← Listen To Sleep - Quiet Bedtime Stories & Meditations
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- [00:01]
Eric
Hey, it's Eric. Before we begin tonight's episode, just a quick reminder. You're about to hear a few ads that help to support Listen to Sleep. If you'd rather drift off without them, you can join Listen to Sleep plus and get every episode ad free, plus bonus stories and meditations. Just go to ListenToSleep.com and click on Support to learn more.
- [00:29]
Hesi Jo
Ever feel like you're carrying something heavy and don't know where to put it down? Or wonder what on earth you're supposed to do when you just can't seem to cope? I'm Hesi Jo, a licensed therapist with years of experience providing individual and family therapy, and I've teamed up with Better Help to create Mind if We Talk a podcast to demystify what therapy's really about. In each episode, you'll hear guests talk about struggles we all face, like living with grief or managing anger. Then we break it all down with a fellow mental health professional to give you actionable tips you can apply to your own life. Follow and listen to Mind if we Talk on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, or wherever you get your podcasts. And don't forget, your happiness matters.
- [01:09]
Alltrails
Out here, it's not only the amazing views, but the way time stretches out a little longer and how the breeze hits just right at the summit. With Alltrails, you can discover nature's best with over 450,000 trails around the world. Download the free app today.
- [01:25]
Eric
M Ooh.
- [01:27]
Hesi Jo
Whatcha eating?
- [01:28]
AM PM
The new banana split cookie from AM pm. All freshly baked with real butter with banana, chocolate and strawberry flavors.
- [01:34]
Hesi Jo
Ah, that sounds amazing. Can I have a bite?
- [01:36]
AM PM
I'm sorry, but no, but you can't split the banana split.
- [01:40]
Hesi Jo
Not even a little?
- [01:40]
AM PM
Not even a crumb.
- [01:42]
Hesi Jo
What if.
- [01:42]
AM PM
No, please.
- [01:44]
Eric
Mine.
- [01:45]
Cravenience
When it's too legit to split? That's cravenience. Get a 3 pack for 99 cents with our app ampm. Too much good stuff plus tax where applicable. Prices and participation may vary in terms of conditions apply.
- [02:01]
Eric
Hello, it's Eric, your mountain grandpa, here with another original bedtime story to help you slow down and drift off to sleep. Tonight's story is a gentle one. It follows a girl named Mara who senses there's more to life than what can be seen or named. And she sets out on a quiet journey to draw something that can't be held the breath of the moon. Along the way, she discovers a deeper kind of seeing, one that comes not from thinking or trying, but from being present with what's here. If you've ever felt the pull of something just out of reach. Something mysterious and true. This story is for you. Let's take a deep breath in and out. Just letting go of the day, feeling the weight of gravity pulling you deep down into the mattress. Another deep breath in and nothing to do. Nowhere to go, no one to be. This is your time. Quiet time. And one more deep breath in and out. If you get tired while I'm reading to you, that's okay. Just let yourself drift off. The Girl who Drew the Moon's Breath Mara had always felt things a little more deeply than most. She lived in a quiet cottage at the edge of a forest where the trees whispered stories if you listened long enough. Most evenings, while others busied themselves with chores or chatter, Mara would sit on the mossy back step and draw in her sketchbook. Not what she saw, though she would sometimes start there, but more what she felt, a breeze curling behind her ear, the hush of dusk settling on her shoulders the moment before a bird takes flight. She didn't have words for these sensations, so she let her pencil speak. Her drawings were strange, others said, unfinished, too soft, not real enough. But Maura wasn't trying to make something real. She was trying to make something true. One night the forest seemed quieter than usual. The crickets sang, but their rhythm held a hush behind it. The breeze tugged gently at the grass but didn't move the leaves and above, the moon rose, full and slow, casting silver light across her page. Mara watched it climb higher, her pencil sitting still. Something about the night felt different, as if the world were pausing, waiting. Then, barely louder than a breath, she heard it draw, the breath of the moon. She turned. No one was there. She looked up again. The moon stared back, silent, steady. Her heart fluttered like the wings of a moth. It wasn't fear exactly, but something she couldn't name. She pressed her hand to her chest and waited, listening. The voice hadn't come again, but the feeling lingered. She turned to a fresh page. What would the moon's breath look like? She closed her eyes, felt the coolness on her skin, the lightness in the air, the way her breath slowed just being under the moon's glow, the way it made her feel both small and held. And then, slowly, her pencil began to move. Not lines, not shapes, but motion, flow. She drew the feeling of silver sliding over stone, of quiet resting in the bones. She didn't know how long she sat like that, only that when she opened her eyes, the page was filled with soft graphite sweeps that shimmered faintly in the