Tune in to mindfulness with these Audible titles
When you’re stuck at home, the constant sound of news alerts, email notifications, viral videos and family demands sometimes leave you craving a little me time.
These demands for our attention can lead to increases in our stress and anxiety as well as decreasing our overall quality of sleep.
If you’re anything like us, all you want to do at the end of a busy day is tune out — to forget the world for a moment and find a bit of relief. But there’s a better path to reducing stress and improving sleep. By tuning in rather than tuning out, you can re-centre your mind and enjoy a moment of self-care to help you unwind and sleep better at night.
Mindfulness is about being in the moment and focusing on channelling positive feelings and dispelling negative ones. And in the spirit of mindfulness, Audible is pleased to offer a collection of titles to help improve sleep and manage stress. Featuring celebrity narrators, Audible Sleep is a collection of guided meditations, soundscapes and bedtime stories designed to invite relaxation and sleep.
A relaxing, reassuring meditation by hip-hop legend Diddy, Honor Yourself is designed to guide you to sleep and inner peace. Diddy’s signature velvety voice will help you slow down and drift off to a peaceful slumber. Guided meditations ease you into a state of relaxed concentration that helps you find emotional tranquility, mental clarity and stress relief. It’s the kind of healing experience that can melt away the stress of the day.
Sometimes all it takes to drift off to sleep is listening to the perfect story. Written by James McGirk and narrated by singer and actor Nick Jonas, The Perfect Swing describes the careers of baseball legends Joe DiMaggio and Ted Williams, and how the two of them shaped the components of a perfect swing.
This story relishes in the minute details and Nick Jonas’ narration gives a calming cadence to the precise and knowledgeable prose. And don’t worry—if you fall asleep before you find out the secret to the perfect swing, it’s just as good the second (or third) time around.
Gabby Bernstein is a motivational speaker and meditation guru, and she applies her charming and candid wisdom to this guided meditation to help you focus on yourself. You Are Here is a meditation that makes you pay attention to yourself. In less than 10 minutes, this special meditation will centre you and remind you that you’re exactly where you’re supposed to be.
Crystal Bowl Breathing uses the vibrating music created by crystal singing bowls to induce a peaceful, meditative state of mind. In this meditation, Jesse Israel combines crystal bowls (played by Jackie Cantwell) with his own calming instructions to synchronize your breathing and embrace relaxation.
Jesse Israel is the founder of The Big Quiet, a mass meditation movement that organizes large scale moments of quiet around the world. Tune into your body and your breathing to the gentle music of crystal singing bowls.
A sound bath is a relaxation technique created to immerse you in a meditative experience. Submerge yourself in the calming reverberations of crystal bowls, tuning forks and other instruments that produce a gentle overtone that will assist you on your way to a restful night. Sara Auster is a sound therapist and a master of the sound bath form, having performed at iconic venues including Madison Square Garden and the Museum of Modern Art.
Agapi Stassinopoulos works as a meditation guide with Thrive Global, the wellness company founded by Arianna Huffington. Bringing practical wisdom derived from her background in ancient myth, Agapi has developed a special meditation for creating space between you and the stress you’re feeling. Find distance from the things that worry you and get closer to a restorative sleep with this calming listen.
Bram Barouh has one of the kindest, warmest voices you might ever hear. He leads a guided meditation that unlocks positive thinking before bed or at any time of day. Loving Kindness has you focus on someone that fills you with love and expand your wishes for their happiness, infusing your day with an irresistible positivity.
Gordon Hempton is a renowned acoustic ecologist who travels the world recording the sounds of incredible locations. His mission is to preserve nature through sound. His carefully produced natural soundscapes will make you feel like you’ve been transported through space to the Cape Cod National Seashore. Drift away to the calming rhythm of ocean waves and water retreating across the sand.
Have you ever experienced ASMR? It stands for autonomous sensory meridian response, but it’s more commonly known as the tingly sensation some people feel in their scalp, neck and spine in response to a particular sound or other trigger. It’s a feeling of well-being and relaxation, and one that a growing number of “ASMRtists” strive to create.
The Office is a unique ASMR experience by New York-based ASMR collective Whisperlodge. In this audio experience, an ASMRtist explains the history and evolution of the art form while simulating the everyday sounds of the office, like paper shuffling in your hands or the gentle clink of paper clips.
The experts from Thrive Global separate fact from fiction in this informative, educational piece about sleep. Thrive Global is pioneering wellness through sleep by helping people change behaviours that lead to burnout. One of the first steps to avoiding burnout? You guessed it—getting a good night’s sleep!
Making Space for Self-Care
If you’ve been having trouble sleeping lately, you’re not alone. Everyone’s routine has been disrupted in one way or another. If the stresses of today – or the anxieties about tomorrow – have you tossing and turning, these titles can help!
The Audible Sleep collection is a series of audio experiences created to help you get the rest you deserve.
In addition to the meditations, soundscapes and bedtimes stories Audible has made available, you can also find tons of self-help audiobooks that will help you discover other forms of self-care. Whether you’re looking for a way to calm down or for titles that will motivate you to change something in your life, there are plenty of resources to discover on Audible.
It’s okay to take time to focus on yourself. Everyone has good days and bad ones. If you’re struggling to stay positive and keep it together, treat yourself to some of these pick-me-up listens that can turn around even the worst day. A little “me time” never hurt anyone.
Found something that helps you get to sleep? Head to our Facebook page and share your sleep success stories, or tag us on Instagram with your story #AudibleCanada. You might help someone else find their moment of peace and quiet.
