Midnight Calm: Quiet Your Mind

Your eyes can be open or closed,

If you've got a blanket please put it over you because your body temperature will drop.

Have your arms alongside the body,

Palms face up,

Feet hip-width apart,

Let your toes fall out to the side and just take a moment to get comfortable here.

A few deep sighs might come,

Nice to take a long deep breath in if you can and sigh it out,

Letting go.

Wiggle your back and shoulders,

Flatten the shoulder blades,

Make yourself comfortable.

And naturally when we come to relax,

Sometimes we then notice how busy our thoughts are,

How busy our mind is,

Welcome it all.

You might notice that there's sounds in your surroundings and maybe other sounds that come through from my end as well,

I'm at home with my daughter and a dog.

But just allow it to be all part of this,

You know,

We are no longer in an age where we can necessarily get perfect environments,

So what this does for us is allows us to accept everything that comes,

Invite everything that comes.

I'm going to invite you now to take a long slow breath in and hold that breath at the top,

One,

Two,

Three,

And then blow out the air through your mouth.

Again,

Inviting a long deep breath in,

Hold it,

And then through pursed lips just blowing the air out.

And then repeating that on your own again,

And then just returning to normal breath pattern.

Everything about this is simple,

Keeping everything really simple to relax the body.

And all I'm going to do is guide you through the body parts and you relax and feel what's going on in that area.

So allow yourself to just put aside any,

Any work,

Any concerns,

Any discernible hint of tension in the body,

Just allow it to drop.

And then beginning at the top of your head,

Just feel the top of your head and notice if you've got any sensations there,

Can you feel anything there?

And then take your attention now down to your toes,

All the way down into your feet,

Toes.

You might instinctively want to wriggle them,

That's okay too.

And then just mentally repeating to yourself,

I relax my feet,

My feet are relaxed.

Taking your attention now,

We're going to move up the body.

So relaxing the ankles,

Feel the calves,

Relax the calves,

The shins.

Feel your knees,

Notice if you can feel any sensation there,

Relaxing knees,

Backs of knees,

Sides of knees,

Knees.

Sometimes deep sides come,

Just bring it all in as part of your experience.

I relax my feet,

My calves,

My knees,

My feet,

Calves,

Knees are relaxed.

Taking your attention now to your hamstrings,

Your thighs,

Your upper legs.

And then to your hips,

Your pelvis,

Your lower spine,

Your lower back.

And just relaxing the body,

I relax my upper legs,

My hips,

My lower back.

Gently and softly,

Softly letting go.

Allow yourself to feel held and supported by whatever you're lying on.

See if you can just relax 10% more.

This wave of relaxation continues up the body,

Through the torso,

Through the front of the body,

Through the sides of the body and through to the mid and upper back so that the whole of your torso is starting to relax and let go.

I relax the back,

Front and sides of my torso.

I allow my torso to relax and my body gets heavier as I let go.

I relax my shoulders,

My arms and hands.

My shoulders,

Arms and hands are relaxed.

My shoulders,

Arms and hands relax.

Allowing this wave of relaxation to continue up the throat,

The neck,

Up through to the face,

The jaw,

The forehead,

The temples.

Even the ears get some tension to relax.

I relax my neck,

My face and head.

My neck,

Face and head are completely relaxed.

Breathing in I feel nourished and breathing out I let go of tension.

Let your whole body relax into whatever you're lying on.

There's nothing to do,

Nowhere to be,

Just here.

Feel your whole body now.

As you breathe in,

You can imagine yourself filling up every single cell of the body with vitality and nourishment.

And as you exhale,

Letting go of tension,

Anything you don't need.

Our breath moves up the 70% of toxins from inside our body.

Allow it to just serve you,

You don't need to do anything else,

Just breathe here as you relax the body deeper and deeper.

Just remind it how to relax.

Don't worry if the mind is going.

Welcome all of it in.

If it helps,

You can repeat these words mentally as you breathe.

So as you breathe in,

You say,

I am.

And as you breathe out,

Here.

Mentally,

Just repeating that to give your mind something to focus on.

I am on the inhale.

As you exhale here.

If you've got any particular part of the body that still feels a bit tense.

Go to the area with the breath.

Just gently see if you can melt that tension.

So breathing in very slowly to meet the resistance or tension.

And on the exhale,

Just letting go.

There's no forcing needed.

Just this melting like action.

It may take a few goes to do it.

We get used to going about our day holding and contracting.

And when we lie down and relax and do this sort of guided relaxation.

Tension will come up and that's quite natural.

So just tell that area to relax and let go.

And use your breath gently and softly.

Maybe you can feel yourself expanding as you relax and the body lets go.

I am here.

See if you can imagine yourself being held.

Well you are being held completely by what you're lying on.

See if you can give your weight to it even more.

See if you can melt into it a little bit more.

So that there's this grounding aspect.

So that there's this letting go.

Allowing yourself literally to evaporate tension.

See if you can notice any tingling in the body.

And as you anchor and allow yourself to rest in this place.

See where you can find space in the body and the breath.

Be curious,

Look for the space.

Look for the areas of expansion,

Of openness.

Maybe your breath feels smoother now.

Maybe there's been some relaxation in the shoulders and neck from lying down.

Look for the areas that feel open and relaxed.

And now look for the areas where you haven't got any sensation.

Where you might not be in touch with,

You might not have any feeling there.

Look for where those areas are.

Just spend some time scanning the body,

Bottom to top.

And just wherever those areas are where you've got no sensation.

They might feel numb.

Just spend a little bit longer with your attention on them.

And see if you can bring some sensation there by focusing on it.

You can mentally visualize taking your breath to that area.

And then just come back to those areas that feel open and spacious.

Where there's a sense of expansion,

Of relaxation.

And now see if you can expand that relaxation to the whole of the body.

So that you feel like you've got this whole space within your physical being breathing.

Into this huge,

Spacious place within you.

And then release and relax.

Slowly bringing attention back to your toes.

Wiggling toes.

You can turn your head gently from side to side.

And then we'll just use these next few moments.

You don't need to get up yet.

But just start to deepen the breath.

And you can exhale out through the mouth.

Releasing anything you don't need anymore.

And then stretch the body.

So stretch the arms up ahead.

Stretch into the toes.

Flex the feet back.

Point the toes.

Make wrist circles with your arms.

With your hands rather.

And just staying where you are.

Rubbing your hands together to create some heat.

And then just cup them over your eyes.

So that there's space for your eyes.

But you can feel the heat of the hands going into the eyes.

You can repeat that a couple of times.

And then taking your fingertips and pressing really firmly into the scalp.

Give the head a bit of a massage.

Find any areas that feel tense.

Open them up.

For me it's usually my temples and my jaw.

So have a look around and see where it is on your neck,

Face,

Head.

And just give it a bit of attention.

And you can,

If you want,

Just start to tap all around the head.

Be quite firm.

And then you can squeeze the muscles of the shoulders.

And go around your neck.

Just start being curious,

See what your body needs.

And then you can open your mouth up really wide.

Because this helps open up the jaw.

Into those areas.

And then just use your hand to pat around the body.

As far as you can reach.

And then you can take another stretch.

Taking the hands out in front of you.

And just start to,

Well you may not even have to go anywhere now.

You can stay there and relax if you need to.

But we are just coming to the end of our session.

Enjoy your relaxation.

And I will see you next week.

Thank you.