moonlight. She stared at didn't look like anything, and yet it felt like everything. The next morning Mara showed the drawing to her grandmother, who had raised her since she was a baby. Her grandmother peered at it through thick glasses, head tilted. It's lovely, she said gently, though Mara could tell she didn't understand it. It's the moon's breath, mara whispered. Her grandmother blinked. The moon doesn't breathe, love. Mara didn't argue. But that night she drew again and again. Each evening the moon rose and whispered something new, not in words but in feelings, and Mara followed, pencil dancing across the page like wind through tall grass. After a while she stopped showing her drawings to anyone. Not because she was ashamed, but because they weren't meant to be explained. They were meant to be felt. But soon even the drawings weren't enough. She began to wonder if the Breath of the Moon could be felt in stillness. What else was out there to be found? What might she discover if she left the edges of her little world behind? The question clung to her like mist. It filled her dreams. And one morning, as the first bird called out into the gray light, Mara packed her sketchbook, a small pouch of pencils, a shawl and a blanket knitted by her grandmother and a round piece of moonstone she had found as a child and never parted with. With the hush of dawn wrapping around her shoulders like a promise, Mara stepped off the porch and into the trees. She didn't know where the trail would lead, but she trusted that if she followed the Breath of the Moon, it would lead her closer to the mystery she longed to draw, not onto the page but into her life. The forest welcomed her like an old friend. Mara didn't follow a marked trail, only the quiet pull of what felt right, the way a shaft of light pointed through the trees, the hush that settled when she paused beside a stream, the sudden awareness that her feet knew something her thoughts didn't. She walked slowly, not because she was unsure but because something in her asked her to notice the soft give of moss beneath her boots, the creak of an old branch above the breath of wind as it touched her cheek and moved on. She didn't rush. There was no need. That first night she stopped beneath a canopy of fir trees where the ground was dry and thick with needles. The moon, nearly full again, rose between the branches like a silver coin caught in the net of the sky. Mara lit no fire. She didn't speak. She just sat cross legged on her blanket, opened her sketchbook, and began to draw. This time she tried to draw what it felt like to be Alone, not lonely. She didn't feel that, but simply without others. A different kind of quiet. The sound of her own breathing. The smallness of her presence beneath the trees. And how that smallness felt oddly comforting, like sinking into a warm bath. Lines curled into shapes, shapes into motion. Her hand moved without much thought. She lost track of time. The forest blurred around her. When she finally stopped and looked down at the page, her breath caught. The drawing shimmered, just for a moment, like mist, then vanished. It didn't fade. It didn't blur. It simply wasn't there anymore. The paper was blank. She blinked, touched the page, turned it over. Nothing. A strange mix of wonder and confusion stirred in her chest. She hadn't imagined it. She felt it leave, as if the drawing had become part of something else. As if it had been received. She lay down with her sketchbook beside her, open to the blank page. The moonlight pooled quietly across it like a blessing. Sleep came slowly, and when it did, it was full of silver threads and the hush of old trees breathing. The next day Mara kept walking. She climbed a ridge where wind swept over tall grasses, sat beside a pond that reflected the sky like a second world. Drew. Each time she paused. Moments, feelings, fragments of sensation. And each time the drawings disappeared, it didn't feel like loss. It felt like offering. She began to think of the pages not as her own, but as invitations. She would draw and the world would take them, not greedily, but tenderly. As though it had been waiting to be seen in that way. On the fourth day, the path grew steeper. The trees thinned. Stones jutted from the ground like teeth. The moon was now full again and brighter than ever. So bright it cast shadows. At night. Mara felt a restlessness. Not worry exactly, but something deeper. As if the next step wasn't just on the trail, but within her. She stopped near a twisted old tree whose trunk had split long ago but still held leaves. The view from its base stretched far. Rolling hills, distant clouds, and the suggestion of a mountain on the horizon. A place she hadn't known existed until that moment. She took out her sketchbook, but her hand hesitated. What was she here to draw now? What was all this leading toward? Her breath caught in her chest. She felt it. The same voice, but not spoken, felt in her bones. Draw the breath of the moon. She closed her eyes, tried to feel it again. But nothing came. No image, no motion. Just silence. She tried to draw anyway. A line, a curve, a motion of light. But the page remained blank. No shimmer, no disappearance. It was the first time it hadn't worked. She stared at the page for a long time, the night deepening around her. Was she doing something