Sleep story · cozy, rain
An attic room, when you only have a few minutes — for winding down
Sloping ceiling, rain on the roof a foot above your head.
Lights off. Press begin and let the story read itself to you, at the pace of sleep.
Screen on or off — we suggest dimming it, or simply closing your eyes after the first paragraph.
The story, in full
The lamp is on the floor beside the bed because there is no room for a table. There is a dormer window with a deep sill, and a mug left on it from last night. The roof is holding, and the rain is outside, and that is the whole arrangement.
The floorboards are bare and slightly uneven, and one of them always creaks. The radiator is small and makes a ticking sound as it cools. There is a box of things under the eaves that nobody has opened in years.
Let your ribs stop working so hard. Your fingers can stop doing anything at all.
Your jaw can drop slightly. Let your teeth part. Let your hands be completely still.
The rain changes intensity every few minutes and never quite stops. The bed is pushed into the low corner, which makes it feel like a den.
Let your lower back sink down into the mattress. Now feel your whole body at once, lying here, being held up.
Notice your hips, wide and settled. Feel the top of your head relax into the pillow.
The air up here is warmer than downstairs and smells of old wood. The rain on the roof tiles is much closer and louder up here than anywhere else in the house.
Your ankles can go loose now. Notice how much of you has already stopped moving.
A carrier bag of shopping is still on the chair, unpacked. The room is in the roof, and the ceiling slopes so steeply that you have to duck near the window.
Let your palms open if they were closed. Feel your belly rise and fall without any help from you.
Notice any tension that arrived while you weren't looking. If you're counting the minutes, that's fine. Count them and come back.
Let your upper arms fall wherever gravity puts them. Let your thighs be as heavy as they want to be.
Let the thoughts come and go without you getting up to answer. Softer.
You do not have to count them. Almost nothing to do now. Let them.
Just the weight. Let the breath be the only thing you are doing. Slower.
A few minutes is the whole requirement.
That is the end of the story. Sleep is the next part, and it does not need instructions.
18 paragraphs, roughly 3 minutes read slowly aloud. Written for cozy, rain.
If this story does not settle you, try Sleep story: a lighthouse at the end of a long day, when you have tried everything else — for the hours after a late shift, Sleep story: a kitchen late at night, when your attention is scattered — for waking too early or A kitchen late at night — a slow story for the end of the day, when you are at home and cannot settle — for the hours after a late shift.