Calming Anxiety | Guided Meditation, Sleep Hypnosis & Panic Attack Relief

Can't Sleep? Stop Counting the Hours — Guided Meditation for Sleep Anxiety & Clock Watching | Coherence Breathing

 

Can't sleep because you keep doing the maths? If I fall asleep right now, that's five hours… four and a half by the time I actually drop off… and then you look again and it's less. This guided meditation for sleep anxiety is for that exact moment — bone tired and wide awake at the same time, body heavy, mind bright, with the low hum of tomorrow underneath it all.

 

Every time you calculate the hours left, you ask your nervous system to stay ready. It doesn't know the difference between a deadline and a danger. So tonight we're not going to try to fall asleep — trying is effort, and effort is the opposite of sleep. We're simply going to stop counting.

 

Hosted by clinical hypnotherapist and former paramedic Martin Hewlett, this 10-minute session uses coherence breathing — five in, five out — to slow the heart rate, settle the nervous system and let the mattress take your weight. Gentle affirmations for insomnia and racing thoughts follow, then three practical caring tips for tonight and tomorrow. Turn the clock away from you, let the phone go dark, and let's begin.

 

⏱️ Time Chapters

 

* 00:00 – The hour when you lie there calculating

* 01:14 – Welcome, and tonight's intention: stop counting

* 01:33 – Settling in — phone dark, clock turned away

* 01:48 – Coherence breathing: five in, five out

* 04:30 – Letting the count go, drifting deeper

* 05:43 – Tonight's gentle affirmations

* 07:01 – Setting down the weight of the day

* 08:07 – Three daily caring tips

* 08:50 – Closing words and drifting off

 

🌿 Today's Gentle Affirmations

 

Let these float through your thoughts as you drift:

 

Lying still in the dark is already doing me good.

 

I do not have to count the hours.

 

I release the need to sleep, and sleep comes closer now.

 

I have been tired before, and I have always been okay.

 

I am calm and I am heavy.

 

I am warm and I am drifting.

 

I am safe. I am here.

 

💡 3 Daily Caring Tips

 

1. Put the clock out of reach. Turn your clock or phone to face the wall and put your phone out of arm's reach, so that checking the time stops being an option rather than a decision.

 

2. The 20-minute rule. If you're still awake after about 20 minutes, get up. Go somewhere dim and boring, even if only for 10 minutes, then go back to bed when you feel sleepy.

 

3. Anchor the morning, not the night. Keep the same wake-up time tomorrow, whatever happens tonight. A steady morning does more for your sleep than a long lie-in ever will.

 

📱 Take Calming Anxiety With You Anywhere

 

Anchored launches Thursday 13 August. Access over 3,000 searchable, offline-ready audio sessions, sleep stories with Books at Bedtime, and built-in nightlight features for the small hours — including a night-time breathing session in the Box Breathing section made for exactly this moment. 👉 [Download Anchored on the App Store Today](https://apps.apple.com)

 

If this episode helped you tonight, please share it with someone who's lying awake too, and leave a 30-second rating and review on Apple Podcasts — it's the single kindest thing you can do for the show.

 

Sleep well, my friend. In everything, be kind.

 

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YouTube: Watch all episodes at https://www.youtube.com/c/calminganxiety?sub_confirmation=1

 

Social Media Support: For younger listeners struggling with social media stress, visit https://www.icanhelp.net/

 

Music: All music by Chris Collins

 

Ready for More Calm?Thank you for listening to the Calming Anxiety Podcast, featuring guided meditation, mindfulness, and sleep hypnosis sessions with Martin Hewlett. Our mission is to provide you with proven tools for anxiety relief, stress reduction, and a path toward deep relaxation. Use this episode anytime you need to calm your mind and feel more at ease.

Sleep Story for Insomnia — The Hound of the Baskervilles, Chapter 8: First Report of Dr Watson | Sir Arthur Conan Doyle | Books at Bedtime

 

A calming bedtime story for sleep and insomnia, read slowly and softly for anyone lying awake in the dark.

 

Tonight, Books at Bedtime continues The Hound of the Baskervilles by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle with Chapter 8 — the First Report of Dr Watson.

 

The narrative changes shape here. Holmes has stayed behind in London, and from this point onward Watson tells the story through his own letters, written by candlelight from Baskerville Hall and dated the thirteenth of October.

 

He writes of the moor and how its vastness sinks into the soul. Of the prehistoric huts scattered across the hillsides. Of the escaped convict who has not been seen for a fortnight and is surely long gone. Of Sir Henry's growing attachment to Miss Stapleton, and of the curious look of disapproval that crosses her brother's face whenever the baronet pays her attention.