wrong? Was she not ready? A breeze stirred soft against her face. She touched her chest, noticing her breath again, uneven now, held too tight. Let go, something whispered, so she closed the book, put the pencil away, and sat listening, not to the world this time, but to herself. It was then that she noticed the mountain in the distance, the one barely visible before was clearer now, as if the stillness had revealed it, and in that moment she knew that was where she needed to go. Not to draw, not to understand, but to listen to something deeper than drawing could hold. She wrapped the shawl tighter around her shoulders, lay down on her blanket beside the tree, and let the moonlight wash over her. Tomorrow she would begin the climb. It began at dawn. Morrow woke with the image of the mountain pressed into her mind like a thumbprint, not sharp, but sure, the way dreams feel true even after they blur. The morning was cold, colder than it had been since she'd left the cottage. Mist curled low across the ground, softening the edges of the path. She ate a bit of dried fruit, sipped from her canteen, and began the ascent. There was no trail, only the pull of the mountain, like a quiet invitation. As she climbed, the forest fell away. Trees gave way to scrub, then stone. The earth beneath her feet grew more uneven, the wind stronger. Her legs ached, but she didn't stop. The ache felt clean, like it belonged. By midday she reached a high ridge, wind tearing at her shawl. The view opened wide. She could see the forest she'd come from, a green ocean stretching in all directions. Her breath caught, not from the height but from something else, a stillness she hadn't expected. She found a small, flat patch of ground tucked behind a boulder and sat. Her sketchbook lay in her lap, but she didn't open it. Instead, she closed her eyes and let the wind speak. It didn't roar. It hummed. It didn't demand. It offered. She sat like that for a long time, minutes or hours, she wasn't sure. She felt the way her body rose and fell with each breath, the tension in her shoulders, the sharp coolness on her cheeks, the way her thoughts began to slow, not because she was forcing them to, but because the mountain didn't need them. She opened her sketchbook, and then she did something she'd never done before. She let the pencil rest in her palm and she didn't move it. She simply breathed. And with each breath the page began to darken, not with lines or shapes, but with a kind of Shadow, as if the stillness itself had started to gather there. A drawing made not by hand, but by being. Mara watched, stunned, and yet not afraid. The page was drawing her. A soft wind brushed her face. Then, just as slowly as it had formed, the image began to lift. It shimmered, quivered, and then disappeared into the air like dust in sunlight. She let out a long, quiet sigh. Mara didn't try to make sense of it. She just felt her heartbeat, her breath, the weight of her body held by the earth. Later, when the sun began to dip toward the horizon, she wrapped her shawl around her shoulders and climbed higher. By nightfall, Mara reached the upper ridge of the mountain where the rocks grew smooth and pale and the air grew thin and clear. There were no birds here, no trees, just open sky and the vast dome of stars. The moon, full and glowing, hung directly overhead. She stood in the silence, felt her chest rise and fall. Her breath visible now in the cold air, slow and soft. And then she heard it again, not with her ears, but through her whole being. Now. Draw what cannot be seen. Draw what is only felt. She knelt on the cold stone and opened her book to the last page. It was blank. Not just empty, but ready. Mara closed her eyes and breathed. She thought of every quiet moment on the trail. The shimmer of wind on the water, the hush beneath the trees, the ache in her legs, the comfort of moss, the weight of the sky, the quiet welcome of the forest, the mountain's gaze, the voice of the moon that was never quite a voice. And without looking, she began to draw. She didn't guide the pencil. She let it move as it wished. It looped, drifted, paused, then circled again. Her hand moved in rhythm with her breath, slow, present, still. She drew. Not an image, but. But an experience. Not a thought, but a knowing. And when she finally opened her eyes, the drawing shimmered once more. But this time it didn't vanish. It stayed, not just on the page, but in the air around her, as if the mountain had accepted it and echoed it back in light. The moon hung still and full above her, and for the first time, she didn't just feel it. She understood it. Not with her mind, but with her whole self. Not what it was, but that it was. Mara slept on the mountaintop, wrapped in her blanket and shawl, her sketchbook tucked beneath her head like a pillow. The moon watched over her, and when the sun rose, pale and golden, she awoke not with urgency, but with a kind of spaciousness. Her body was sore but calm, her mind quiet. The drawing from the night before still. There, the lines gentle, like waves flowing without end. She touched the page once more. It felt like cool stone and warm light all at once. And then she closed the book. There was nothing else to do here, no grand discovery, no final answer, only this feeling of having touched something true. She began