Whatever name we give to the mystery behind our lives.
God.
Consciousness.
The universe.
Tonight,
I simply rest in its presence.
I am here,
Breathing.
For these next few moments.
Everything can become simpler.
The day is complete.
Some moments brought joy.
Some brought lessons.
Some simply came and went.
And now.
Evening has gathered them all and carried them gently into the past.
The day can settle.
The body can become still.
Tomorrow will bring its own time for conversations.
And as I hear these words,
I remember something deeply reassuring.
My body already knows how to sleep.
Long before I understood language.
Long before I made plans.
My body knew.
It knew how to soften.
How to become heavy.
How to enter the mysterious landscape of sleep and return refreshed.
That wisdom still lives within me.
And tonight,
I give my body permission to follow what it already knows.
The muscles around my eyes soften.
My jaw becomes loose.
My shoulders settle.
And my breath discovers its own quiet rhythm.
Gentle.
Easy.
My heart continues its rhythm.
Life continues moving.
And I can rest inside that movement.
Somewhere,
Mourning is beginning.
Somewhere,
Evening is falling.
Across cities and villages,
Across mountains and islands,
Across every border human beings have drawn,
People are surrendering to sleep.
For a few precious hours.
We become beautifully simple.
Breathing creatures beneath an enormous sky.
I belong to this earth.
I belong.
There is comfort in belonging.
We rarely know how far our warmth travels.
A hand placed gently on a shoulder.
A moment of patience.
A few sincere words spoken at exactly the right time.
These small things move through the world and my life has left such traces too.
I have mattered in moments I may never fully know about,
Simply by being here.
That is a beautiful thought.
Whatever holds the stars in their distances.
Whatever guides planets through darkness.
Whatever intelligence allows a seed to become a tree.
Hold me tonight.
Let me feel surrounded by peace.
For these hours,
I become simply a human being at rest.
And beneath every role,
Beneath every story,
Beneath every achievement.
There is simply awareness.
And even that awareness can become softer now.
Sleep comes through allowing.
Through softness.
Through surrender.
Through trust.
Surrender can be a form of wisdom.
The wisdom of recognizing how beautifully life can continue while I rest.
So tonight,
I release the day.
I release every conversation into the quiet.
I release every question into a larger space.
And there is something else worth remembering.
Some of the most beautiful moments of my life were once completely unknown to me.
There was a morning before I met someone I came to love.
There was a day before I heard words that changed me.
There are places my eyes will see for the first time.
There are sunsets I have yet to stand beneath.
And as another breath leaves my body.
I can offer one final kindness to myself.
Thank you,
Body.
For carrying me through another day.
Thank you heart,
For continuing to feel.
The night is here.
Sleep is already finding me.