 

There is a walk to the two great weathered stones where the legend of the wicked Hugo is said to have begun. A lunch at Merripit House. An introduction to Mr Frankland of Lafter Hall — red-faced, choleric, ruinously fond of a lawsuit, and lately to be found on his own roof with a telescope, sweeping the moor for a glimpse of the convict.

 

And then, at two o'clock in the morning, a stealthy step in the corridor. A long black shadow. A candle held against the glass of an empty room, and Barrymore staring out into the blackness of the moor.

 

There is some secret business going on in this house of gloom.

 

This is a full-length classic audiobook chapter, read as a sleep story — no sudden music, no jarring endings. Just a familiar Victorian mystery, told at a pace made for drifting off. If you fall asleep before Watson finishes his letter, that is exactly as it should be. The chapter will still be here tomorrow night.

 

Read by Martin Hewlett, clinical hypnotherapist, former paramedic and host of Calming Anxiety — the daily 10-minute guided meditation podcast. Books at Bedtime and Coffee Break for the Soul are the story companions to the daily show, made for the small hours.

 

The Hound of the Baskervilles is in the public domain.

 

Sleep well, my friend. In everything, be kind.

 

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Support the Show:

 

Ad-Free Listening: Enjoy Calming Anxiety without ads at https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/calming-anxiety--4110266/support

 

Buy Me a Coffee: Support hosting costs at https://www.buymeacoffee.com/calminganxiety

 

Newsletter: Subscribe on Substack at https://calminganxietypodcast.substack.com/?r=6zm0sc&utm_campaign=pub-share-checklist

 

Rate & Review: Leave a 5-star review on Spotify or Apple Podcasts to help us reach more listeners!

 

YouTube: Watch all episodes at https://www.youtube.com/c/calminganxiety?sub_confirmation=1

 

Social Media Support: For younger listeners struggling with social media stress, visit https://www.icanhelp.net/

 

Music: All music by Chris Collins

Ready for More Calm?Thank you for listening to the Calming Anxiety Podcast, featuring guided meditation, mindfulness, and sleep hypnosis sessions with Martin Hewlett. Our mission is to provide you with proven tools for anxiety relief, stress reduction, and a path toward deep relaxation. Use this episode anytime you need to calm your mind and feel more at ease.

Panic Attack Relief — Calm the Numb, Shaky Aftermath | 10 Minute Guided Meditation for Anxiety

 

Panic attack relief for the moment nobody talks about — the aftermath. The attack itself has passed, but the body still feels numb, the hands are tingling, the legs are unsteady, and the mind is already asking the frightening question: will I ever get over these? This ten minute guided meditation is for exactly that moment.

 

Hosted by clinical hypnotherapist and former paramedic Martin Hewlett, this session uses slow out-breath focus and a gentle winter's-morning visualisation — watching your breath leave as small white clouds, then watching the grey mist of fear and dark thoughts drift away on the breeze — to settle a nervous system that is still running hot. There is no need to fight the feeling. You simply breathe, and let the panic evaporate from the surface of the skin.

 

Whether you are looking for panic attack help, anxiety relief, breathwork for a racing heart, or a daily guided meditation to steady you before sleep, take these ten minutes now and regain control, composure and calm.

 

⏱️ Time Chapters

 

* 00:00 – The moment after a panic attack — numb body, tingling hands

* 00:22 – Welcome, and why this one is personal

* 00:44 – Diary note: Anchored launches Thursday the 13th

* 01:07 – Settling in — the almost hypnotic rhythm of the breath

* 01:50 – The pause between breaths, and letting the panic evaporate

* 02:59 – Deepening — muscle fibres loosening, sinking down, safe and secure

* 03:34 – Visualisation: seeing your breath on a cold winter's morning

* 03:51 – Breathing out the dark grey mist of fear and anxiety

* 04:47 – Preparing for today's affirmations

* 05:28 – Affirmations, first pass

* 06:54 – Affirmations, second pass

* 08:13 – Three daily caring tips

* 09:05 – Gently returning — fingers, toes, a stretch, and open your eyes

* 09:30 – Closing thoughts and the Anchored launch

* 10:37 – In everything, be kind

 

🌿 Today's Gentle Affirmations

 

Repeat these softly after me, silently or out loud, taking note of the sound, the shape, the feel of them:

 

I find calm and peace with every out breath.

 

I am in control of all that I am.

 

The negativity and darkness of my past does not define my future.

 

I am worthy of peace and joy as much as anyone else.

 

I love all that I am.

 

💡 3 Daily Caring Tips

 

1. **You are safe.** When panic arrives, tell yourself you are safe. You have got through worse before and you will get through this once more.

 

2. **You are not broken.** You are not at fault. We are all human and we all face the same challenges.

 

3. **Rest and steady yourself.** Take your rest once the panic is finished, have a drink of water and steady your nerves. Cold water on the back of your neck or on your wrists helps the parasympathetic system take back control.

