How Imagination is Key To A Great Night’s Sleep

My Help For sleep online course is available now for only £39. It contains everything you need to tackle problematic sleep. Click here and tap the ‘Get Started Now’ button top right.

I used to believe the solutions to better sleep simply lay in avoiding caffeine, blue light and stress. What I didn't know (yet) was that drifting off to sleep was to be more about my imagination and ‘self talk’. Once I had learnt this, I would rarely be troubled by sleep problems again.  

No doubt about it, insomnia is a huge problem in the UK. Research from 2017 concluded that two-thirds (67%) of UK adults suffer from disrupted sleep and nearly a quarter (23%) manage no more than five hours a night - and this was pre-pandemic. Since then, insomnia numbers are believed to have doubled.

Me, a former insomniac no longer dreading going to sleep!

Sleep anxiety: where we’re going wrong

Whether it’s trouble drifting off or waking in the early hours and not being able to get back to sleep, it’s clear that we need help.

Standard suggestions of what can help, or hinder, our ability to drop off (often termed ‘Sleep Hygiene’), can have a knack of making us feel even more anxious about sleep. This is a common theme I noticed in my own time as an insomniac. 

The dos and don'ts can lead to anxiety over ‘doing it wrong’.

‘Oh no, I’ve had a coffee at 1pm and my cut off is 12pm. I won't sleep tonight’. 

‘Oh no, I've checked my work emails. I won't sleep tonight’.

‘Oh no, I've had a nap but it wasn't 8 hours after waking and 4 hours before my estimated bedtime. I’ll never sleep tonight’.  

Sound familiar?

As a nation we buy supplements, lavender pillow sprays, we sign up for meditation apps. We avoid anything gloomy on TV and put a curfew on caffeine and our devices.  

We’ve read it all; the dangers of blue light, the best room temperature for sleep and the optimum time for a nap. Yet the uncomfortable fact remains; sleep issues have rocketed and the current advice doesn't seem to be helping.

If avoiding caffeine and blue light before sleep aren't the answer to insomnia, what is the Solution?

I used to absolutely dread the night so it was a surprise and delight to find the answer was inside my own head. 

You see, the tales I would tell myself throughout the day (such as the ones above about my caffeine cut off) would have me essentially performing mean hypnosis on myself. A kind of nocebo. By telling myself I wouldn't sleep, my very literal brain would follow that command. It’s mind bogglingly simple.  

We watch the clock, calculating the hours we’ve had vs the hours left until our alarm. We attribute a relevance to those numbers, making them mean success or failure and imagining the very worst outcomes for the day ahead. 

And it’s here, in the most trying moments that the answer lies. It’s your imagination that will hand you the keys to a blissful night’s sleep.  

Breathwork

The foundation to any imaginative practices is always the breath. Using our trusty ‘Coherent’ breathing (in for 6 and out for 6 exclusively through the nose) takes us to the sweet spot of 7.83hz on the border of Alpha and Theta brainwaves. 

This breathing technique optimises the amount of oxygen the brain receives making it feel safe. When stressed or anxious we tend to shallow breathe or even hold our breath and the ensuing lack of oxygen drives the brain crazy.. With a steady supply, the brain is more inclined to put its feet up and switch to autopilot rather than prepare for battle. 

Watch our IGTV on breathwork tips here

Fantasise

So that’s the breath, what about the thoughts and pictures? If you’re a night-waker and inclined to slide down the 3am spiral of doom, a great trick is to interrupt it by picturing the next day going like a dream and enjoy the fantasy. How good can it get!

The hours between 3am and 5am are the most peaceful and viewed as an auspicious time in Buddhism - the best for meditation and positive thought. 

From a neuroscientific perspective this coincides with the time of day when our minds are most plastic or open to repatterning, making it even more important to speak kindly to ourselves, imagining a great outcome instead of the worst.  

Stop watching the clock

Another game changing technique plays on our skill for tormenting ourselves about the time. Does this sound familiar?  

You look at the clock and it says 02:33 the colon separating the 2 and the 3 flashing furiously, reminding you of the seconds passing by… Closer to a terrible day, sore eyes, no energy and the meeting that will now be a disaster... STOP!

What a great imagination! Now try to use this gift for projecting into your future to work in your favour:

Remind yourself...

• How you always eventually fall asleep.

• How incredulous you’ll be on waking, as to why you spent hours agonising about him/her/that/then. How insignificant it will seem in the daylight.

• How you were fine in that other meeting with even with less sleep

• How when the alarm goes off suddenly, this bed feels the most comfortable place in the world. How you’ll wish for 4 more hours to stay here and sleep. And here you are now with 4 more whole hours of delicious, cosy comfort. 

Remember your best sleep memory

If the struggle is getting to sleep in the first place, imagining a scene which makes you feel so unbelievably cosy. Along with the breathwork, this is an extremely powerful way to calm the mind to sleep. 

I recently asked the question to friends, clients and colleagues ‘What is your best sleep memory?’. 

