My Personal Bedtime Rituals & Pre-Sleep Stacks
Sleep used to be a huge issue for me growing up. I could never fall asleep, and then when I finally did, I would wake up throughout the night or super early. And then a few years ago, I had an experience with ongoing tribulations that led to sleep issues re-emerging. I am so grateful to share that I am back to having the sleep of my dreams 😴. I am here to share what has helped me resolve these sleep issues, which includes my bedtime rituals and pre-sleep stacks. I do not make it through all of these every night, but they are my pre-sleep stacks toolbox I pull from.
Note: If you are struggling with clinical insomnia or are struggling with sleep and have yet to receive a diagnosis, I encourage you to seek out another licensed mental health professional in your state or medical doctor. These are my holistic and spiritual personal practices rather than a clinical treatment plan.
Part of my sleep recovery journey has been identifying my sleepless night emotional triggers, which for me are:
Anger
Fear
Panic
Grief
It is imperative for me to make space for these feelings in my own healing work so they do not take over my pre-sleep time and sleep, when my conscious efforts to compartmentalize are less accessible as I move into the beginning stages of sleep. If these emotions do come up before sleep, I have a mental game plan of speaking to my mind instead of listening to my mind (learned that one from a brilliant client) to switch the mental track.
An example of how I transmute an emotion when I want to go sleep instead of getting activated is the following: Listening to my mind get worked up and then I start to experience anger → instead of getting lost in the story my mind is telling me and getting my nervous system all revved up before bed, I say to myself "I am like that too." I recently learned this one from Organic Olivia, and I have to say I love it, despite wondering whether I would become defensive.
I choose this more peaceful mental track because I want to be able to preserve moving through the pre-sleep and sleep brain wave states. In the first stage of sleep, our brain wave state is a relatively low frequency (8–13Hz) of Alpha waves. Then we move into Theta waves, which are an even lower frequency (4-7 Hz) and also the brainwave state of hypnosis. This brainwave state also means that we can access our subconscious mind, which is wonderful when we are doing reprogramming work; however, it is also where our fears live. Our conscious brain is beginning to rest so it is less able to suppress our fears, which is often why I’ll hear from clients that their fears are keeping them up at night. If we successfully move through Alpha and Theta brain waves states, stage 3 of sleep is Delta, followed by REM.
My bedtime routine or sleep stacks I draw upon to ensure a deep sleep:
I make sure all of my lighting in my bedroom and bathroom is incandescent or red light so that I am only exposing my eyes and skin to red and orange tones of the light spectrum and not blue or green spectrum.
My partner and I both work until 9pm most evenings, so we try to give ourselves some space to chat and connect. However, we have a no-activating conversations flexible but firm boundary before bedtime. We are both incredibly empathic and sensitive, so if we unearth things before bed, we will work through their subconscious imprint throughout the night, keeping us up, or we will have nightmares. This is a big motivator to having radical transparency around our feelings throughout the day and through dinner to process interactions and challenging family dynamics. Late in the evening is not the time to for us to talk through more activating things that can work us up, so we have to make space and be honest about how we feel throughout the day. Otherwise they will snowball throughout the day and come to a head right when we are trying to wind down.
I either have one or a few of the following soothing drinks or supplements:
Magnesium in water
Milk
Peppermint tea with milk
Medicinal herbal infusion drinks
Medicinal herbs
Flower essences like Bach flower remedies or Alexis Smart remedies
So I usually go into the bedroom with magnesium in water, plain filtered water, and some sort of soothing drink. I drink the tea or milk first while I stack other rituals and before I do my oral hygiene routine, then the magnesium, and then have the plain filtered water in case of thirst throughout the night.
If my ancestor altar is in our bedroom because we are traveling or friends are visiting, I cover my ancestor altar so no spirits are drawn at night.
I set up our AirDoctor air filter so that my lungs, the organ associated with grief and sadness, are unencumbered by irritants.
I turn on my red light therapy panel and my pup crawls near it for some infrared healing, and I keep it on while I do other rituals or read.
I make sure my space that I am looking at in my bedroom is clear of clutter.
If I do not have time to clean it up, I literally pick it up and move it out of the bedroom so it is out of my sight for neuroaesthetic purposes.
I turn off all blue, green lights and make sure any light indicators that are blue or green spectrum are off or covered.
I stretch a bit especially around my external hip flexors where I tend to hold a lot of intense emotions so I do some standing adjusted pigeons using the edge of my bed.
I shower or bathe to wash the day away and cleanse.
I do any facial or body cupping, fascia blasting, and/or use my Morrocco Method Scalp Massager & Invigorator tool to move any physical blockages in my body that have been imprinted on it throughout the day.
