| Length | 29:58 |
|---|---|
| Subject | Sleep & Bedtime |
| Best time | In bed, lights off |
| Position | Lying down, head on something soft |
| Style | A sleep meditation. Voice for about 16 minutes, then it fades out. No bell, no count back. Music underneath, and it keeps going after the voice stops |
About this meditation
A walled garden that only grows at night, and only while somebody is resting in it. Tonight that is you.
About 16 minutes, tense and release first. Only listen where it is safe to sleep.
Tense and release through the whole body to begin with, because falling asleep is a skill and that is the part that works. Then you sit on an old bench and the garden grows around you at the speed of your breathing. A leaf unfurls on the way out, a seed settles on the way in. It does not need you to watch it. Your resting is the gardening.
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Steven
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Who this is for
You are lying there hoping sleep turns up, and hoping has never once worked.
Falling asleep is a skill, and the part of it we skip is letting the body go first. The mind follows the body, not the other way round.
Only listen somewhere it is safe to fall asleep. Not in a car, not while anything needs your attention.
What happens in this meditation
We start with tense and release through the whole body, feet upwards, then everything at once. That is not a warm up. It is the part that does most of the work.
Then a walled garden that only grows at night, and only while somebody is resting in it. You sit on an old bench and it grows around you at the speed of your breathing. A leaf unfurls on the way out. A seed settles on the way in.
It does not need you to watch. Your resting is the gardening. There is no ending to get to.
How to get the most from it
The file runs half an hour, but I stop talking around sixteen minutes in and it fades away to nothing after that. You are meant to miss most of it. Not reaching the end is the meditation working.
Do not skip the tense and release to get to the story. That first part is the bit with the evidence behind it.
Set it to play without anything queued up after it, and put the phone face down and out of reach.
Questions people ask
What if I am still awake at the end?
Then you have had sixteen quiet minutes and the body is a good deal further along than it was. Start it again if you want to. Nothing has gone wrong.
Why does it say half an hour when the notes say sixteen minutes?
Both are right. Sixteen minutes of me talking, then it fades out slowly rather than stopping dead, so nothing wakes you at the end of the track.
Is there a bell or a countdown at the end?
No, and that is deliberate. It does not bring you back and nothing will jolt you awake.
I cannot picture the garden. Does that matter?
Not really. Let it be a feeling of somewhere walled and quiet instead. The breathing is doing more of the work than the picture is.
Read the transcript
The transcript follows the audio. Press any line to jump there.
0:00Foreign.
0:08Webb.
0:08And welcome to sleep in the Night Garden.
0:13And just a quick, gentle reminder before we begin totally,
0:17this meditation is designed to send you to sleep.
0:21So only listen to this.
0:24If you are somewhere safe, not while driving, not while doing anything
0:29that needs your attention, because you will fall asleep.
0:35So just allow yourself to become comfortable somewhere quiet
0:40enough that you can drift off part way through.
0:44And that's totally allowed.
0:47And that's the whole idea, is that you don't make it to the end.
0:52And let your head rest on something soft and let your eyes
0:57gently close.
1:05There's nowhere to be after this except in a deep, healing sleep.
1:15Something that's worth saying while you're still settling in.
1:19Falling asleep is a skill.
1:22We often lie in bed and just hope it happens.
1:26We think, we worry, we try to make something happen.
1:31But falling asleep isn't something you do, it's something
1:35you allow.
1:37And when you feel safe, when you feel comfortable, the body falls
1:42asleep on its own.
1:44It knows how.
1:46And once the body has fallen asleep, you simply allow the mind
1:50to follow.
1:52Your body.
1:53And your mind already know how to sleep.
1:57They've done it many times.
1:59When you're absolutely exhausted and it's time to go sleep,
2:03they'll just do it.
2:07So the only thing you need to do tonight is allow your body to
2:10relax.
2:12Nothing to fix, nothing to force, nothing to achieve.
2:19Just listen to my words, follow where I take you, and let
2:24sleep come whenever it's ready.
2:28It doesn't matter when you fall asleep, really.
2:31It doesn't let go of any goal.
2:40So we're going to do a small release throughout the body.
2:45And I always do this because I find it really helpful.
2:47And it allows the body to fall asleep.
2:51So just tense up your feet and your toes and your ankles and then
2:56let them go.
3:04And now we're going to tense up the legs and hold them really
3:07tight.
3:08And now just let them go.
