GROUNDING PROMPTS
How do you feel right now?
What is stopping you from resting?
Where do these messages come from?
Why do you choose to listen to these messages? What are they bringing you?
What would rest look like for you?
How would you feel afterwards?
What do you need to allow yourself to rest?
What small action can you take this week towards this?
GROUNDING PROMPTS
What do you feel a prisoner of?
How were these limits established upon you?
Whose choice was it?
For what purpose were these limits established?
Clearly defined each limiting belief stopping you and answer for each all the questions above. What do you notice?
Which of these limits are you ready to break free from?
What will it feel/look/sound... like when you are completely free from these limits?
What will you be able to do? Who will you be able to be?
What needs to happen for these limiting beliefs and circumstances to vanish or at least subside?
What can you do to help the process?
What resources and support do you need?
How can you get it?
What is the very first step you can take towards setting yourself free from these limits?
GOING DEEPER
What is your current situation?
What in your situation are you happy with?
What are you dissatisfied with? What caused this?
What needs to happen to transform these aspects you are dissatisfied with?
What action can you take to encourage this to happen?
What do you need to let go of to ensure success?
What would be the cherry on the cake?
GOING DEEPER
What is my guilt all about?
When was it born? Under what circumstances?
What does this guilt feel/look/sound like to you?
Does it feel this way every day or when a certain reminder occurs?
What does this guilt prevent you to do/say/feel/experience?
What would help you to alleviate the weight of this guilt on you?
Who can help you do that? What resources do you need?
What small step can you commit to in order to start releasing this guilt?
What will your life be/feel/look like when you have completely released this guilt?
GROUNDING PROMPTS
Do you feel OK with not being OK? Why (not)?
How does it feel to not be OK? Think of as many examples you can remember.
In each if these examples, what caused you to feel not OK?
How did you react/respond?
What do you wish you would have done differently?
What can you do next time?
In the meantime, or if it doesn’t work, how can you find being OK with not being OK?
What will it feel/look like to be OK with not being OK?
What resources do you need with being able to be OK with not being OK?
GROUNDING PROMPTS
What does this mean to you?
What does it look like?
What does it feel like?
Does this affirmation feel true to you right now? Why?
How would your life be transformed when this affirmation feels totally true to you?
What can you do this week to move towards making this affirmation true to you?
GOING DEEPER
What would you have liked to do differently if you could have?
What would have been the result in your life?
What lesson would you have learnt from this chance of being able to change the experience?
What would you have missed out on?
Who would you be without this experience?
Is there anything you can do to come to terms with the experience? What is it?
Does a reconciliation feel possible to you right now? In the future?
What is the first small step you can take this month towards reconciliation and/or coming to terms with the experience?
What will it feel like to reconcile and/or come to terms with the experience and forgive?
GOING DEEPER
In what areas of your life do you feel your personal space (in and out) is being violated?
What examples come to mind?
How does it make you feel?
How do you wish you could respond?
What would it mean for you to respond that way?
What boundaries do you need to establish?
How can you present them to people around you (family, friends, work...)?
How can you enforce these boundaries with kindness and in a way that will feel natural and comfortable to you?
How will it feel like to have these boundaries respected?
What will be able to start happening for you then?
GOING DEEPER
Have a look at each area of your life that applies to you (health, relationships, self care and personal growth, social, finances, work/career, studying, environment, spirituality, fun - as examples) and determine on average how much time in a day (or a week if you prefer) you spend in this area
After you have determined how you spend your time, are you surprised by the results? In what ways?
Are you happy with the results? In what ways?
If you’re not happy with these results, what would you like to change? How? Have a clear picture of what you’re aiming for for each area of your life. Be as detailed as you can.
What can you start doing this week to move towards the way in want to spend your time? Review every week
Good job! You have just tried the Wheel of Life exercise (more to come on next article)🤩🤩🤩⭐️⭐️⭐️❤️❤️❤️🙏🙏🙏
I have been practising yoga for many years (thanks to Yoga With Adrienne on YouTube) but, having been on and off the band wagon many times over these years, and also considering my current level of strength and flexibility, I don’t consider myself even intermediate. Some intermediate poses and modifications I can do while some basics poses I struggle with.
However I have been aware of many types of yoga (yoga yin, yoga hatha...) but I have never really known the differences between them. I just do whatever videos I feel attracted to on YouTube. I had come across the term Yoga Nidra and assumed it was another type of yoga (ie. movement/“workout”).
As you might be aware if you have been reading my blog articles for some time, I am a big fan of the app Insight Timer (and have recently stopped resisting and ended up subscribing!). I came across the term Yoga Nidra many times as titles for meditations and that really puzzled me so I decided to try one - and realised what Yoga Nidra really is.
Yoga Nidra is also referred to as yogic sleep and is a state of consciousness between waking and sleeping. This state refers to reaching a theta and delta brain waves/frequencies state. The yoga nidra meditation, by inducing this state, calms our autonomic nervous system and is often used to reduce stress of all kinds and anxiety.
By following the guided meditation verbal instructions you come from an awareness of what is around you to your thoughts, then to your body and inner world.
