Hi,
Ellen here with Head and Heart and I wanted to offer sleep or relaxation meditation.
This would be nice to do as part of a bedtime routine to prepare for sleep.
It also might be nice to drift off to sleep while doing it.
And I can't emphasize strongly enough that it is also nice to just dip into a state of relaxation and letting go throughout the day.
So maybe once or twice throughout your day when you just need a recharge.
We will begin.
So wherever you are finding a comfortable seat and become aware of your breath.
The in breath and the out breath.
It might be helpful to note internally I breathe in,
I breathe out.
I know that I am breathing.
Breathing the face,
Softening the shoulders.
And the mind will wander.
It's okay.
It's what minds do.
If you are human,
Which I think I can safely assume you are,
This is inevitable.
The wandering,
The thinking,
The future,
The past,
It truly is inevitable.
So it's not about not doing that or avoiding that or chastising when it does happen.
It's simply about noticing it.
Ah,
There I go again.
And coming back to the breath.
The in breath and the out breath.
You might even notice that you don't have to think about your breath.
Your breath knows what to do.
It's breathing whether we think about it or not,
Right?
So just return to this deeply wise and intelligent breath and let your body be breathed.
Beautiful.
And as you begin to let go,
I'll invite you to soften the muscles around the skeleton.
I'll invite you to rest and lean back into gravity.
Feeling the cushions underneath you holding you up.
Feeling into how interconnected everything is and resting in that,
Being held in that.
I might invite you to bring your hands to your belly.
Just breathe into your hands.
Feel the rise and fall of your belly.
Again,
You don't have to do anything to make that happen.
There's a way in which we hold ourselves and we carry things that we don't need to.
Our skeletons got us.
Again,
That reliable gravity that's got us.
Our breath is nourishing us.
And as you exhale on every exhale,
See if you can just let go a little bit more.
Feeling the feet and legs get heavy.
Moving up into the hips and pelvis,
Letting that get heavy.
Your arms and low back softening.
Feet and shoulders releasing into the ground beneath you.
Your brain softening in the skull,
Eyeballs loosening in the sockets and the jaw letting the jaw go slack.
Being held by this little micro ecosystem that we each in each of our bodies reside in.
And the hands rise and fall with every breath.
And I'll invite you to bring both hands to the heart,
Resting them on the heart.
Breathing into your heart,
Activating the heart and just wishing yourself well.
Just wishing this body and you,
Your being,
Your light,
Just wishing it well.
Be thanking yourself for carving these moments out to just rest.
And lean on and trust all that surrounds you and holds you.
You are not alone.
