If you are feeling exhausted but not quite able to rest,
If there is a kind of hum that won't quite settle,
If your body is tired but your mind is still turning over the day,
Still holding tension,
You're not broken.
Your nervous system is doing exactly what it has learned to do.
And tonight.
Something in your nervous system gets to remember something else.
Welcome to the Mindful Movement.
I'm Sarah Raymond.
I invite you to make yourself comfortable.
Let your body settle into whatever surface holds you.
And feel that support receiving your weight.
There's nothing more required of you tonight.
Nowhere to go.
Nothing to accomplish.
The only thing happening here is rest.
Allow your eyes to close whenever they feel ready.
Take your time.
Bring your hands together and rub your palms against each other.
Creating warmth between them.
Let that warmth build for just a moment.
As you feel the warmth build,
Place your palms over your eyes.
Feel the warm touch on your face.
Sense your eyes releasing.
The muscles around your temples softening.
And your forehead smoothing.
Rest here for a breath.
Now allow your hands to shift one to your heart.
And one to your belly.
Feel your own heartbeat.
Feel the warmth of your hands on your body.
The weight of them as they rest here.
Something in your body is receiving this.
Through contact.
Through presence.
You are holding yourself with great care.
Like someone who loves you completely.
Like someone who knows you have been carrying a great deal.
Hold yourself here.
Rest here.
Breathe here.
Now creating a bit more intention in your breath.
Breathe in through your nose,
And at the very top of that breath,
One small sip more.
And then release it all,
A long,
Slow exhale through your mouth.
Again,
In through your nose.
A tiny extra breath at the top.
And release.
One more double inhale.
Breathe in.
A little more.
And let it all go.
Something shifts with that breath.
Even just slightly.
Your body already knows.
Let the exhale on the next breath become sound,
Simply the breath releasing a soft sigh.
As quiet as you'd like.
The breath finding its voice.
In.
.
.
And out with the softest sound.
And on your next exhale,
A low hum.
You might feel it in your chest.
Your throat.
The bones of your skull.
A gentle resonance moving through everything it touches.
Breathing in.
And out.
Aum.
And then silence.
The breath returns to its natural rhythm.
But something of that resonance stays.
It lives in your body longer than the sound.
Let your breath continue on its own now.
The quiet rise and fall.
The exhale longer than the inhale.
Without effort.
The body breathing itself.
Your hands still resting.
Your heartbeat steady.
Something is already beginning to settle.
Let your awareness rest now on your face.
Simply.
Arriving here.
Notice the small muscles around your eyes.
They can be completely still and relaxed now.
Not holding any expression.
Simply at rest.
The space between your eyebrows can soften and widen.
Your temples.
Your forehead.
Smooth.
Release.
Move your awareness down to your jaw.
The place where much of the day gets held without even knowing.
The jaw can be unclenched.
The teeth not quite touching.
The muscles of your jaw releasing their grip on the day.
Your tongue resting in your mouth.
The muscles around your mouth relaxed with nothing left to say today.
Move your awareness down into your throat.
The place where words live.
Where the voice begins.
Your throat can be open and easy now.
Back of your neck lengthening slightly.
The front of your neck soft.
The muscles along either side of your neck can release now.
They have been holding your head up all day.
And they can set that work down now.
Your shoulders can soften away from your ears.
Your awareness can flow down into your chest.
Place where so much is felt before it becomes a thought.
Your chest can be open now.
The ribs expanding with each inhale.
And softening with each exhale.
Your heart beating in its own steady rhythm.
Your flowing awareness moves to your belly now.
Rising and falling on its own.
Each breath,
Arriving here without effort.
The muscles in your abdomen can release.
Any holding or effort now.
Everything you are feeling in these places.
Has been there in service of something.
And that something can rest tonight.
Your face is soft.
Your jaw,
Relax.
Your throat is open.
Your shoulders.
Release.
Your chest is wide.
And your belly is rising and falling.
As your body continues to relax.
And your thinking mind slows down.
Something is already shifting.
The part of you that manages.
And organizes and plans.
Is being given permission.
To set its work aside for the night.
And as it does.