Primarily used for improving the quality of sleep, Yoga Nidra can also be used for intentions and manifestation as intentions/messages can be easily imprinted into the subconscious when in a theta state (dream state) and/or delta state (deep sleep).
For a more detailed explanation of Yoga Nidra’s benefits, steps and the science behind it, I highly recommend this article on Yoga Nidra on DoYouYoga’s website: here
MY EXPERIENCE OF YOGA NIDRA
My sleep in the last few months had been quite disrupted before I tried Yoga Nidra. I was falling asleep more or less well, depending on events of the day - I always did a Ziva meditation in the evening so that always helped shake off a lot of the tension - but I was waking up 3 or 4 times each night, so when I was waking up and getting up in the morning, I would feel really tired, like I had barely slept. I would have at least one intense nightmare in early morning (between 2am and 4am) pretty much every day.
Bumping into Giovanni Dienstmann’s Yoga Nidra meditation audio on Insight Timer was the Universe sending me a life line! Giovanni is one of the many teachers on my Favourites Insight Timer list and I have been following his weekly Sunday evening (in the UK) live sessions on Mindful Self-Discipline for more than 15 weeks now. So I had full confidence in the quality of this meditation before I started. I just stayed open and followed Giovanni’s instructions. For quite a few nights at first, I was falling asleep so quickly that I would rarely hear the end of the meditation! That’s good, right?! I have been listening to the meditation at bedtime every night for the last 3 weeks now and, yes I can now listen to the whole meditation and do it, but, more importantly, I sleep much better, very occasionally wake up during the night (only once if I do) and my nightmares have now become quite infrequent. Obviously it’s not magic and that’s it, I’ll never wake up in the night or have nightmares ever again. Like many things in life, it takes practice and maintenance to build stable foundations and to keep things improving.
If you are an Insight Timer enthusiast like I am, you can find the meditation Effortless Sleep With Yoga Nidra on Giovanni Dienstmann’s Insight Timer teacher profile. It is free access, you do not need to pay a subscription.
If you are an Insight Timer subscriber and have access to the courses, teacher Dr Patty Hlava from AwakenPeace Healing has just released a 10 day course called Journey Through Consciousness With Yoga Nidra only a few days ago. It explores more how to use Yoga Nidra and its principles/techniques in your conscious state (including intention setting as we mentioned at the beginning of the article).
Are you ready for Yoga Nidra to improve your life? Take the plunge and enjoy ❤️ There are so many benefits to this practice that you literally have nothing to lose and everything to gain.
Happy sleep and peaceful life ❤️❤️❤️🙏🙏🙏
Credit for photo above: https://www.freepik.com/photos/people People photo created by yanalya - www.freepik.com - thank you❤️
GOING DEEPER
What happened this year, month by month?
How did I feel?
What lessons have I learnt?
What did I lose?
What did I gain?
What are my regrets from this year?
What can I do to turn things around?
What will bring me peace?
What will bring me happiness?
What do I need to let go of to achieve these?
What am I grateful for?
GOING DEEPER
What are you scared of right now?
Why does it scare you?
What would happen if your fear(s) were to come true?
How would that impact your life?
What goal is your fear trying to achieve by coming into mind?
Close your eyes and imagine your fear is taking form. What does it look like?
You say hello to your fear and ask it, What do you want from me? Why?
How can you and your fear can co-operate on what you are trying to achieve? Ask your fear form.
GROUNDING PROMPTS
Who do you matter to?
What is the type of relationship you have with each person who loves you?
How do they express their love for you?
How does it make you feel?
Is knowing you matter to them enough for you to feel loved? Why?
What do you need for you to truly feel loved?
How can you get it?
What about self- love? Do you matter to YOU?
GOING DEEPER
Who does this memory involve?
What are you doing in this happiest memory?
What other feelings and qualities does it bring?
How can you re-create these conditions so that every day you have a happy memory?
What other happy memories can you draw on to help you re-create happy conditions for your evey day life?
GROUNDING:
What has influenced you in the past to make your decisions?
What does currently influence your decision making?
How do these two (past and present) influences make you feel?
Have they been good criteria to make decisions?
How could you have made better decisions? What would have the difference been in how you felt about it and the results?
Were your decisions made in line with your values and truer self? Why?
What would it mean for you to make your decisions/choices from a place of love and truth?
How can you start doing this?
GOING DEEPER -
Where in the past are you stuck? How does it feel to be there still?
What patterns do you feel keep repeating over and over again?
What are these patterns and experiences you are so attached to teaching you?
How would it feel like if you were free of your past?
Are you ready to move forward and leave the past behind? If not, what is keeping you there?
What do you need to do? Forgive yourself? Forgive others? Make sense of the experience you’re stuck with? Let go?
What is one small thing you can do TODAY to help you move forward?
It IS hard to work with our past, painful, disorienting, and sometimes discouraging. When you think you have found some resolution with an experience from your past, and a reminder comes up, and you feel like you’re back to it all over again. That’s what I’ll be working on this coming week with this prompt, and exploring the “going deeper” questions above.
Much love on your journaling journey with this prompt, and please remember that if anything comes up for you that could possibly be traumatic, first, it is normal, and also, always make sure that you have a support group or professional support to help you through this xxx
