My bed becomes a ship in the night
on a soft, undulating sea.
A sweet, crescent slip of a moon sends
lunar nectar between the sheets cascading over my flesh.
My bed is surrounded by sweet scent,
warmth and flavor of what is to come.

Sleep,
blessed mistress of the night.
She enters the altar of my body,
stilling the restless mind,
sending soft shivers of relaxation through the body,
embracing the longing of the heart.

-Constantine Darling

We begin by inviting the normal, analytically directive mind to become a passive, witnessing listener to its somatic body intelligence. Paying delicious attention without directive or judgment to the way the tactile body responds to life in every moment is an entryway to sleep. The central, housing landscape by which the subconscious/unconscious and emotional worlds communicate is through sensorial, tactile wavelengths or frequencies.

We introduce a language that romances the subconscious into dropping you into deep sleep. It is the same language needed when persuading a two year old to do something. Direct, cold orders generally don’t work. Coming around through the back door usually does. This is the language of the subconscious/unconscious. It ‘hears’ and understands through input from the senses of the body. We call this somatic intelligence. We describe ways for you to begin listening to what your body is telling you about what is working or not working. Not only does the subconscious ‘hear’ through its own senses of the body, but it also receives information from the external world, filtered through the body’s senses. We call this empathy. This external information either triggers us into nervous system overload (think of riding the subway during rush hour in New York), or into a calming letting go of that part of our mind that keeps us awake (think of quiet time--watching the sun set).

We can choose to have our conscious mind signal the subconscious into weaving this magical state of sleep for us by inviting our daytime, analytical, controlling mind to temporarily take a break from the driver’s seat. We call this romancing the daytime self into intermittently releasing words and descriptions as its primary form of communication throughout the day. The nervous system can’t unwind through cognitive description. It unsderstands through a somatic, visceral response to the environment. This is not to say that the conscious, analytical mind is somehow unwelcome in this recipe for a good night’s sleep. Every part of an individual is an important piece of the integrated whole. We are suggesting that the daytime, consciou mind can choose to find a new placement for itself by softening its continually descriptive hold throughout the day into one of soft embrace and quiet listening. These small shifts throughout the day would speak to the nervous system in its ‘native’ language, causing it to have an easier time at night in knowing how to ‘let go.’ This would allow the subconscious/unconscious to exist in daytime reality where a relationship between the seen and unseen minds can find mutual admiration for each other.

The following graphic illustrates the interconnected aspects of an individual, all seamlessly flowing through each other. There is a constant exchange of information and validation of the individual as a whole of many parts, each aspect holding its rightful place in nourishing the integrated unity of the person, ultimately resulting in a harmonious, stress-reduced state of being.

The yin-yang symbol is used to weave the Interconnected Aspects of Being in the below diagram. Yin yang is the perfect union of a white and black fish, spinning after each other in perfect symmetry, existing in equality. It is unity, shadow and light in one form, spinning in energetic union. They do not exist in negation of each other; they are not at war. But rather, they are in complete admiration and synchronicity of each other.

This graphic represents the various ingredients called upon to induce a good night’s sleep with a more relaxed, stress-reduced daytime experience. Nothing needs to change in your environment. That’s usually out of your control anyway. What is in your control is how you relate to your environment.

Some other ingredients in the recipe of sleep are intention and attention. By shifting our focus from a directive approach to a softer, intending to pay attention to the body’s signals, we can gently bring forth the necessary ingredients for restful, rejuvenating sleep. It is an inner-world tapestry, woven by an unspoken language that caresses the nervous system into deeply languorous sleep.