3:17And then just do it with your torso and your bum.
3:21And then let it go and soften.
3:30And now we do the shoulders and the arms and your hands, fingers.
3:33Tighten it all up, hold it.
3:36And now just let it go and become really heavy.
3:45And now we're going to do the whole body.
3:491, 2, 3.
3:51And the whole body.
3:52Your toes to your forehead, eyes, tense, everything, everything.
3:58And now just let it all relax as if it's heavier than ever.
4:03And soften in this moment, Allow your body to soften.
4:15Breathing in sleep, breathing out the day.
4:31There's a garden somewhere, a small one.
4:35It's all walled in stone.
4:38And this garden is A little bit different.
4:42It only grows at night, and it only grows when someone rests there.
4:54Tonight.
4:56That person is you.
5:09You find yourself at a wooden gate.
5:13It's just slightly open.
5:15The last of the light is low and gold and soft, and it's just
5:21fading.
5:23You step through the gate.
5:25You don't have to push it.
5:27It opens for you.
5:32Everything here just happens.
5:36Inside, the air is cooler.
5:40There's a path of flat stones, still warm from the day.
5:46You walk along them slowly.
5:48No hurry.
5:51The walls are gently all around you.
5:55There's ivy on some of the stones.
5:59There's moss.
6:00In other words, At the middle of the garden there's a low bench.
6:17It's cushioned, old, and it's worn and very smooth.
6:24It's been waiting.
6:27You sit down and you let your weight sink into it.
6:34You let your shoulders come down, let your hands rest in your
6:39lap.
6:59And as you look around, the garden is quiet.
7:04You can see the little plants, but nothing is blooming yet.
7:11A few slender stems.
7:24And then you notice something.
7:26Something small.
7:28Something very slow.
7:37As you breathe out, a single leaf unfurl somewhere in the beds
7:42around you.
7:44Just one.
7:46Gentle, like a hand opening.
7:58And as you breathe in, somewhere, a seed shifts, settling
8:04a little deeper into the earth.
8:14And as you breathe out, a curl of green finds its way through the
8:18moss.
8:29You don't have to do anything with this.
8:33You don't have to try.
8:37You're already doing the work.
8:40The work is resting.
9:01Breathing in quiet, breathing out.
9:04Sleep.
9:07And as you settle, the garden begins to grow more around you.
9:12Quietly.
9:14You don't have to watch it.
9:16You don't have to help.
9:22You begin to notice a scent.
9:26Lavender maybe, or jasmine.
9:31Something soft and warm.
9:37The kind of scent that makes your shoulders drop a little more.
9:48And somewhere above you, the first star appears.
9:54You don't see it.
9:56You just feel the sky getting a little deeper.
10:04And all around you, the garden is filling in.
10:12It's all happening ever so slowly, almost like when you look,
10:17you can barely see it.
10:22You have to really slow down.
10:27You have to just be aware of your breath.
10:31And then you notice the climbing roses threading the stone.
10:37The honeysuckle along the wall.
10:41Long grass is soft against your legs.
10:46A pear tree somewhere, all in slow growing flowers.
10:57A small pond that you hadn't noticed.
11:02And it now has the water and lilies.
11:08None of it needs you to look.
11:12None of it needs you to wake.
11:16It grows because you're here.
11:19It grows because you're falling asleep.
11:25The stillness is the gardening tonight.
11:32And you've been trying so hard for so long.
11:36All the doing, all the fixing, all the carrying.
11:42Tonight you get to put it all down.
11:47You get to be the thing that rests the garden that does the rest.
11:55Breathing in, breathing out.
12:13The light has gone.
12:16The walls around you are soft in the dark.
12:20The garden is now becoming full.
12:23Every space has something gentle growing in it.
12:41It's your perfect kind of garden.
12:45You can't see most of it.
12:47That's fine.
12:49It doesn't need your eyes.
13:02Your body is heavy.
13:05It's warm and it's held.
13:10The bench is holding you.
13:12The garden is holding you.
13:18The night is holding you.
13:39There's nothing left for you to do tonight.
13:43The garden has what it needs.
13:47It has your rest.
13:49It has your breath.
13:51It has your stillness.
14:04Breathing in, breathing out, just allowing.
14:21And the garden grows a little more and you soften a little more.
14:32Breathing in, Breathing out.
15:01Nothing to do, Nothing to be.
15:25Just rest.
15:38The garden is growing.
15:48And you are sleeping.
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