Patience.
Always available.
You are simply remembering the way back.
And now your mind in this deep and receptive stillness is open to everything I'm going to say.
And everything I say will settle into the part of you that knows exactly what to do with it.
Taking root quietly.
Growing stronger with each passing day.
You will carry the knowledge of this place with you.
Not the heaviness that belongs to this rest.
But the certainty that beneath the noise of any day,
This quietness exists inside you.
That you can find your way back here more easily,
More quickly,
Each time you need to.
Your body now knows the way.
You will find that tension leaves you sooner,
And that you notice it earlier,
Before it has a chance to build and settle.
And your body,
Having remembered what it feels like to be truly,
Completely still,
Will begin to seek that stillness naturally.
Releasing a little throughout each day.
Loosening with each breath.
Dimming when it needs to.
And resting when it can.
And when you return from this rest,
You will carry a quiet with you.
Like the quality of light after a cloud has passed,
And the world feels clean and settled and unhurried.
And that feeling will remain steady and certain as you move gently back into your day.
And in a moment,
I'm going to begin to bring you back.
Not all at once,
But very gently.
The way morning comes.
Not with sudden brightness.
With a slow,
Quiet gathering of light at the edges.
You may become aware first of the sounds around you.
Sounds that were always there,
Returning now to the foreground of your awareness.
And that's good.
Exactly right.
Allow those sounds to come in slowly.
This is no rush.
No urgency.
Simply the world waiting patiently for you to return in your own time.
You might begin to notice your breath again.
A little fuller now.
A little more deliberate.
And with each breath in,
You gather a little more awareness back into your body.
Beginning at your fingertips.
Just the faintest sense of them returning to you.
If you'd like to,
You can begin to allow your fingers to move.
Just slightly a gentle curl.
Nothing forced.
Just an invitation.
Letting your hands know that you're coming back.
And that returning awareness begins to travel now.
Back up through your hands,
Your wrists,
Your forearms.
The light beginning to return very gently.
The way sensation comes back to a limb that has been still for a long time.
Not all at once,
But gradually and warmly.
Your arms beginning to feel their own weight again.
Their own aliveness.
And your legs now.
You might wiggle your toes just a little.
Allowing your ankles to roll gently,
If that feels right.
Your calves and thighs waking slowly.
It's like a landscape emerging from the early morning fog.
You can take a slightly deeper breath now.
Letting your chest expand just a little more than it has.
Feeling the air fill you and stir you gently back towards wakefulness.
And your face now.
Perhaps a small movement of your jaw.
A gentle swallow.
You might notice the light through your eyelids.
Just becoming aware of it there.
Not yet opening your eyes.
Just noticing,
Taking a moment to appreciate how your body feels right now.
That deep,
Settled quality.
That quiet that is yours to keep.
And in a moment,
I'm going to count from one to five.
And with each number,
You'll feel yourself returning a little more fully,
A little more brightly.
Until at five,
Your eyes will open easily and naturally.
You'll feel calm,
Clear and refreshed.
As though you've had the most restoring sleep.
One.
Awareness returning to every part of your body now.
A gentle aliveness moving through you,
From the tips of your toes,
To the crown of your head.
Your body remembering itself.
Two.
Becoming more aware of the room around you.
Temperature of the air and the surface beneath you.
Feeling pleasantly alert,
Comfortable,
At ease.
Three.
Halfway back now,
You might take a deeper breath here.
Let it out slowly.
Feel how good it feels to breathe fully.
To feel the quiet still present,
Even as you return.
It isn't leaving,
It's coming with you.
Four.
Almost fully back now,
Your mind clear,
Your body rested and refreshed.
You might feel a natural desire to stretch,
To move.
You can begin to do that gently if you wish.
Allowing your body to wake in its own way.
And five.
Eyes open now,
In your own time.
Gently.
No need to rush.
Taking a moment before you sit up.
Let yourself arrive back fully.
And when you're ready,
You can sit up slowly.
Carrying that quiet with you,
Back into the rest of your day.