 

📱 Take Calming Anxiety With You Anywhere

 

Put it in your diary — Thursday the 13th, Anchored launches on the App Store. It is the app I have written over the last few months: a home for all of this and so much more. The free plan gives you four sessions a day, the ambient night light, box breathing, and the night timers. Find out more at https://calminganxiety.fm/anchored

 

If you download it, please leave a review in the first day or two. It genuinely does spread the word, and I would love as many people as possible to be able to access it and take back control of their lives.

 

And if this episode helped you today, please share it with another soul, and take thirty seconds to leave a rating or review on Apple Podcasts.

 

Have a lovely day my friend. Smile often, positive thoughts whenever you can, and then in everything…be kind.

 

 

👉 Click to subscribe and unlock ad-free episodes now!

 

Support the Show:

 

Ad-Free Listening: Enjoy Calming Anxiety without ads at https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/calming-anxiety--4110266/support

 

Buy Me a Coffee: Support hosting costs at https://www.buymeacoffee.com/calminganxiety

 

Newsletter: Subscribe on Substack at https://calminganxietypodcast.substack.com/?r=6zm0sc&utm_campaign=pub-share-checklist

 

Rate & Review: Leave a 5-star review on Spotify or Apple Podcasts to help us reach more listeners!

 

YouTube: Watch all episodes at https://www.youtube.com/c/calminganxiety?sub_confirmation=1

 

Social Media Support: For younger listeners struggling with social media stress, visit https://www.icanhelp.net/

 

Music: All music by Chris Collins

Ready for More Calm?Thank you for listening to the Calming Anxiety Podcast, featuring guided meditation, mindfulness, and sleep hypnosis sessions with Martin Hewlett. Our mission is to provide you with proven tools for anxiety relief, stress reduction, and a path toward deep relaxation. Use this episode anytime you need to calm your mind and feel more at ease.

Sleep Story for Insomnia — The Hound of the Baskervilles, Chapter 7: The Stapletons of Merripit House by Arthur Conan Doyle | Books at Bedtime

 

A calming bedtime story for sleep and insomnia, read slowly and gently by Martin Hewlett of Calming Anxiety.

 

This is Chapter 7 of Arthur Conan Doyle's classic Sherlock Holmes mystery, The Hound of the Baskervilles — a free audiobook read designed to quiet a busy mind and carry you softly down into sleep.

 

Morning light floods the mullioned windows of Baskerville Hall, and for a moment the grim impression of the night before is eased away. But Dr Watson has a test to run at the Grimpen post office, and a walk out across the moor that will change everything he thinks he knows.

 

Out among the boulders he meets Mr Jack Stapleton, the naturalist of Merripit House — a man who knows the ground better than anyone, and who leads Watson to the edge of the great Grimpen Mire, where the earth itself waits to swallow the unwary.

 

And then, drifting across the moor, comes a long, low moan that the country folk have a name for.

 

If you struggle with insomnia, anxiety at bedtime, or a mind that will not switch off, this is a story to be listened to in the dark. There is no need to follow every thread. Let the words become a sound to rest inside, and if you drift away before the end, that is exactly as it should be.

 

Part of Books at Bedtime and Coffee Break for the Soul from Calming Anxiety, hosted by clinical hypnotherapist and former paramedic Martin Hewlett — bringing you calm, relaxation and better sleep, one chapter at a time.

 

Sleep well, my friend.

 

And in everything, my friend, be kind.

 

 

👉 Click to subscribe and unlock ad-free episodes now!

 

Support the Show:

 

Ad-Free Listening: Enjoy Calming Anxiety without ads at https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/calming-anxiety--4110266/support

 

Buy Me a Coffee: Support hosting costs at https://www.buymeacoffee.com/calminganxiety

 

Newsletter: Subscribe on Substack at https://calminganxietypodcast.substack.com/?r=6zm0sc&utm_campaign=pub-share-checklist

 

Rate & Review: Leave a 5-star review on Spotify or Apple Podcasts to help us reach more listeners!

 

YouTube: Watch all episodes at https://www.youtube.com/c/calminganxiety?sub_confirmation=1

 

Social Media Support: For younger listeners struggling with social media stress, visit https://www.icanhelp.net/

 

Music: All music by Chris Collins

Ready for More Calm?Thank you for listening to the Calming Anxiety Podcast, featuring guided meditation, mindfulness, and sleep hypnosis sessions with Martin Hewlett. Our mission is to provide you with proven tools for anxiety relief, stress reduction, and a path toward deep relaxation. Use this episode anytime you need to calm your mind and feel more at ease.