Here were the most common themes:

• Being looked after (back at the family home or a hotel). There was  something about having no responsibilities that allows us to let go and drift off. 

• The memory of resting your bones after a long satisfying day, often in nature with lots of fresh air and finally being able to drop into a well earned sleep. 

• By far the most popular memory was of the perfect bed, often in a hotel, a dreamy mattress, plump pillows and freshly washed, white bedding. It had to be white.  

Use your imagination

For those who couldn’t recollect a ‘best sleep ever’ they imagined a fantasy sleep instead. This works just as well as a memory. During my worst insomniac days (thanks Corporate World) I regularly used an imaginary scene to settle me.

I would imagine myself in the prehistoric past, curled up in a cave, with a crackling fire, lots of furry covers and elders keeping watch. Something about this vignette ticked off lots of primal needs; to feel warm, dry, fed and protected, it was just the remedy at a time when in retrospect I felt vulnerable to attack at work. 

This works

Using thoughts and pictures (the imagination) to coax what we want rather than what we’re trying to avoid can have an enormous impact, it turned my life around. I no longer goad myself into sleeplessness, instead of dread bedtime is now the best time. 

Once you’re fluent in your own imagination the waking and sleeping world is your oyster.

My Help For sleep online course is available now for only £39. It contains everything you need to tackle problematic sleep.

Go here and click the ‘Get Started Now’ button top right.

Use Artificial Intelligence for your magical practices!

The key to successful manifestation (aka getting what you want in life) is both

1. Knowing what you want

2. Holding the vision

Despite good intentions, sabotaging forces soon come a knocking; memories of past disappointments, financial constraints and the total buzz wrecker that is "being realistic”.


Incredible feats never came from being realistic.

The fact that you are reading an electronic article was not ‘realistic’ to most people 40 years ago, but times changed. Things we once thought impossible become actualised at super-speed and it's only going to happen faster in the Age of Aquarius. 

If you just pictured hippies with wild hair frolicking in nature you’re not alone and can thank the writers of a 60s musical for the misleading visual. Sadly (or gladly) that’s not what is in store. 

               What happens in Age of Aquarius? 

Aquarius’ symbol of 2 wavy lines do not represent water, though they are waves.

This is an air sign, these are invisible waves; sound, micro, light, electromagnetic waves and likely others that humans have zero knowledge of yet. 

Aquarian energy is similar to the hippy trope of the 'Age'; rebellious,  disliking of tradition, hierarchy and convention. Expect the establishment and institutions we bowed down to, to crumble from Hollywood to Monarchy. This is revolutionary energy that favours futurism, technology, speed and innovation.

The shadow aspect of Aquarius is detached, as cold and etheric as deep space. At the same time, egalitarian but can be so macro, sooverarching that it loses touch with it's humanity. 

There's a joke that Aquarians love humanity but not people.  

Funnily enough, as I write Elon came to mind, so I just looked up his birth chart and low and behold, he has Aquarius for both his Mars and North Node (the direction in which a person is meant to grow and evolve). Astrology is no joke. 

Artificial Intelligence is a massive theme of this coming age. It’s crept into our behaviours through our liking for convenience, from Chat GPT to ‘googling it’. 

How do you feel about Artificial Intelligence (AI)?  I used to be suspicious, who am I kidding still am. Each time I see its naff art or characterless ChatGPT writing, I feel the sweet relief of knowing I have a moments reprieve from being deemed surplus to requirements.

Personally I prefer myself some ‘divine intelligence’ over the ‘artificial' type but I’m not against using it to make my life easier. 

Within 2 seconds, AI can provide the kind of sequential, linear, strategy that would take me an entire morning (on a good day) with all my distractions and messy emotions.

(Image of a ‘magical assistant robot’ generated by AI - not quite the vibe)

So how does AI handle a magickal task like manifestation?

Better than it’s art.

Remember the whole 'not being good at knowing what we want or holding the vision’ business from the start of this letter? All that self-doubt and disappointment? 

Turns out the robots can be pretty handy if you're struggling to call in your dream life, being that they are devoid of the messy human stuff.

If they stick to their skills and let us stick to ours maybe we’ll all survive this Aquarian business.

Try out this step by step guide…

Using AI 🤖 to help manifest your dream life.

1. Define Your Goals

Start by clearly defining what you want to manifest in your life. This could include career success, financial abundance, personal relationships, health, or any other aspect of your life. 

Write down your goals and desires in detail.

2. Creating Your Future Self Story

Our heads are often swimming with all the reasons of why not, compromises and caveats. Get AI to tell a story without any of that naysaying creeping in. 

Open ChatGPT or similar, I also like Perplexity.

Ask it to generate a story about a day in your dream life. Provide it with your list of goals and desires, and give it the prompt below to write a narrative as if you have already achieved those goals. For example… 

  Tell me the story of a day in my dream life as my future self who already has [insert goals and desires]. This story should be vivid and include sensory details to help me visualise my desired life.

3. Daily Visualisation

Read your generated story regularly, ideally with conviction and emotional engagement. Really feel it - that’s why you needed the detail. 

