To Run With Wolves

Transform yourself and embrace the energy of the wolf in tonight’s folklore-inspired bedtime story – perfect to enjoy as we approach the Autumn Equinox.

In tonight’s story, you are the recipient of a strange fairy bestowal: to take the form of a different animal at each Full Moon. As the day wanes, you reflect on the many forms you’ve taken over the last year, and how much you’ve learned from the experience. You look forward to tonight’s incarnation in your favorite form: that of the wolf. As the moon rises, you awaken to your wildest self and embrace the freedom of the forest.

Music/Sound: A Glimpse of Avalon by Flouw, Is It Still Yours by They Dream By Day, Epidemic Sound

Transcript

Transform yourself and embrace the energy of the wolf in tonight's folklore-inspired bedtime story,

Perfect to enjoy as we approach the autumn equinox.

Sleep and Sorcery is a folklore and fantasy-inspired sleep series.

My name is Laurel and I'll be your guide on tonight's fantastical journey.

Sleep and Sorcery is one part bedtime story,

One part guided meditation,

And one part dreamy adventure.

I'm here to help you fall asleep.

Listen to my voice for as long as it serves you,

And when you're ready,

Feel free to let go of the story.

If you're still awake as it comes to a close,

I'll guide you through a gentle meditation for authenticity and opening the throat chakra.

In tonight's story,

You are the recipient of a strange fairy bestowal,

To take the form of a different animal at each full moon.

As the day wanes,

You reflect on the many forms you've taken over the last year and how much you've learned from the experience.

You look forward to tonight's incarnation in your favorite form,

That of the wolf.

As the moon rises,

You awaken to your wildest self and embrace the freedom of the forest.

Do you know what you are when you are sleeping?

Are you a body or soul,

Or an occult and mysterious thing?

The book of Taliesin,

Translated by Christopher Hughes.

Tonight is a wolf moon.

You've been waiting for the wolf moon.

Already you can feel the tingling in your fingers and toes that presages the change.

Tonight you'll run and howl with your sisters and brothers and your wolf mother.

It's been too long.

Each form has its blessings,

Its wonders,

Its lessons,

Though at first you were reluctant to learn them.

When this gift first came to you,

You believed it a curse,

And in a very real sense it was.

On a darkened road on a stormy evening long ago,

You failed a test of honor.

You neglected to help a poor woman who begged for your assistance.

You had food enough to give her,

And you had the means to bring her to shelter,

And yet you scorned her.

Then as you turned your back,

You saw a flash of blinding light and heard a note of music sweeter than any you'd heard from harp or lute.

It was as if the very forest sang together,

A choir of trees and plants and birds.

And when you looked,

The poor beggar woman had transformed into a brilliant fairy queen.

Her hair was red as the sun in summer,

And her eyes were golden green as the glade at dawn.

She blazed,

Beautiful and sorrowful at once.

Immediately you knew that you'd been tested,

As so many of the tales of the forest have told.

The fairy queen,

In all her strange glory,

Sentenced you at every full moon to roam this wood in the guise of one of its creatures,

That you might begin to understand the lives of others and live your own life with more empathy and care,

To wake outside one's own skin in all the innocence and ignorance of being born,

To navigate the unknown realms of the world on unfamiliar feet or wings or fins.

You feared the transformation then,

And the never-knowing whose eyes you'd look through on the night of the full moon.

Having returned to the city,

You tried in vain to erase the image of the fairy queen from your memory.

You tried to carry on with your carefree existence,

But as the moon tilted toward her fullest expression,

You quivered with eerie anticipation.

How would it feel?

What would you become?

On the night of the harvest moon,

You sat in your chambers within the great city.

From your window,

If the night is clear,

You can see the tops of the trees in the old wood beyond the city walls.

If the town is quiet,

Sometimes you can hear the wolves a-howling or the night birds whistling.

You waited for the moon to rise and shine her autumnal golden light over your surroundings,

But you never saw that moon through your own eyes.

You must have fallen asleep in waiting by the window,

For soon you awoke,

Nestled under dead leaves.

Your limbs folded beneath you in this unusual resting place,

Felt flexible and soft,

Teeming with potential energy.

You felt buoyant,

Alert and alive.

Every inch of your body a tingle,

Suffused with a sense of cool,

Pillowy lightness.

You had come to learn that this sensation was unique to the form.

It was the absorption of nourishing breath through your very skin.

