Downriver

Welcome to our little rowing boat. The water here is calm and the river isn't wide, and we can just float along with the flow of the current. It is dusk and the sky is a deep gray blue. Can you see the first stars beginning to appear? Seems like the perfect moment to drift off. Before we set out on our journey downriver tonight, we're going to do a little lying down exercise. Tonight's exercise is a visualization. It will help you feel just a little bit lighter, maybe a little bit more peaceful too. So, when you're ready, let's begin. So no matter what's been going on today, whether it's been a busy day or a calm one, this is an opportunity to just put everything down, to let go of any inner chatter, and just find a place of rest in both the body and the mind. So first, get yourself comfortable in bed. Just taking a moment to pause, be still. And when you're ready, just taking a big, deep breath, breathing in through the nose and out through the mouth. And as you breathe out, just allowing the body to sink down into your bed, feeling the weight of the body, allowing thoughts to come and go. Just imagining steady a flow of warm sunlight, just flowing down through the body, dissolving any tension, any discomfort as it begins to fill the body, starting with the toes, moving up through the feet, the legs being filled with sunlight. The quantities of warmth, space, ease. As it continues to travel up through the body, up past the waist to the back and the stomach. It's as though just washes away any discomfort. Continues up through the chest and the back, into the shoulders and down the arms, all the way down to the hands and the fingers. Sense of relief in the body, stillness in the mind, as it continues to travel up through the neck and the throat into the head and face, all the way to the very top of the body until there's nothing other than that sense of stillness remaining. And now, just gently bringing the attention back to the body. So now you're nice and relaxed. Picture yourself easing into the most comfortable part of our boat. Feel free to stretch out and focus your attention on the things the boat passes as it floats slowly along. Going to begin our trip downriver. You'll relax into the rhythm as we float along. Over on the bank, there are three or four sunflowers standing together like a huddle of tall people. The sunflowers have study, pale green stalks with pale green leaves, fluttering in the air. Their round, yellow faces gaze out across the river. Something about the sunflowers seems calm and content. Nothing could really worry them and they nod their heavy heads as the water flows by. As we come closer, the sunflowers seem to be swaying. Perhaps they're dancing...