I wash my face in the shower two to three times if I wore makeup that day, with my Aquasana shower filter, and do facial massage like buccal facial massage.
If I am bathing, I love to do one of Dr. Linda Lancaster's healing harmonics therapeutic baths.
I do my oral care routine.
This usually looks like: tongue scrape, floss, water pic, brush teeth, and swish.
I perform my skincare routine which feels excessively long at night and I always joke how my fiance just splashes water on his face twice a day and has perfect skin. He and I think this is because he actually does not use a bunch of skincare products and actually has a really balanced skin microbiome and skin barrier that is not disrupted by all the stabilizers in skincare these days.
Alas, I use a serum usually first.
Then use my Laneige sleeping mask and Laneige sleeping lip mask which I love to get from TJMaxx. Anyone else love the skincare aisle of TJMaxx? It is pure chaos which feels comforting to my inner child, since that is what I knew growing up with three younger brothers and parents who worked in the evenings a lot. And now instead of creating my own chaos and then creating my own little safe haven within it, I choose to find little ways to comfort myself with the familiarity of chaos like the TJMaxx skincare aisle and then search for a gem in the wreckage.
I then slug with Vermont's Original Bag Balm or Vaseline, face tape with Frownies, or use silicone face wrinkle prevention pads – cannot do all three because they won't stick… also cannot use the sleeping mask if I want to face tape.
I put on my blue blocker glasses to filter out the blue spectrum so that I am not signaling to my brain that it is noon.
My phone is on Do Not Disturb mode during all sessions and dark mode and because I see clients a lot in the evenings. My phone is usually on this mode from 7pm on, and I do not receive push notifications throughout the day for deep work purposes.
My fiance and I give ourselves a deadline of how much phone time we can have that evening and tell each other the time to hold each other accountable.
Before I go to sleep or read, I turn my phone on Airplane mode.
I make sure to place my intention imprinted device by Invisible Hand Press. This is a silk sachet dyed with natural indigo and filled with mugwort underneath my pillow to activate my olfactory senses (my neuroprocessing type, i.e. the senses that I can use to directly communicate with my subconscious mind, bypassing the barrier between the conscious and subconscious) with the calming and the medicinal spirit of the herb mugwort so that my subconscious mind is at ease to dream, heal, and expand.
I get in bed and read.
I like to have three to eight library books out at a time. This way, I can never have the excuse of not wanting to read about something or being bored with a particular book. I use my incandescent reading light clip to read, not a lamp or overhead light.
My fiance gives me back or hand rubs while we listen to a subconscious reprogramming/hypnosis session.
We do a subconscious reprogramming session for something we are currently working through like shadow work, lineage work, spiritual protection/connection, somatic body healing, money up-levels, fear reprogramming, trichtotillomania etc…
This is why I love making subconscious reprogramming recordings for clients, because it is best to use before bed before you enter the delta brain wave state. Currently, I am making hypnosis recordings for trading performance for my fiance and his trading group, manifesting alignment with your ideal partner, magnetic money moves, career up-leveling, digestion, weight loss, diastasis recti healing, grief around loss of spirit babies, and manifesting your dream home, to listen to while doing yoga, walking, bathing, or laying down.
I pray for my family, clients, family friends, friends, and those suffering in the world.
I fall asleep deeply and fully and sleep so soundly.
Some nights, on occasion, I'll stack the following from my pre-sleep toolkit:
I'll sun-gaze at sunset to get the orange, violet, and red tones of full light spectrum.
I'll journal or look over my manifestation lists which I categorize for myself and with clients through relationships, health, career, health, and home.
I'll do gua sha if I did not get to it in the morning.
I'll place my silk cloak of protection from Invisible Hand Press by my door to protect me from all forms of harm.
I'll look at my digital vision board I created for my current manifestation list.
I'll do legs up the wall.
I'll do a castor oil pack.
I'll do belly massage for digestion.
I'll fascia floss.
I'll use my neurostimulation device.
I'll put on foot detox pads to wear overnight.
I'll do LightStim for acne.
I'll mouth tape to promote nose breathing over mouth breathing which is a cavity prevention from my dentist and promotes an alkaline over acid environment in your mouth.
I'll use earplugs, Blue Blockers eye mask, and a weighted blanket.
I'll use rice socks on my belly, hip flexors, or lower back.
I'll do self-hypnosis, which I teach clients how to do.
I'll listen to theta waves.