I'm So Tired of Starting Over — Guided Meditation for Setbacks, Self-Doubt & Beginning Again | Coherence Breathing

 

If you are so tired of starting over, this 10-minute guided meditation is for you. Setbacks, false starts and the quiet exhaustion of beginning again can leave you convinced you are going backwards and somehow behind. This session is not going to ask you to be positive about that. It is going to show you something you have stopped being able to see.

 

Hosted by clinical hypnotherapist and former paramedic Martin Hewlett, today's anxiety relief session uses coherence breathing, also known as resonant breathing, at six counts in and six counts out. At roughly five breaths a minute your heart rhythm and your breathing fall into step and synchronise, calming the nervous system and building resilience rather than simply distracting you. From there, gentle affirmations for self-doubt, self-worth and starting again settle you into a beautiful, trance-like state of deep relaxation.

 

This episode also carries a personal announcement. Six years after these meditations began with a microphone and not much of a clue, the Calming Anxiety app — Anchored — launches on Thursday the 13th of August. Slow, interrupted, unglamorous progress is still progress — and that is as true for you as it has been for me.

 

⏱️ Time Chapters

 

* 00:00 – "I'm so tired of starting over" — you are not lazy, not weak, not behind

* 00:49 – Welcome, and why setbacks are not the end of the story

* 01:22 – A personal announcement: six years, a van, a microphone, and Anchored

* 02:31 – Settling: feet flat, shoulders down, eyes closed

* 02:41 – Coherence breathing explained — six in, six out, five breaths a minute

* 03:22 – Three guided rounds of coherence breathing

* 04:54 – Affirmations for setbacks, resilience and beginning again

* 06:41 – Deepening — drifting down with every out-breath

* 07:22 – Second pass of affirmations

* 08:51 – Your three daily caring tips

* 09:35 – Coming back to the room

* 10:07 – Anchored launches Thursday 13th August — put it in your diary

* 11:01 – In everything, my friend, be kind

 

🌿 Today's Gentle Affirmations

 

Let these words settle. You don't have to believe them yet — just allow them to land.

 

* I am still here, and that is not a small thing.

* I have come further than I have ever given myself credit for.

* I am not behind. I am on my own path, at my own pace.

* Setbacks have shaped me. They have not stopped me.

* I am allowed to begin again, as many times as it takes.

* I am building something, even on the days it doesn't quite show.

* The quiet work I am doing still counts.

* Every setback I have survived is already inside me as strength.

* I am becoming resilient, one ordinary day at a time.

 

💡 3 Daily Caring Tips

 

1. Name what you have already survived — write down one thing you have already survived this year and read it back to yourself tonight before sleep.

 

2. Make the next step almost silly — choose the smallest possible next step, so small it feels almost silly, and do only that today.

 

3. Turn the measurement around — when you catch yourself measuring how far you have left to go, turn it around deliberately and measure how far you have already come.

 

📱 Take Calming Anxiety With You Anywhere

 

Download Anchored on iOS. Access over 3,000 searchable, offline-ready audio sessions, sleep stories with Books at Bedtime, and built-in nightlight features for the small hours. 👉 [Download Anchored on the App Store Today](https://apps.apple.com)

 

Anchored launches on Thursday the 13th of August. Please put it in your diary now, while you are thinking of it, before the day takes over. The more of us who arrive on the same day, the further it travels, and the more people it reaches who need it.

 

And if today's episode found something in you, please share it with someone who has been knocked back lately. You probably know exactly who. If you have thirty seconds, a rating and review on Apple Podcasts helps more people find their way here.

 

Sleep well, my friend, or go gently into your day. I'll be right here with you again tomorrow.

 

And in everything, my friend, be kind.

 

 

👉 Click to subscribe and unlock ad-free episodes now!

 

Support the Show:

 

Ad-Free Listening: Enjoy Calming Anxiety without ads at https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/calming-anxiety--4110266/support

 

Buy Me a Coffee: Support hosting costs at https://www.buymeacoffee.com/calminganxiety

 

Newsletter: Subscribe on Substack at https://calminganxietypodcast.substack.com/?r=6zm0sc&utm_campaign=pub-share-checklist

 

Rate & Review: Leave a 5-star review on Spotify or Apple Podcasts to help us reach more listeners!

 

YouTube: Watch all episodes at https://www.youtube.com/c/calminganxiety?sub_confirmation=1

 

Social Media Support: For younger listeners struggling with social media stress, visit https://www.icanhelp.net/

 

Music: All music by Chris Collins

Ready for More Calm?Thank you for listening to the Calming Anxiety Podcast, featuring guided meditation, mindfulness, and sleep hypnosis sessions with Martin Hewlett. Our mission is to provide you with proven tools for anxiety relief, stress reduction, and a path toward deep relaxation. Use this episode anytime you need to calm your mind and feel more at ease.