You could take in the glorious nutrients from the air when nestled among the leaves,

But you could also find it in water,

For as your powerful limbs at last revealed,

You had taken the shape of a frog.

Like the fairy tale prince,

You first rejected the guise of things so antithetical to the you you knew,

Proud,

Poised and dignified.

You longed to cast away this mask and return to your truth,

But now how differently you feel.

How alive,

How attuned you are to the rhythms and the cycles of the earth and of the spheres.

How much you've come to cherish the frog's ability to walk two worlds,

The one above the surface of the water and the other below.

From the frog form you learned true sensitivity and true vulnerability,

And you learned to hide in plain sight.

You felt song swell as naturally as breath in the depths of your belly,

And you felt power surge through your small frame.

On the next full moon,

After a long day of wringing your hands and pacing the halls,

You at last succumbed to sleep and awoke with frosty grass beneath your feet.

Your senses sparked,

Picking up the mingled sense of aster and butterfly weed,

Of dying trees and fox fur.

You could feel your muscles twitch,

Tense and relax,

Over and over,

Waking and resting,

Always prepared to flee.

You could hear the crackle of the frost and the groaning of the trees deep in the forest.

The swift wing of an owl,

Still far off enough to make a quick escape if it came your way.

And when you did spring into action,

What powerful bounds you made in the shape of the hair,

Your fur already turning white to meet the coming snow.

In that form,

You discovered tunnels deep in the earth,

A labyrinth of burrows in which cool clay meets organic warmth,

And stories are shared over foraged foods.

In the twinkle of an eye,

The twitch of a nose,

By the time of the third full moon,

The days had begun to grow very dark.

The wind blew cold through the trees on its way to the city,

For it would wrap around the structures like a sash and squeeze.

You fell asleep under layers of blankets and awoke among a thousand blinking fireflies.

You were leaner,

Stronger than you'd been before.

You'd become a sleek,

White part.

In this shape,

You encountered the soul of this most elusive creature,

The object of so many a hunt and so many a nightly desire.

You felt the stirrings of the quest it initiates,

The threads of the dance it leads into the spiral heart of the forest,

The eternal reverberations of that desire,

The hunt,

The dance.

As your waking world darkened,

Your sleeping soul ventured further into the forest.

Your waking step became more cautious,

Your eyes opening wider to the world around you,

The people around you.

Once in the night,

You woke in the form of a black bird called to a frenzied flight.

In deep December came the blue moon,

So that in the month of blanketing frost,

You found your soul first take the shape of a tawny owl,

And then the form of the oak tree in which it nested.

As the owl,

You learned the meaning of scarcity and self-reliance,

Of solitude in midwinter.

As the tree with your roots deep in the earth connected to all your brothers and sisters,

You learned new ways of knowing,

Knowing by nutrients,

Water and sugar,

Knowing through networks of roots,

Fungal filaments and soil relationships.

You were home and harbor to many of the forest's creatures.

Effortlessly,

You bestowed the gift of shelter upon them,

A gift you had once refused a poor woman,

The fairy queen in disguise.

Each moonlit turn on hooves,

Wing and root brought you further from your own experience and yet deeper into yourself.

The heart is slow to change,

It resists,

But moon after moon you felt yours begin to yield.

You softened to the hardships of the hair,

The flight of the white heart,

And the softness of the frog,

So much so that you turned your gaze in waking life toward the needs of your community.

And you made,

For the first time,

An effort to share your wealth and bounty,

But it was not till the wolf moon that you yourself were truly transformed.

For days leading up to the moon's crescendo,

You heard the wolves howling in the wood.

Their cries traveled on the whistle of the wind,

A chorus both haunting and enticing.

And under that hungry moon,

You awoke on four strong legs,

With your eyes sharp and mind focused.

What struck you first was the trembling,

At first you thought it was your own body shivering in the cold,

But you did not feel the icy bite of frost,

In fact,

Under winter layers you felt warm and content.

No,

The tremble came from outside your body,

From deep in the ground,

Tiny quivers that expanded to awesome quakes,

An oscillation like music from the center of the earth,

And all this you could feel from the pads of your paws.

The movement was constantly changing shape,

Evolving.

You tried to make sense of it,

And could not,

Not just yet.

You stood on a great rock,

Overlooking a river which bellowed beneath,

A rapids folding with white foam.

Snow lay thick on the banks,

And the bare trees were delicately coated with ice.

