Resting The Mind With Five Koshas And Yoga Nidra

Experience the ancient practice of Yoga Nidra—often called conscious sleep. This 30-minute guided session begins with a gentle awareness scan through the Five Koshas, or layers of being, to help you settle into stillness. From there, you’ll be guided into a deeply restful state where the body relaxes, the mind quiets, and awareness remains awake.

Use it as a mid-day reset or evening wind-down—a nourishing practice for calm, clarity, and renewal.

Transcript

Welcome to this Yoga Nidra practice.

Before we move into Yoga Nidra,

We're going to do a preparatory practice where we work with the five koshas,

The five layers of being.

We're going to move from the outermost layer into the deepest layers.

We're going to start with the physical body,

Our skin,

Our bones,

Our muscles,

Our tissues,

Our organs.

And with that,

I invite you,

If you haven't already,

To find your comfortable position.

You may want to lay in shavasana,

Maybe sit on a cushion on the floor or in a chair.

And as you find that position,

Notice if you're comfortable.

If not,

Maybe you need to wiggle around a little bit,

Make some adjustments so that your body can be comfortable being still.

If you're carrying a lot of tension and busyness into today's practice,

You may want to support your head,

Neck,

And shoulders,

Your upper back.

Maybe on the floor,

You can use a pillow.

If you're seated on a cushion on the floor,

Maybe you'll nestle up against a piece of furniture or a wall to support the back,

An upright posture.

In a chair,

Maybe you bring your feet flat on the floor and move to the back of the chair so that your back can be supported with an upright posture.

Do whatever you need to do now to make your body feel supported and comfortable moving into stillness and relaxation.

We're going to start our work today with the physical body with a body scan.

We're going to move our attention or our awareness through the various parts of the body.

This type of practice helps improve our relationship with our body,

Our ability to sense what's going on,

What it may be telling us,

The messages it's sending to us.

A body scan is also a great way to move out of your head and into your body,

Building a stronger connection between the mind and the body.

Let's start with bringing your attention to the back of your head,

The back of your neck,

Your upper back.

We can carry a lot of attention in this part of the body.

If you're noticing that,

Maybe you can take a deep breath and on the exhale,

Release any tension that's there.

Let's move our awareness to our mid-back,

The place where our ribs connect with the spine moving to the lower back,

To our glutes,

To our hips.

Noticing the back of our legs,

The back of the thigh,

The back of the calf muscle,

All the way down to the heel and to the soles of our feet.

Moving to the top of our feet,

Our ankles,

Moving our attention to our shin,

To our knee,

To the front of our thigh,

To where the thigh bone attaches to the torso.

And all of those muscles and tendons that allow us to bend at our hips,

To bend forward.

Let's move our attention to our stomach area.

If this is an area of the body that you feel particularly vulnerable in,

Go ahead and move your attention upward a little bit more.

Let's move our attention to our lower abdomen.

But if you're comfortable being here,

Let's notice the lower abdomen,

The upper abdomen,

Our ribs,

The chest bone and sternum,

Our chest,

Our chest muscles,

Maybe even sensing our heart in the center of our chest.

Moving our awareness to the top of our shoulders,

To our upper arms,

Our elbows,

The lower arms,

The back of our hands,

The back of our fingers,

Our palms.

What's there?

What can you sense?

Not just visualizing,

But sensing.

Moving to the front of our neck and our throat,

Our lower jaw,

Our upper jaw,

Where the two parts of our jaw come together.

Are we clenching our jaw,

Or is it nice and relaxed?

If we're clenching our jaw,

Can we release the teeth,

Separate them just a little bit?

And the tongue,

Is the tongue relaxed?

You might want to gently release your jaw.

Bring the tip of your tongue to the roof of your mouth,

Right behind your front teeth.

Noticing our cheeks,

The area around our eyes,

Our eyes.

Are our eyes opened or closed?

If it's comfortable for you,

Close your eyes.

If not,

Just soften your gaze.

Noticing our forehead,

Our eyebrows,

Our ears,

The area around our ears,

Our scalp,

Our skull.

Do we feel our brain?

No.

Now notice your whole body.

What's the sensation of the whole body?

Lying here,

Laying here,

What's the sensation of the whole body?

If you're laying down,

What does that feel like?

If you're seated,

Either on a cushion or a chair,

What do you notice?

Sometimes the body resists stillness.