Your deeper mind.
The part that has always known how to heal.
How to restore.
And how to renew.
Becomes more fully present.
Your subconscious mind is listening.
Even as you drift.
Even as the sounds of the world outside grow softer and more distant.
Even as thoughts begin to slow down.
And drift past like clouds.
That no longer need your attention.
Your deeper mind.
Hears everything.
And it knows exactly what to do with what it receives.
Let your body sink a little heavier into what holds you.
With each breath,
You move a little further from the surface of the day.
With each exhale,
You drift a little deeper into rest.
The threshold between waking and sleeping.
Is a place you may begin to know now.
The soft dissolving place where the edges of things blur slightly.
Where the need to understand.
Gives way to simply being.
Allow yourself to drift.
Deeper rest is arriving.
You are safe.
You are held.
You are moving further from the day now.
Further from the noise.
Deeper still.
Almost dreaming.
The hum of the day quietly complete.
As your body continues to settle further.
Somewhere in your awareness.
A place begins to take shape.
Of forest.
The ground is soft from recent rain.
The air carries pine and soil.
And the faint mineral smell of water nearby.
It is a clear night.
There is enough light from the moon that shapes are visible.
The path ahead of you.
The trees on either side.
The pale shimmer of something that might be a creek in the distance.
You are here now,
Standing at the edge of it.
And something in you settles just at the sight of it.
The ground beneath your feet is holding you,
Supporting you.
Present beneath you.
Receiving your weight.
The way the ground always does.
The trees are large.
Wide trunks.
Rough bark with the texture of something that has weathered many seasons.
Their canopy is far enough overhead.
That the forest feels spacious.
Something about the scale of them.
Releases something in your chest.
The vast size of the forest feels like relief.
There is one tree just off the path.
Wider than the others.
Your energy is called to this tree.
And your hands rest against it.
The bark is cool and solid.
Beneath your hands,
There is a sense.
Of energy,
Of presence.
A tree that has been through every season.
And through all of it,
The tree simply grew.
Experienced what came.
And released what passed.
Something in you responds to that.
A sense of release and relief.
Below thought.
You move to sit on the earth.
And your back finds the tree trunk.
Leaning against its bark.
Your weight.
Settling into it.
And the tree holds you.
Here with your back.
Against this tree.
Something inside your chest begins to ease.
The way a held breath finally releases without you realizing you were holding it.
It has been waiting for exactly this.
For a signal of safety to arrive.
Your body is receiving this safety.
This feeling of being held.
Your breath is slow now.
And from somewhere inside,
Something settles.
A recognition.
That you are not the sum of what you carry.
That you are not the exhaustion.
That beneath all of it.
There is something in you that is simply alive.
That breathes.
That doesn't need to be maintained or managed or held together.
Something that simply is.
And that something is resting now.
Resting against this tree.
In this forest.
In the dark and the cool and the quiet.
The forest holds you.
The night holds you.
The ground beneath you holds you.
And you are allowed to be held.
A settling moves through your body now.
Your whole body is receiving this.
Slowly the forest begins to soften at its edges.
The sounds become quieter.
The outlines of the trees are less defined.
Everything is moving gently toward the beautiful blur of sleep.
Simply let it go.
And as you let it go.
Your body sinks a little deeper.
A little heavier.
A little more completely held by what is beneath you.
This is what it feels like when your nervous system finally sets down its work.
This is what it feels like to be safe enough to rest.
Your breath is slow now.
The rhythm of someone who is nearly sleeping.
You are safe.
Everything that needed to happen today has happened.
Everything that needs to happen tomorrow.
Will be met by a version of you who has rested.
Who has been held by the night.
The night is holding you now.
You are safe.
Sleep.
Simply sleep.
You have done enough.
You are enough.
The forest is gone now.
There is only rest.
While you sleep,
Your body will repair what the day has worn.
Your system will recalibrate.
You do not need to do anything.
It is already happening.
You are healing now.
The night has you.
The earth has you.
And when you wake.
Many hours later.
You will carry something of this stillness forward.
A trace of the forest.
A memory your body holds even when the mind has moved on.
You you
