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WARNING: This is a sleep meditation and should not be listened to while driving or doing anything that needs your attention. IMPORTANT: You will fall asleep.

Falling Asleep By The Sea - A Sleep Story Meditation

A long-form sleep story meditation that guides you to a quiet shoreline at sunset. The spoken meditation gently settles your body through a progressive tense-and-release practice before walking you along a warm beach, where the sound of the waves and the safety of the sand dunes carry you into sleep. The remainder of the episode is ocean sounds to sleep by.

Please do not listen to this while driving or doing anything that needs your attention.

All episodes of Inner Peace Meditations are brought to you without adverts by the generous donations of listeners treating Steven to a coffee.

DETAILS

Level: Beginner Practice type: Sleep story, Body scan, Guided imagery Duration: 50:00

WHO IS THIS FOR?

• You struggle to fall asleep and need something to guide your mind away from the day
• You find silence at bedtime makes your thoughts louder
• You like ocean sounds and nature imagery as a backdrop for sleep
• You've tried shorter sleep meditations and want something that stays with you longer
• You want a practice that doesn't ask you to do anything — just listen and drift off

BENEFITS

• A full-body tense-and-release sequence to physically prepare for sleep
• A vivid, calming beach visualisation that gives your mind somewhere peaceful to rest
• Extended ocean sounds that continue long after the spoken meditation ends
• A gentle reminder that your body already knows how to fall asleep — you just need to allow it
• A sense of safety and comfort to carry you through the night

ABOUT STEVEN WEBB

Steven Webb is a meditation teacher, podcaster, politician, and the host of Inner Peace Meditations. A former mayor of Truro in the county of Cornwall, Steven continues to split his time between politics and the contemplative work he is best known for. After a life-changing accident left him paralysed from the chest down, he found his way to inner peace through mindfulness, Zen philosophy, and the teachings of Alan Watts and Shunryu Suzuki. He now helps others find calm and resilience — especially those who find meditation difficult. Steven lives in Cornwall, England and shares his work at stevenwebb.com. You can also find his podcast on politics and public life, Stillness in the Storms, at https://stillnessinthestorms.com/

KEYWORDS

guided meditation, inner peace, sleep meditation, sleep story, ocean sounds, falling asleep, body scan, bedtime meditation

Welcome to Falling Asleep By The Sea. I'm Steven Webb and before we begin just make sure you're safe, warm and you're able to fall asleep. Do not listen to this while driving or doing anything that needs your attention. And you can either use headphones or just have this on your phone or whatever you play it on, it really doesn't matter. Whatever you're most comfortable with. This is your time to sink into comfort and let your whole system slow down. Let's settle down and start to fall asleep. So take a breath that just feels natural, nothing forced, just a gentle arrival in this moment. And just let your body settle. If you're not quite in a comfortable place just wiggle your body a little bit until you're in the place where you know you like to fall asleep. No one knows your body like you do. And we're going to go through the body and do a tense and release. And this is a way of telling the body and the muscles just it's time to relax and go sleep. And very often the body will fall asleep before the mind. So we do this by just tense up your feet and your toes, tense them and hold them and just let them go and let them relax. Let them become really heavy. And now we'll do it with both of the legs. Just tense up both legs really really tight. And just let them both relax into the bed now, just become really heavy. And now we'll do the torso and your bum and all that area, just really tense it up in your belly. Just let it go and you start feeling that rush of relaxation go through your body. Now just do your arms and your fingers and your thumb, just tense them all up really tight, hold it and just let them go. And now we're going to do the shoulders and the neck and the head and the face and just all of it in together now just tense it all up, it doesn't matter what you look like and just let it all go. And we're just going to do that exercise one more time but we're going to do the whole body. So just a moment you're going to tense up everything. So one two three tense everything from your eyes to your toes to your fingers everything and now just let it all go. And now feel it go deeper down into the bed feeling really heavy. And now your body will just start going to sleep by itself. Your body knows how to fall asleep, it's just allowing it to happen. Allow in the breath to settle. There's nothing you need to do right now, there's nothing you need to fix. The body knows how to fall asleep. It's only when we try to fall asleep or we get involved, one of the real key things about falling asleep is allowing it to happen. Have you ever noticed when you give up trying to go to sleep, you're suddenly asleep. So we're not going to try to go sleep tonight, we're just going to enjoy the walk along the beach. Your body's already started drifting off. And as your mind's just going on this story, just become aware of any little last tense areas of your body, maybe in your shoulders or legs, just give them permission to relax. Just invite them to fall asleep. And then thank you, thank your body for falling asleep. It's just your mind left now. And if you do notice a slight discomfort, just move it very gently as not to disturb it. And just imagine walking along the beach. It could be one of your favourite beaches or just a beach that you've completely made up. And you can hear the sea. At the moment the sea is quite close. You can feel the sand beneath your feet. You can feel the warmth left over from the day. You can see the sun just out over the horizon, just about to dip down over. And just as the sun's going down, the moon comes up the other side. As we continue walking, we're just really appreciative of the sound of the sea. And the way the sea doesn't try to be anything other than the sea. It just comes in with the tides and it goes back out again. Each wave doing what it does. Just like your breath. Each breath doing what it does. You don't have to tell your body how to breathe. Your body knows how to breathe. Your body knows how to breathe. Your body knows how to breathe. You don't have to tell your body how to breathe. Your body knows how to breathe. Your body knows how to fall asleep. And the air is still warm. The sky fades into the deep colours of the evening. There's no one else around. Just you and this quiet shoreline. Just you and the waves. You and the sand. And you notice just ahead there's a nice little sand dune. You walk over to it and you notice it's perfect for sitting down and watching the tides. And you notice the slight coolness in the air. Just the perfect temperature for falling asleep. Because you know this place is safe. You know no one's around. You decide to lie down. You're in the waves. The sand is perfectly holding you. And you know the sea is going to go out and uncover a lovely open beach. All that open space. The gentle breeze. And then it's going to come back in for the morning. And you know you've got a good night's sleep ahead. You're in the sea in the background. Feeling completely safe. The air wraps around you. There's nothing to worry about. There's nothing to think about. Your body is already asleep. And it's just your mind slowly drifting off. Just don't know how it's going to happen. As the tide drifts out further and further. And further and further. Until the waves become almost distant. Almost a memory. And your body sleeps. And your mind is almost asleep. Everything is lovely and quiet. Leaving all your worries behind. Leaving the busyness of the day behind. Just the perfect place for a perfect night's sleep. I'm going to leave you asleep now. I'm going to say good night. Good night.