If you're noticing that,

Maybe you need to shake your body a little bit,

Your arms and your legs,

Move around some more,

Maybe do a little stretching.

Sometimes our bodies resist resting and relaxing,

Being still,

Because they sense this need that they might be called on to get up and go.

To get up and tend to something.

Give your body the permission to rest.

Let it know it's okay to be still for the next several moments.

Let's notice the sensation of the energy in your body as we move to working with or noticing the energy body.

That's the part of the body that circulates energy through our systems,

Through our body.

What do you notice about your energy?

Is there a sense of aliveness or vitality?

A sense of stagnation?

Or maybe something in between.

Whatever you're sensing is fine.

There's no right or wrong here.

We're just noticing,

And we're staying as objective as we can to what we notice.

You may want to take note of something we discovered today in our physical body,

As well as our energy body.

And deal with that after our practice.

So no judgment,

No critiques.

We're just noticing.

But as we notice,

We might notice something interesting.

That the noticing itself shifts the body and shifts our energy.

The energy body is subtle.

And we work mainly through our breath when we work with the energy body.

How does the breath feel?

Are you breathing in and out through your nose or in and out through your mouth?

Generally,

In a practice like this one,

We breathe in and out through our nose.

But if that's not accessible to you today,

Breathing in and out through your mouth is just fine.

You may just want to slightly part your lips and breathe in and out through your mouth.

For a stronger connection to your body,

You may want to put your hands on your belly,

Palms down.

And as we do that,

We feel the body move as we breathe.

This is an example of how these layers are not separate and distinct.

They're interwoven.

There's a lot of interplay between them.

For example,

You may notice if you take a nice,

Slow,

Deep breath and then release that,

Your body softens.

And you may notice that when you relieve or release tension in the body,

Your breath slows and becomes more gentle.

Let's move to the third layer of being,

The thought mind.

We call this the lower level of the mind.

There's two things that we notice or that we can notice when we work with the thought mind.

One is becoming a witness to our thoughts.

And when we do that,

We notice that there's a separation between us and our thought.

We are not our thoughts.

That might be something that you observe.

The other thing when we're working with the thought mind is that we notice our thoughts.

What are they about?

As you worked with your physical body and your energetic body,

You may have had thoughts of,

Boy,

I feel really connected.

Or you may have thoughts of feeling disconnected and maybe numb in some areas.

Those thoughts are okay.

Let's open our awareness to our thoughts for the next couple moments.

And when we do so,

We may notice some silence at first,

But that's okay.

Give it a couple minutes,

Be patient,

And you should begin to see things that your mind is bringing to your attention.

What is in your thought stream?

Some things may be descriptive thoughts about what's going on in the moment.

Others may be thoughts about the past,

Thoughts about the future.

Some thoughts may come and go very quickly.

Other thoughts may be a little sticky,

And they want to stick around.

Notice what happens with these types of thoughts.

Can you resist the temptation of becoming caught up in those thoughts,

Boarding the thought train and moving away from the present moment?

If you noticed you've gotten onto a thought train,

That's okay.

Bring yourself back.

You may first come back to your breath,

And maybe bring your attention to your forehead and soften there,

And return to the role of observer,

The witness.

Let's move to the higher levels of the mind.

Not higher in the sense of better,

But higher in the sense of deeper,

Deeper into the mind,

And see what's there.

You may notice that you're connecting to wisdom,

To your intuition,

To that knowing,

That gut sense of things,

Which is another example of how these layers play together.

As we move to these deeper levels of the mind,

You'll want to see if you can't hold the awareness of your breath and your body,

Your thoughts,

But hold them loosely.

Maybe let them fall to the background as you bring your awareness to your wisdom and to your intuition.

If you notice a lot of movement or desire to move in the physical body or busyness in the thought mind,

See if you can't go deeper.

Let that movement and that busyness be there,

But move your awareness deeper into the mind,

Much like diving into a body of water,

Leaving the turbulence and churn of the surface and moving into an area of calm that supports you.

As you rest your awareness in this part of the mind,

You might be coming aware of a lightness,

Sensing a light in the center where everything else melts away and it's just your awareness of this light.

Let your awareness be fully absorbed in this light,

In this area of the mind of bliss and joy.

Let's rest in this area of the mind,

But also witness that our attention may move between the other layers.

You know,

If we noticed an itch or a twitch in our body,

Our attention may go there or a thought popped into our mind,

Taking our attention away from this deeper level,

This light at the center.

