Portugal Stories For Sleep | Grounded Sleep Podcast #90

Good evening,

My sleepy friend,

And welcome back to the Grounded Sleep Podcast.

And tonight,

As we fall asleep,

I wanted to share my recent journey to Portugal,

Where I had the beautiful opportunity of teaching a retreat.

And so,

Before I go into that journey,

Get ready for bed,

As always.

Make sure your teeth are brushed and your pajamas are on,

And the lights are off.

All the animals are settled,

The plants are watered,

And be in that nice,

Comfortable,

Almost nest of your bed.

And the calmer you can be as you fall asleep,

The more likely you're going to have a really restful night.

So as you start to close your eyes and let your body just melt into the mattress,

I'm going to share some of my journey recently in Portugal,

Some of the history of Portugal,

And the beautiful retreat center that I got to teach at,

Monte da Orada,

Which is in central southern Portugal.

So take a few deep breaths with me.

Let's start to really ease into the night.

And if you've never been to Portugal,

You can kind of take that journey with me this evening.

Portugal is all the way to the west of Europe.

It's west of Spain.

It's above North Africa,

Morocco.

And Portugal has a very long history.

People have been living there for thousands of years,

From Neolithic tribes to Celtic people to the Romans,

All the way to the Moors,

And then to modern Portugal,

Which was born around 1139 AD.

And Lisbon,

Which is the capital of Portugal,

Is one of the oldest cities in all of Europe.

And when you get to Lisbon,

You'll find all of these incredible winding streets,

Cable cars,

Tiny alleyways,

Countless restaurants.

It's on the water,

And you can just feel this very calm,

Laid-back vibe.

And our retreat center,

Monte da Orada,

Was about two and a half,

Three hours south of Lisbon,

In a very calm,

Sparsely populated region.

And when we got to the retreat center,

It was sunny,

It was warm,

It was peaceful.

And the center is sitting inside this valley.

There are no roads,

There's no noise,

There's this beautiful river you can walk down to.

And the retreat center had this really cool vibe,

A bit rustic,

A bit Alice in Wonderland,

With gardens and trails,

A beautiful dining hall,

All vegetarian food.

There was a sauna and a natural pool,

Even a teepee,

Where you could do fires.

There were a few cats that came with the property that would just lounge around with us,

A dog named Max that would come visit,

And just a lot of space to play and have class.

And just as I'm sharing this story,

Let your body relax a bit more,

And check in,

See if you're breathing deep enough.

Let the vibe of southern Portugal kind of seep in,

This laid back,

Calm energy.

Things might happen today,

They might happen tomorrow.

In fact,

At one point during the retreat,

The coffee machine broke,

And they said,

Yeah,

The guy,

He might come today to fix it.

He might not,

And it definitely took him a few days to get there.

And so during the retreat,

Each morning there would be yoga class.

After yoga,

We'd have breakfast as a group.

After breakfast,

We'd have class,

Where me and my friend Scott Stabile,

We would teach on a topic,

Some sharing,

And of course,

Meditating.

And after a few hours of class,

We'd go out,

Relax,

And have lunch.

And then in the afternoon,

Sometimes we'd come back for breath work,

Or people would go take a hike into the forest,

Or just relax.

One day,

We had a wonderful sound healer come in,

And we laid down for almost two hours,

While this beautiful Portuguese man played all of these different instruments.

And then each evening,

We would have dinner together as a group.

And then after dinner,

We would have class again.

And this was the rhythm of every day.

We'd move our bodies,

And in all honesty,

I would rest while the group took yoga,

And I would prepare for my teaching.

But we would move,

Eat,

Meditate,

Share,

Laugh,

Cry,

And there was a lot of time where we would really just connect with each other and make long-lasting friendships.

And there's something very special about the energy of going on retreat,

Where you separate from the world,

You turn off your phone,

You minimize that mental pollution,

And you just spend a week focusing on yourself.

A lot of us need that rest and that reset.

And right now,

As you fall asleep,

Perhaps you're getting some of that rest and some of that reset for yourself.

There's a legend of a woman named Arada who lived in this area,

Who has a very special spiritual presence.

And at the retreat center,

There's a carving of her in this small temple where you can go sit and meditate or pray.

And some of the legend is people sleep well while they're at the retreat center because of her energy.

So perhaps we can have some of her energy this evening,

Watching over us as we fall asleep.

And one of the things that I really loved about Portugal was that laid-back attitude,

That low-stress environment where you can be connected to nature and eat well and let your nervous system just relax.

And as you gently fall asleep,

Allow your muscles to let go of any tension from the day.

Maybe you loosen your jaw.

Allow all the muscles in your face to slowly unwind.

Allow that breath to deepen even more.

So this region of Portugal,

Sometimes people call it the Tuscany of Portugal.

It's got these rolling hills,

It's sparsely populated,

Very nice energy.

And one day we took the entire group to a gorgeous beach with dramatic cliffs.

There was almost no one there.

And there was this one little cafe on the edge of the cliff,

Looking over the beach,

Looking over the water.

And about halfway through our journey,

It started to rain.

So we all went inside,

Sat down,

Had a drink,

Some snacks,

And we just got to chat and connect.

And that was very special.

I have a friend from Africa,

From the country of Cameroon,

Who would tell me,

In the West,

Time dictates events.

So from 2 to 3 p.

M.

We meet,

And that is the event.

Where he is from,

Events dictate time.

We're going to go take a walk in nature,

And however much time it takes,

That's what it takes.

So the event dictates the amount of time.

And that is a much less stressful way to function.

Just notice,

You probably have time dictating your events,

Even how much you sleep.

But right now,

As you fall asleep,

Can you let that go?

See if you can turn the volume down on that part of your mind that always needs to dictate events.

One of the things I've learned living part of the year in Spain,

Being in Portugal,

Is how to slow down.

As you fall asleep,

Let yourself slow down until you begin to just drift away.

And just allow that stillness of the night to slowly bring you into sleep.

No effort,

No thinking.

Allow yourself to just have a deep rest.