As the wind swayed the branches,

You could hear the ice crackling and snapping.

You heard a nightjar some ways off,

You could hear the breath even of a hare at the mouth of his burrow,

Keeping still to camouflage his presence from you.

You could feel how the movements of plants,

Animals and mankind,

Even at a distance,

Affected those wavering vibrations from the ground,

It all built within you,

Humming up from your paws where they met the earth,

Buzzing through your limbs and core,

Building in your bones to a great culmination,

The howl,

Climbing a helix of breath,

Escaped on the night,

Tremulous and unrestrained,

That first howl was so deep,

So full,

Like an exhale long awaiting its moment of release,

As if you'd held your breath for a hundred years,

And finally let go,

It reached so far on the night wind,

That you thought it might echo off the moon,

Or melt the very snow,

In the silence that followed as your great howl disappeared into crackling frost and surging water,

You felt the brisk edge of solitude,

Even knowing of the forest's great multitude of souls,

You felt for just that moment,

As if you were the only one,

The only thing in the world,

Solitude settled upon you like a layer of snow,

Sparkling on your fur,

And for the first time,

You yearned for the company of others,

In the space between that longing and the blink of a star,

There came an echo,

A whisper of the same cry you'd just released,

Then the echo was joined by a harmony,

And soon a choir of howls arose in the valley beyond,

Ascending round the tree trunks,

To light the night with bane,

They came like a winter storm,

All gray and white in the moonglow,

Thunderous and swirling,

The pack,

Your family,

They knew you,

Your scent and your spirit,

That you'd never seen through these eyes before tonight,

In the language of wolves,

Sound,

Scent and sinew,

They welcomed you as an initiate,

You moved as one body through the forest,

Keenly attuned to one another's signals,

But oh,

To run with the wolves,

This was the sublime,

The awe-inspiring,

Breathtaking,

Indescribable,

When you ran together as a pack,

You leapt on the lightest feet,

You fell away from yourself,

From all fear,

You dissolved into the rout,

You darted through the trees,

Each of you surging like rapids,

Diverging like tributaries,

Sliding in and out of a river on a course to the same end,

There was almost no separation between you,

But at the head of the pack,

Her coat glistening by moonlight,

Was your mother,

You knew it the moment you caught her scent,

The bond between you was palpable,

In an instant you placed all your trust in her,

She was like a trail of blazing light through the forest,

A beacon to follow,

And when you ran all together,

The forest was most alive,

It breathed with you,

The trees seemed to bend from your path to let you pass,

The ground frost-bitten and damp with dead leaves seemed to swell into place to meet your thundering feet,

Every sense seemed to have a new dimension,

Wind invisible to your human eyes carried a signature you could see,

Light had a smell,

Sound had a feeling,

The experience of it was like nothing else,

To run on the edge of the night,

Alive and sparkling in the wild woods,

When you awoke to dawn's golden haze,

You dearly missed your brothers and sisters,

The mother at the head of the pack,

You could still feel faintly the thrum of the earth in your feet,

Harmonizing with your heartbeat,

But as the day lengthened,

Your vulpine senses slackened,

Try as you did to retain them,

Still,

Having woken from that wonderful dream,

If you can call it such,

Of running with the pack,

You clung fiercely to your newfound sense of the collective,

Just as the alchemists,

By their strange experiments,

Make new and finer metals from the ores of the earth,

You were reforged by that night,

You emerged from the wolf pack in a sense purified,

Ready at last to forswear your great riches in favor of astounding charity,

Ready to work with your hands,

Ready to give more than you take,

Trusting that that which you put into the world will come back to you,

As the trees send nutrients to each other through their root systems,

And the animals of the forest dance through a natural cycle of thriving and sacrifice,

