Free 20 Minute Yoga Nidra Script for Depression [PDF]

Preparation and Settling In

You may wish to use a cushion or blanket under your knees, an eye pillow to cover your eyes, and a light cover for your body. A folded blanket under your head will tilt the chin forward slightly, supporting the mind to relax.

Come into savasana, lying on your back with your legs a comfortable distance apart, palms face up and chin slightly tucked.

Invite a deep breath in and hold it for a moment, tightening the glutes, tighten the face, make fists of the hands, and tighten as many muscles as you can, and let go … Inhale deeply again and tighten as much as you can.

Squeeze whatever is no longer serving you, and then let it go. Release and let your body soften into the earth … Inhale deeply again and tighten as much as you can. Squeeze all the judgments, the self-limiting beliefs, the expectations, everything that is blocking the free flow of healing energy and love. Squeeze, squeeze, squeeze, and completely let go. Allow your body to soften into the earth. (Pause.)

Now join with your own natural rhythm of breath, welcoming the breath wherever it lands … letting it deepen … Ride the waves of your breath home to who you are inside, beneath the current mood, the social mask, the costumes you put on. Ride the waves of your breath home to the ground of your being where you are intimately and eternally connected, the ground of your being that knows no separation.

Heartfelt Prayer

From this place of wholeness, invite a heartfelt prayer to arise, revealing itself in your heart’s mind. What’s the burning bush in your heart? … The seeds are already present in your life. When you’ve identified the seed of the longing, plant it in your heart, and say it to yourself in the present tense, as though it’s already blossoming. For example, “Joy breathes through me now,” or “A drop of joy flows through me now,” or “I am open and available to give and receive love and joy.” This is your sankalpa, your Resolve.

Take four or so more natural breaths as you imagine breathing your sankalpa into your heart, letting the heart expand with each breath. Breathe your sankalpa through every cell. The beginning and end of your practice are the most fertile times to nourish the seed of your sankalpa. If you plant the sankalpa every day during Yoga Nidra, that seed will blossom more fully in your life.

Rotation of Consciousness and Breath Awareness

The whole body is lying on the floor. Become aware of the whole body, lying on the floor. A global awareness of sensation shimmering through and around the whole body lying on the floor.

Awareness of Opposites

Sense the whole body lying on the floor and the energy field expanding around the body.

Is there an area of discomfort in the body? Perhaps an unpleasant tightness or numbness. Allow the breath to join the area of discomfort  without trying to change anything. Aware of discomfort in your body.

Breathe into the area of discomfort. Is there an area of comfort in the body? Perhaps a pleasant sensation of tingling or lightness. Let the breath join with the comfort in your body, without trying to change anything. Simply notice comfort in the body.

Breathe into the area of comfort. Can you flow back and forth between the area of discomfort in the body and the area of comfort in the body? Take two or so long breaths into the area of discomfort or constriction. (Pause for two breaths.)

Take two or so long breaths into the area of comfort or freedom. (Pause for two breaths.)

Sense into the deeper awareness that welcomes discomfort and comfort, constriction and freedom … Sensing back now into a greater timeless awareness, expanded and spacious, aware of both discomfort in the body and comfort. Welcoming sensation.

Body at rest, waves of feeling arising. Allow waves to wash over and through. Perhaps a wave of grief … Perhaps a wave of sadness laps against the shores of this body, heavy, lying on the earth, grounded, heavy, sinking in the sand. No words necessary. No labels, just a felt sense of sadness or heaviness … Allowing the tide to rise with the emotion and recede.

Welcoming and Witnessing Waves of Joy with Awareness of Opposites—Bliss

From this earthbound heaviness, a lightness arising … Welcoming a wave of joy. Body light and floating. Perhaps a wave of love for no reason … No story … Joy for no reason. Body light … No words necessary. Allowing the tide of joy to rise and recede … Waves of bliss to wash over and through … Joy.

Allow the tides to move through you. Waves of sadness, washing over and through. (Longer pause.)

Waves of joy washing over and through. (Longer pause.)

High tide. Low tide … A storm at sea … A sunny beach … A clear, calm day, embracing the changing tide of emotions. (Longer pause.)

Embracing both the discomfort in the body and the unpleasant emotion, and the comfort in the body and the pleasant emotion … Can you sense back into a spacious awareness where discomfort and comfort, pleasant and unpleasant, heaviness and lightness can live in the bodymind?

Awareness expanding, formless … timeless. Here … Now … From the ground of your being, your own true nature, embracing the waves of life.

Unsullied by whatever has happened to you. One with all that is. You are the ocean of bliss … ananda … bliss, welcoming it all.

Awareness of the energy around the body, bliss expanding and spacious like a great cosmic smile. Invite the smile to enter your heart. Maybe a memory comes—a moment of happiness. Inhale and breathe the moment around your heart. Heart smiling. Your eyes. Eyes smiling. Your cheeks.

Cheeks smiling. Memory dissolves. Whole body smiling. Blissful smile extending beyond the limits of your physical body lying on the floor. Bliss expanding beyond the limits of this room. Bliss spacious and expanding beyond the limits of this country. Bliss spacious, radiant, expanding beyond the limits of this planet. Bliss shimmering eternally, intimately.

No separation between the ocean of healing energy that surrounds you and the rivers of healing energy flowing through you now. From this expanded place of spacious awareness, everything you need is flowing through you now. Whole. Here. Now. No separation. (Longer pause.)

Heartfelt Prayer

Begin noticing your body lying on the floor … Notice the sounds in the room [name some sounds if you are leading a group]. Invite the breath to deepen and breathe into your wholeness … Breathe your heartfelt prayer, your sankalpa through every cell. Your sankalpa is already present, growing. Nourish the seed of your sankalpa with your breath and your attention. As you breathe your heartfelt intention through you, completing  your Yoga Nidra practice, you are fertilizing the seed of intention that will manifest fully, blossoming in every facet of your life. (Pause.)

Reawakening and Closing

As you end your Yoga Nidra practice and return to your daily life, resolve to pause throughout your day to remember who you truly are, beneath your mood, beneath any label, beneath all the to-dos of your daily life. Simply pause and sense back into this greater awareness of who you are. Not separate. Whole.

Begin to stretch and move in your own way. Perhaps stretching arms overhead and taking in a breath that moves from toes to fingertips. Feel your energy. Your contentment. You may wish to bring your knees to your chest and give yourself a gentle rock from side to side … Roll onto one side. (Pause.) 

Before you rise, say something kind to yourself, just the way you would to a small animal or a little child in your care. Say something loving and understanding, maybe to a younger part of yourself that needed to hear it. (Pause.)

This is a practice, just like rolling out your mat. When you’ve said that kind thing, use your upper hand to press yourself into a seated position.

Namaste. Thank you for practicing Yoga Nidra with me today.

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This script has been crafted with love and formatted in a clear, organized layout, making it easy to read aloud for individuals or groups. It is suitable for personal and professional use, including YouTube videos and monetization, and for voiceover recordings.

Use this script to lead your own Yoga Nidra meditation, edit or alter the script to suit your needs, use it in courses you create and sell, or use it privately with your clients.

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