That's okay,

Just notice that.

Bring your awareness back to this bright light in the center.

If our attention moves away,

Maybe we take a deeper breath or see if we can't release more tension in a particular part of the body.

That might help us soften,

Even sigh,

And let us soften and settle and rest in this deep level of the mind.

Whenever your attention moves away,

Bring it back,

Bring it back to the light of your true self in the center.

And notice how that light radiates out into your mind and let your mind come to stillness.

The mind has a very loose conception of time.

It often doesn't stay in the present moment very often.

That's okay though.

We're just noticing when the mind moves away,

We catch that and we turn our attention back to the center of the mind.

And notice how it feels when we rest in the center,

How our mind can get quiet.

Hold the awareness of this being,

This level of being at the center,

And with it,

Hold an awareness of all five layers.

And just notice the interplay of moving from the deep to the surface,

The surface back to the deep.

Now we're going to move into a simple form of yoga nidra,

Where we rest deeply,

But remain awake and alert.

We're going to focus the mind a little bit differently here.

Let's bring your awareness to your eyebrow center.

The ajna chakra,

Right behind the forehead above your eyebrows.

In the yoga tradition,

A chakra is a wheel of energy that spins.

Notice,

If you can,

That wheel of energy spinning right behind your forehead,

Above your eyebrows.

Maybe you visualize that spot first,

And then expand that visualization to sensing the energy there.

And now imagine that you're breathing in and out of your eyebrow center,

The ajna chakra.

Breathing in and breathing out.

If your mind wanders away,

That's OK.

Bring it back to the eyebrow center,

And back to imagining the breath moving in and out of the eyebrow center.

Now let's release that imagination or that vision,

That sensation,

And move to the throat center,

The vishuddhi chakra.

The visual of the throat center in the center of your neck is the image of a moon,

A full moon.

Relax your thoughts.

Relax your throat.

And imagine breathing in and out from the throat center.

Let your body be relaxed and your breath smooth.

If your mind wanders away,

Bring it back to the full moon at the center of your throat,

Breathing in and breathing out.

And then gently shift your awareness to your heart center.

Not just thinking about your heart or visualizing your heart,

But sensing your heart center,

The anahata chakra,

In the center of your chest,

By your physical heart and spine.

Sensing the energy moving in that area.

You sense an energy of love,

Emotional well-being.

And imagine breathing in and out through your heart center.

Let go of the awareness of any thoughts of your physical body.

And let your awareness rest in your heart center,

Breathing in and breathing out through your heart chakra.

Gently let the awareness of your breath fall to the background and bring your awareness completely into your heart center.

Let your mind rest.

Let your mind be awake and alert.

And let your brainwaves come to stillness.

Let all thoughts be way in the background and rest in the stillness of your heart center.

If you've drifted off to sleep or into a train of thought,

Just come back.

Take a moment to breathe in and out through your heart chakra.

Come into stillness.

Let your mind be still.

If you're deep in stillness,

It's fine to remain there.

If you're ready to move out of the practice,

Bring your awareness back to your breath.

First,

Breathing in and out through your heart chakra.

And then let your awareness and your breath flow from your heart chakra through the throat center to the eyebrow center.

And then back through the throat center to the heart center.

Inhaling from the heart center,

Throat center,

Eyebrow center,

And exhaling back to the throat center and the heart center.

Continue with that rhythm and that flow for a few more moments.

And then let that energy and awareness flow from your eyebrow center to the base of your nose and then back to your eyebrow center.

So exhale from the eyebrow center to the base of your nose and then inhale back to the eyebrow center.

Let that rhythm be for a few more moments.

Coordinating your awareness with your breath,

Letting the mind remain still,

Flow through your body,

And become aware of the physical sensations as well as the energy sensations.

If you're lying down,

Turn onto your left side.

And whether you're lying down on your left side or seated,

Bring your awareness or your attention to the right nostril.

And let your energy flow through the right nostril and through the right side of your body to wake your body up a little bit.

Take your time.

You might want to begin to wiggle your fingers and toes,

Maybe wiggle your jaw,

Roll your shoulders a little bit,

Keeping the mind quiet,

The mind still.

And notice what is happening with your mind.

As you begin to move out of your practice,

And notice what your experience was during the practice.

We're just noticing,

No analyzing,

No judgment,

Just noticing what the experience was and what it included.

And may peace remain with you for the rest of your day.