I do not always get to all of these things, nor have access to all of them always, nor feel the need for all of them, but it is nice to have a routine to move through and a pre-sleep toolbox rely upon if I am feeling ungrounded for sleep. Some nights, it is just oral care and a shower, which I am still grateful for and feel the cleansing of the day. There is no either-or fallacy present in my relationship to these rituals, they are just rituals that I can move through if I feel so called. I really enjoy curating sleep rituals for myself and with clients. I encourage you to write out your own holistic sleep plan that signals to your brain it is time for rest and healing.
WORK WITH US IN-PERSON IN SOUTH FLORIDA THIS WINTER OR VIRTUALLY
Alljoys Sessions
Modalities used in Alljoys sessions to stack subconscious, somatic & spatial integration:
Hypnotherapy, 4-7 Hz theta brain wave state, subconscious reprogramming, neural rewiring, for ongoing neurogenesis, and neuro-processing type testing
Somatic embodiment healing work for vagal nerve toning, accessing parasympathetic state, and vagal nerve activation; or yoga therapy and breath work
Neuroaesthetic solutions for physical and digital spaces based on and developed for Alexandra's ADHD consulting and systems work for Sparking Joy with Marie Kondo
Shadow work and executive coaching for conscious integration, inter-relational dynamics, systems psychology informed by Penn training as a psychotherapist
Holistic and spiritual practices to increase flow and receptivity in manifestation
EMDR-inspired tapping, EFT, Parts Therapy & self-hypnosis training
Alljoys Exclusives & Subscriptions
Practice Roadmap in Alljoys Exclusives to invest in rapid expansion and transformation:
Subconscious unblocking & Subconscious reprogramming
Fears, maladaptive patterning and behaviors, health, money/finances, relationships, love, career, home...
Hypnosis: Age Regression, Parts Therapy, Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP), Thought Training, and Past Life Regression, Visual, Auditory, and Kinesthetic Processing, How The Subconscious Mind Works, Neural Pathways, Depth Testing, Self-Hypnosis, Emotional Freedom Technique
EMDR-inspired somatic & subconscious work
Inner child container work
Attachment style work to up-level interpersonally and align your relationships
Trauma-response determination: fight, flight, freeze, fawn
Manifestation: Healing Arts List Calligraphy, Expansion, The Art of Receiving
Money Up-Leveling: Co-Creation, Meetings, Self-Recording & Intentions
Shadow work, Performance of Self, Archetypal Journeys & Jungian Work
Systems theory, Ecological systems theory, Psychology, Schematic therapy, Neuroscience, CBT, Narrative Therapy, Acceptance and Commitment Therapy/Dialectical Behavior Therapy, Multigeneration Structural Family, BioPsychoSocial inspired conscious coaching
Genogram creation to heal intergenerational patterning in your generation
Biohacking practices to ground, heal, and strengthen your nervous system
Healing Arts of the Elementals & Sound Therapy
Lineage work, Ancestor healing for intergenerational healing
Ongoing neurogenesis practices
Neurostimulation, self-reprogramming
Neuroaesthetics: ADHD x Spatial systems
Somatic work: Physical holistic healing arts, Body Mapping, Traditional and generative somatics, EMDR-inspired tapping, Kinesthetic neuroprocessing, Diastasis recti testing+healing, Spinal Hygiene, Fascia flossing, Alternate nasal breathing techniques, Pelvic floor loosening and strengthening for a toned core, Yoni egg practice, Herbal steams, Facial reflexology, Facial massage for unblocking emotions and draining lymph and stagnation
Yoga therapy
Anatomy, Yamas and Niyamas, Asana, Philosophy
Spiritual Work
Astrogeography X Ecological Systems Theory: the micro system, the mesosystem, the exosystem, the macro system, and the chronosystem; Human Design as it relates to Your Psychology, Natal chart x Psychology, Art Creation as Intention Imprinted Devices, Prayer practice container building, Sigil practices, Mood board to utilize your physical and digital spaces to reprogram through visual neuroprocessing, Somatic & Subconscious Spellbook for Your Legacy, Akashic record reading, Ancestor Altar Magic, Candle magic, Oracle Card Reading, Pendulum practice somatic decision making, Herbal pots for olfactory neuroprocessing
For each of these modalities, I provide you with a training lesson applied to your current situation, practices, Notion document, subconscious reprogramming hypnosis, journaling exercises, and aligned actions to take between sessions to support your ongoing neurogenisis. Get your package here.
Lastly, I am thrilled and thankful to share that I am now accepting psychotherapy clients for those who reside in Florida! I will be sharing more on this in the next few weeks, but I wanted to let my subscribers know first. I am seeing psychotherapy clients in-person at a mental health collaborative. If you are interested in seeing me for psychotherapy and your primary address is in Florida, you can email me at office@alljoysco.com or by calling me at my office line (609) 312-5740 so we can see whether we take your insurance and I can schedule you in.