the descent in silence, her breath slow and easy. The mountain seemed to be carrying her home. Each step back down felt like a conversation between her feet and the earth. No need to rush. The mystery would come with her. At a small spring halfway down, she paused to drink. The water tasted brighter somehow, like she could feel the sky in it. She didn't try to draw it. She simply closed her eyes and felt it cool and real. Birdsong returned as she reached the lower slopes. The forest opened her arms once more. Light danced through the leaves. The sounds that had once seemed ordinary now felt textured and alive. She paused again, this time not to rest, but to listen. The birds, yes, the wind, yes, but also the space between sounds. She began to notice it more and more, the space inside things, the pause between footsteps, the silence behind a bird's call, the stillness inside. A breath that she realized was the mystery. Not the objects, not the pictures, but what holds them, what breathes through them, what is when nothing else needs to be. She returned to the cottage one soft morning as fog still clung to the ground. Her grandmother stood in the garden, tying back stalks of overgrown fennel. She looked up, startled, then smiled. You're back. Mara nodded. Her grandmother didn't ask questions. She only walked over and wrapped her arms around her, warm and firm. You're different, she said quietly. I know, mara whispered. That afternoon, Mara sat on the back step where she had first heard the moon's voice. She opened her sketchbook and turned to the final drawing, still there. She traced it gently with her fingertip. It didn't shimmer now, but it didn't need to. It was part of her she didn't draw that day. Instead, she watched the wind move through the grass and felt the air on her face. She let it pass over her, into her, and through her. The breath of the moon lived not just in the night sky. It lived in every quiet moment, in every small letting go. And it was always drawing something, whether she saw it or not. Days passed, then weeks. Mara didn't speak much of the mountain or the moon's voice or the drawing that shimmered and stayed, not because she was hiding anything, but because the experience didn't need explaining. Some things she had come to understand deepen when left unnamed. She returned to her sketchbook most evenings. But something had shifted. She no longer felt the urge to fill each page. Sometimes she would simply sit with it open on her lap, watching the sky darken. Other times she would let her pencil drift across the page. Not to make anything, but to trace the shape of the moment. The breath in her body, the light in the trees, the quiet between thoughts. Her drawings became less visible, but somehow more alive. One night a soft rain fell. She sat under the porch roof, listening to the rhythm of drops tapping on the leaves, the steps, the stones. She drew what the rain felt like on the inside of her chest. How it seemed to slow the world, soften it. How it invited everything to lean in and listen. The drawing disappeared before she even looked down at it. She smiled. As the seasons turned, neighbors began to notice small changes in Mara. Not in her appearance or her habits, but in the way she was with things. She didn't rush. She didn't interrupt silence. When she looked at someone, it felt like she really saw them. Even in the moments they didn't know what to say. Children were especially drawn to her. They'd bring her scraps of paper with half finished doodles or odd shaped rocks they were sure were special. Mara always took them seriously. Not with the seriousness of an adult, but with the quiet reverence of someone who understood that wonder took doesn't need polishing. Sometimes she'd lead them into the woods behind the cottage, handing each a pencil and asking only one thing. Draw what you can't see. At first they'd frown, then giggle. Then slowly begin. Some drew sounds, others drew feelings. One child drew the shape of laughter. Another, the taste of sunlight. Mara never corrected, never praised, just nodded softly and asked, how did that feel? That became her only real question. One night, long after the children had gone home and the crickets had begun to sing again, Mara sat alone beneath the stars. She wasn't drawing, just breathing. The moon was a sliver now, barely there, but it still cast enough light to see the mist above the grass. She closed her eyes, let the air move across her face. And then she felt it. Not a whisper this time. Not a voice, just presence. The kind that needs no shape, no proof, no reply. And she breathed with it. In that moment, she realized the breath of the moon wasn't something she had to capture. It wasn't something outside of her. It was the space she had always carried within. The space where stillness meets seeing. Where feeling becomes knowing. Where the mystery breathes through us just as we are. She opened her eyes. The world was unchanged. But she was not that night. Mara didn't draw anything. But the air seemed to hold her like a page. And the mystery, for once, did not drift away. It simply stayed quiet. Whole, true. Like the breath of the moon. Never owned, always near. And with that, Mara rested, wrapped in the hush of the evening. Listening to the silence that had always been drawing her home. Good night.