Good evening and welcome to this evening ritual meditation to help you close up your day and get ready for a great night's sleep.
So first you want to make sure that you're in a comfortable position and take a couple of slow deep breaths in through your nose.
Hold for a second and then out of your mouth with a long exhale.
And you made it through today.
Now you can just do a brief scan of your day taking special note of the things that you did well and giving yourself a little recognition for each thing that you did well today.
Even if it was just something small like making sure to give yourself some breakfast or getting a task done that was important to you to complete today.
And in addition to giving yourself that recognition for any opportunities to give some gratitude,
If you believe in any kind of a higher power,
This can be a time for you to say thank you.
Or if not,
You can just take a moment to give some attention to the things that you're grateful for in this day.
Maybe there was beautiful weather.
Maybe a friend or a family member said something kind to you.
Just give me some attention to that and some gratitude.
And as you're scanning through the day,
You might notice some other things that catch your attention that may not seem as positive or that may lead to planning or replaying,
Ruminating on what happened.
So for each one of those,
Like you just visualize that the scene or the image just leaves your mind and becomes a colorful marble,
Which represents a memory.
So it goes from something that you're keeping alive in the present to something that is just a memory from the past.
And each time something new comes up that your mind wants to think about from today,
You can just visualize putting it into a memory marble and sending it there to the past.
Taking a couple moments to scan through any of those kind of items coming up.
And also noticing if you're hanging on to anything that doesn't belong to you.
Maybe you're worrying about another person.
And you can just take this opportunity to trust them with their own life.
Whatever you're trying to figure out for them or worry about for them,
It's not yours and they're capable of handling it and they deserve the trust and the opportunity to do so.
So just visualizing whatever is theirs that you are hanging on to,
Sending that back to them.
And as you're relaxing,
Getting ready for bed,
Sometimes you might also notice that in addition to thinking about the day that's past,
You might be thinking about days to come,
The future.
And since you've already finished your day,
You've done the things that you needed to do today.
You've done all of the planning and preparing that you could for this day.
It's okay to close that up now.
And any time that planning or preparing for the future comes up in your mind,
I'd like you to visualize the image that represents it shrinking down into a time capsule that you can just send to your future self.
You can trust your future self to be ready to respond when the time comes.
You don't need to pull that incident from the future into the now to try to change it or fix it.
You'll be ready for it when it arises.
So just sending any future concerns into nice little time capsules to be encountered at the time that they occur.
And I'll just give you a few seconds to finish up any of that visualization of sending thoughts or energy that aren't matching to this present time of you going to bed,
Getting some rest.
Sending them where they are meant to be,
Which is not here and not now.
And you can even visualize as you take slightly deeper breaths that your exhale sends those things out away to where they're meant to be.
You can pause if you need more time,
But if you're ready for the next thing,
I want you to go ahead and think of your intention for this sleep.
What's your wish?
Would you like this to be rejuvenating,
Healing?
Maybe you'd like an exciting dream.
Maybe you just like a loving,
Snuggly,
Restful sleep.
Think of that intention.
Think about what that feels like when you're in that state.
Maybe you'll remember a time when you felt that way.
Remember what it felt like in your body.
See if you can recreate that a little bit in the present.
And finally,
We'll just relax the muscles a little bit so that you can drift off very easily.
So go ahead and just notice the muscles around your skull,
Your face,
Your jaw,
Your brows.
And just imagine and feel what it would feel like for them to loosen up and relax and let go.
You can imagine on your exhale blowing out the tension that you hold there,
Allowing that relaxation to roll down over your neck,
Your shoulders,
Your chest,
Letting those muscles loosen up and let go.
And imagining that relaxation spreading down over your belly,
Your lower back,
Your hips,
Your thighs relax,
Your shins and calves all the way down to your toes.
And any remaining tension,
You just imagine it rolling down through all of those relaxed muscles off the tips of your toes,
The tips of your fingers down into the earth where they can be absorbed and transformed.
Just imagine what you think to be a beautiful,
Relaxing color of light just shining down on any areas that remain tense,
Fully completing your relaxation and getting you ready for a restful,
Relaxing,
Refreshing night of sleep.
I'm wishing you a beautiful night with the sweetest of dreams and a morning waking up feeling refreshed.
Good night.