Combining efforts to build a stronger whole,

At the following moons,

You learned the cleverness of the wren,

The wisdom of the salmon,

And the playfulness of the otter,

Each new lesson became a pillar to enrich your sense of community,

Compassion,

And generosity,

You have turned,

Like the world,

Toward light,

And the forest has endless lessons,

It seems,

Endless creatures,

Souls,

And minds,

Each with an entirely unique experience,

You could waltz with the moon every month,

For your whole life,

And never capture it all,

Which is why it's so strange,

So exhilarating,

That tonight,

Before the sun even sets,

You can sense what's to come,

Your fingers prickle,

And your heart flutters,

Knowing that the pack awaits you,

How is it that the fairy queen will allow you to revisit your favorite form,

As she watched your transformation all this year,

As she decided that your punishment,

Though it's been some time since you thought of it as such,

Should be ended,

You move through the day in a kind of anticipatory haze,

A frisson of expectation,

The little hare is standing up straight on the back of your neck,

It's as if you can feel the howl building on its spiral within you,

Before you even take the honored shape,

The city,

Unaware of your curious lunar escapades,

Continues about its business,

At a regular pace,

The natural world is kept at bay outside its walls,

But you can feel the pulse of padding feet,

Reaching roots,

And swift wingbeats,

Still,

You purchase fresh fruit from the market,

Tossing apples to the children who always hang around here,

With hungry eyes,

Then you turn to head for home,

Dusk is settling,

And with it a chilly mist,

It is autumn once more,

For the first time you realize that tonight is the harvest moon,

It's been a year since first you since first you leapt with frogs,

A year since you received the curse that became a gift,

This lifts your heart,

Some say people can't change,

But oh how much you've changed in a year,

How much richer you feel,

Even if your pockets are lighter,

Now that you know the love of a community,

When you come to the steps of your stately home,

You're surprised to find someone sitting there,

Upon the threshold,

She is dressed in peasant's clothes,

A shawl wrapped tightly around her shoulders,

To protect against the briskness of the evening,

But even in such a disguise,

You know her,

My lady,

You say,

A quiver rising to your voice,

The woman meets your gaze,

Her eyes golden green,

Come inside,

You entreat her,

And share a meal,

Will you,

It is the first time you've seen her smile,

She climbs the steps behind you,

And as she slips from the sight of the public,

Her costume falls away to reveal her full splendor,

Here stands the fairy queen,

You met all those moons ago,

On the darkened road,

At last,

You can offer her the kindness you once so carelessly refused,

Your suppers are more modest than they once were,

No longer lavish feasts,

But simple nourishment with little waste,

After all,

You've come to understand scarcity and subsistence,

So it seems foolish now to overlay the table with meaningless decoration,

Nevertheless,

In the company of the radiant lady,

It seems to you a table set for kings,

When you have supped enough,

And the sun disappears from the windows,

Leaving the fairy queen's own luster as the only source of light within your residence,