Visualize yourself living that life, feeling the emotions, and experiencing the sensations described in the story. This helps to solidify the vision in your mind and align your subconscious with your goals.

4. Creating a Daily Routine

Now this is very cool. 

Instruct ChatGPT to generate a daily routine or schedule that aligns with the lifestyle of your future self. This can include specific actions, time management strategies, and habits that will help you move closer to your goals. You could ask what experts to research, videos to watch or books to read. 

5. Affirmations and Mindset Shifts

Instruct ChatGPT to generate you daily affirmations and visualisation techniques tailored to your specific goals. 

For example, if you're after a financial boost, provide affirmations and visualisation exercises to help you improve your mindset around money. 

6. Subconscious Reprogramming

We know by now, this stuff works, reprogramming your subconscious mind by unlearning old, limiting beliefs and replacing them with new, souped-up ones. 

You could record the future self story, listen while going about your daily activities or at bedtime as you drift off. What we take in (visually or aurally) as we fall to sleep enters our subconscious, permeating our dreams, so probs best to make it lovely vs true crime.

So there you have it, a benevolent use of both the light and shadow of Aquarius. With AI set to stay, I'm keeping on its good side, remembering to thank its efforts after every prompt. After all, you never know what’s around the corner! 😳

Finding The Lost Parts: Soul Retrieval Through Dreamwork

I still can't comprehend how most people dismiss their dreams, they are the real deal when it comes to magic.

The power of Dreamwork or intentional dreaming, sits under our noses throughout our entire lifespan, patiently waiting for us to notice and play. This is a characteristic of real magic that I have come to recognise over and over.

It’s winter as I write this, a time of retreating inwards making it the perfect time for taking stock and some healthy introspection.

2 nights ago I was lying in bed listening to an episode of Rune Soup that mentioned 'Soul Retrieval’, a shamanic process of bringing back the lost parts of our soul. This is Soul seen as ‘energy’, a precious intelligence assigned at birth providing the twinkle in our eyes, joy, wonder and unconditional love - children are full to the brim with it. You could surmise that they are closer to having their souls intact.

Soul Retrieval recognises that moments of shock in our lives can lead to parts of our soul breaking off but thankfully being an energy it doesn’t cease to exist, just resides elsewhere.

Turns out, the fragments leaving, act like a protective mechanism protecting us from further hurt but in the process kind of hollowing us out. Reminds me of the lizard who can detach their tail to escape danger knowing it's gone for now, but, it'll be back.

The problem with too much fragmentation is we can feel lost, numb, it all seems grey, people report no longer dreaming, depression or a grief that never lifts. Many experts such as Gabor Mate, Bessel Van der kolk believe physical illness to be seeded by shock and trauma.

But 2 nights ago, feeling safe in myself, and out of sheer curiosity I asked my dream to “Find my lost parts!".

My dream guides respond best to a heartfelt but simple, (somewhat bossy) instruction. But don’t feel bad for them, they speak to me that way too. It’s our thing.

The night’s dreaming was jam packed with places and people, the quality of my sleep was lighter and more physical, much turning and pillow plumping.

On waking, I knew the work was not quite done but that an opening had been created allowing it all to flow out; both the memories and tears.

So I started to write, to reclaim these scattered bits of soul recalling moments from as young as I could remember. Rather like a scavenger hunt on a map of my memories.

When I found them, I pictured the scene in my mind, those moments where I'd felt punched in the gut (metaphorically speaking) by shock, a searing pain of shame, or a throbbing, heaving sadness in my heart.

Vignettes appeared like video clips, in full colour and still full of emotion.

Up to now I’d established a pattern of turning away from these memories but now I stepped into the scene and spoke to 'child me', as 'adult me'. My task was simply to comfort 'child me', reassure her and rebalance all those disempowering opinions that I’d held with the wisdom that comes with time. I took on the guise of a kind teacher, kneeling down to 7 year old me to reassure her that I in fact had not done anything wrong…you get the idea.

It felt good to let it flow out of my imaginal and through me - literally - out of my eyeballs.

No resistance, no more fear.

The whole idea of soul retrieval is fascinating but certainly comes with a warning, is it right to bring our lost parts back into a similar shitty situation? No, they've kept us safe for a reason, why re-traumatise.

Because I am not in those situations now, I felt safe to do this on myself. I’m not sure this dream request would count as legit, shaman-trained Soul Retrieval but when I think of those events now, that were buried in my subconscious for 40+ years (and therefore influencing around 90% of my decision making) I feel far less sting.

Something had changed.

Thank you dream, soul (whatever you are) and imaginal realm for listening to my request and helping me fulfil the task.

Working with our higher-selves whether though dreamwork or guided imagination is both subtle, highly personal and profound work.

If you’re keen to explore the power of intentional dreamwork and its potential for healing and self-discovery, The Luminous Arts runs again February 2025. This fun, nurturing online group programme provides all you need to connect with your dreams and understand their messages.

Check out The Luminous Arts page for more info.

Clare x