You ask her the reason for her visit,

I have watched you,

She says,

All this time,

I have seen your heart change,

This past year,

It's all you can do,

To calm the swell of pride that rises in your chest,

Though a little pride,

You suppose,

Is all right,

Under the circumstances,

And so,

Tonight,

She continues,

After a year of lessons,

I will lift the curse,

Now your heart sinks,

The seed of the howl deep in your belly shudders,

And dissolves,

Oh,

You reply,

Unable to conjure any stronger words for the lady,

You lower your eyes,

There's silence for a little while,

And you go to the window,

In the quiet,

You can almost hear the moon rise,

Beyond the walls and the woods,

You feel your heart swoon softly toward it,

Like the tides of the ocean,

At last,

You summon the courage,

To look back at the lady,

Bringing your eyes to meet hers,

The color of the forest,

Once more,

You plead,

I feel it in my bones,

Let me run with the wolves,

For one more moon,

Her expression is at first inscrutable,

She regards you as if you are the most mysterious surprise of the world,

And then it softens,

Frost melting from blades of grass,

Soil settling,

Roots deepening,

Once more,

She says,

She crosses to join you at the window,

Then gently touches your cheek,

With a soft hand,

There is magic in her fingertips,

You think,

She spins magic from the beams of the moon,

Good night,

My wolf,

You can still see her,

An imprint of her like a spiral of light,

Long after she's gone,

But the moon takes her place,

Hanging there in the sky,

With a voluminous presence,

It's red as the fairy queen's hair,

The howl rekindles in your belly,

And soon you welcome sleep,

To run with the wolves,

For one last glorious moon,

The pack is waiting for you,

Under a purple mist,

With the wildness of the wood,

And the wind,

And the whisper of winter,

You run,

You howl,

Morning comes,

As it always does,

You awake in your own body,

In your own bed,

In your own sunlit chamber,

As the day passes,

You expect the howl to fade,

Or your senses to dull,

But they never do,

More days pass,

More moons rise,

And the howl never leaves you,

It sleeps,

Deep within,

Your senses remain full,

Multi-dimensional,

And focused,

You walk with your own two feet,

But you are,

In your heart,

A wolf,

Loyal,

Committed,

Wild,

You continue to work toward the betterment of your community,

You continue to give generously,

Of your own wealth,

You walk in the woods,

From time to time,

Time to time,

Once,

You glimpse the pack,

They move on,

Uninterested in you,

Except for one,

The lone majestic creature stays behind,

Gaze locked with yours,

It's a brief moment,

Of extraordinary peace,

The eyes look just like your eyes,

And then the wolf moves on,

Rejoining the pack,

Take a moment to find some stillness,

In your resting place,

Letting your breath slow down,

And deepen,

The breath traveling in through the nose,

Down the throat,

And all the way into the belly,

Filling you up,

And releasing,

Breathe out through the mouth,

Allowing your body to soften,

And settle deeper down,

Let the mind be soft here,

Open and receptive,

Letting go of any thoughts or stresses that hang you up,

And simply focusing on the sensation of the body,

And the breath,

Moving through its constant cycle,

Swelling,

And receding,

Like the moon and the tides,

Keep breathing deeply,

The breath traveling deep into the belly,

Letting each exhale relax you more,

Soften you more,

Now tune into the sensation of the breath traveling through the throat chakra,

This passageway,

This threshold between the outer and inner worlds,

The homa of your voice,

Your song,

If you like,

You can let your exhale be audible,

Releasing it on a sigh,

Or even a gentle hum,

Feel how this creates a little vibration in the throat,

And makes it a little more spacious each time you exhale,

Keep breathing deeply and slowly,

Settling the body,

Letting the belly rise and fall,

Relax the arms and the legs,

The torso and the head,

And in your mind,

As your breath travels on its cyclical path in through the nose,

Down the throat,

Into the belly and out,

Passing again through the throat,

And sighing out through the mouth,

Begin to visualize a soft blue light that radiates from the throat area,

It glows a little brighter with each deep inhale,

As if you're feeding the energy with your breath,

And on each slow exhale,

The soft blue light dims slightly,

Preparing to recharge,

Breathe in,

The light pulsing just a bit brighter,

And expanding out a little bit more,

And breathe out,

On a sigh,

A soft whispering sound,

Or a gentle hum,

The blue light dimming and dwindling,

Keep breathing,

Maintaining the visualization of the soft blue light in and out,

With each breath,

Let the passage of your throat feel more open,

More relaxed,

Making space for your voice,

The expression of your deepest self,

Your authenticity,

Your unique experience,

Your own hell.

Now,

As you breathe,

Feeding and stoking the soft blue light,

Allow it to expand slowly,

Pulsing with your breath,

To envelop the whole of your body,

And expand yet more,

To shine on your surroundings,

Breaking down the boundaries between your inner and outer worlds,

Connecting you to your space,

Your environment,

Your pack,

Your community,

And well beyond.

Think of the web of connections you weave each day,

And how your voice,

Your deepest,

Most authentic self,

Travels that web,

Changing shape sometimes,

To move into and through different spaces,

But always grounded in a true you which abides.

Think of your voice as the song of that deep,

Abiding you,

The song of your soul,

An individual,

A unique collection of experiences,

And part of a larger whole,

A network of souls and stories.

Feel how this web,

This network,

Supports you,

Cradling you on your way to sleep,

Breathe,

Relax,

Sweet dreams.

Reviews

I heard like none of this …..ZzZzZ 😴I fell asleep so quickly. Your stories have a way of putting me right to sleep. I will definitely be listening to it a bunch more to try and actually hear the story. Thank you. Your stories are greatly appreciated.

This was a great way to connect with nature and my spiritual self. Thank you for sharing this experience.

I always enjoy this story! The imagery is lush and it's beautifully crafted.

This is a wonderful story to easily fall asleep with.

As always such a helpful story. The beginning was so interesting and soothing then I only heard the good night ending so must have drifted off. On the good night I fell asleep again. Absolutely the only way I have found to be able to consistently get to sleep is listening to your stories. Thank you so much, looking forward to listening to the new ones as well. 🙏

Many lessons within this story and very fitting for the current time in society. The strengthening of our communities is very important. Blessings 🙏✨💕

Your work is wonderful. Your commitment to bringing insight to the inner workings of the soul is a wisdom experience for all those who listen.
Thankyou

A wonderful journey, full of insight and imagery. Thank you! 💖

I really like the story.

The AI generated "wolf" image is nightmare fuel though.