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

The Selfish Giant by Oscar Wilde — A Calming Bedtime Story for Sleep & Insomnia | Books at Bedtime

 

A soothing bedtime story to help you drift off tonight: Oscar Wilde's beloved fairy tale The Selfish Giant, read slowly and gently for sleep, insomnia relief, and quiet, unhurried listening. This is the first instalment of Books at Bedtime — also known as Coffee Break for the Soul — from the Calming Anxiety podcast, a strand of classic story readings designed as a calming audiobook for anxious or restless nights.

 If you'd like the whole library, plus ambient night-light features for the small hours, download Anchored on iOS:

https://apps.apple.com/us/app/anchored-panic-anxiety/id6785035669

 

Narrated softly by Martin Hewlett, clinical hypnotherapist and former paramedic, this reading follows a selfish giant who banishes children from his beautiful garden — only for it to fall into an endless winter until he learns, slowly and gently, what it means to let love back in. No jump scares, no urgency, nothing to keep your mind alert — just a slow, unhurried voice and a classic tale, ideal as a sleep story or relaxation audiobook for falling asleep, insomnia, and quieting an anxious mind before bed.

 

First published in 1888 in the collection The Happy Prince and Other Tales, Oscar Wilde's The Selfish Giant is in the public domain worldwide (Wilde died in 1900); this reading is Calming Anxiety's own narration of the classic public-domain text.

 

This episode is part of the ongoing Books at Bedtime strand, alongside classic short fiction from Katherine Mansfield, Kate Chopin, and Arthur Conan Doyle — currently working through The Hound of the Baskervilles — with new instalments added regularly to the main Calming Anxiety feed.

 

 

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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

Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/calming-anxiety-guided-meditation-sleep-hypnosis-panic-attack-relief--4110266/support.

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.

Mind Won't Switch Off? — Racing Thoughts Meditation for Anxious Nights | 4-7-8 Breathing

 

If your mind won't switch off — even though your body has clearly clocked out — this guided meditation is for you. Whether it's 2am or the middle of an ordinary afternoon, racing thoughts don't wait for a convenient time, and this episode meets you exactly where you are with 4-7-8 breathing, a calming cognitive visualisation, and three daily caring tips you can use anytime the loop starts again. For the nights it gets harder than ten minutes can fix, download Anchored on the App Store: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/anchored-panic-anxiety/id6785035669 — it's the same voice, free, and there whenever your mind decides it needs help.

 

Hosted by clinical hypnotherapist and former paramedic Martin Hewlett, today's session uses 4-7-8 breathing — in for 4, hold for 7, out for 8 — a technique drawn from years on the road as a paramedic, where changing what the body is doing is often the fastest way to change what the mind is doing. From there, a gentle visualisation reframes anxious thoughts as letters arriving through a letterbox: you don't have to open every one, read it end to end, or write back. You are the house, not the letter.

 

⏱️ Time Chapters

* 00:00 – Welcome: when your mind won't switch off

* 01:28 – Introducing 4-7-8 Breathing (from years as a paramedic)

* 02:17 – Breathing practice, round one

* 04:10 – Breathing practice, round two

* 04:29 – The letterbox: thoughts aren't instructions

* 05:31 – Today's Gentle Affirmations

* 08:17 – Three Daily Caring Tips

* 09:28 – Coming back, stretch and release

* 09:47 – Outro & be kind

 

🌿 Today's Gentle Affirmations

Repeat these softly if you wish:

I do not have to solve this thought right now.

I can notice a thought arrive without following it out of the door.

My mind is allowed to be busy; I am allowed to become underneath it.

I am having a thought, though that is not the same as the thought being true.

I do not need to answer every question my anxiety asks of me.

Some thoughts can just sit on the mat until morning.

 

💡 3 Daily Caring Tips

1. **Name it out loud** — When a thought loops back for the third or fourth time, try naming it: "that's the one again," rather than arguing with it. Naming it takes some of its power away.

2. **Keep a scrap of paper by the bed** — If a thought insists it needs solving right now, write three words about it and tell yourself you're looking at it in daylight. Most things look smaller by breakfast.

3. **Try the long exhale on its own** — In for four, out for eight, even just once. You don't need the full ten minutes to borrow a little calm.

 

📱 Take Calming Anxiety With You Anywhere

If tonight — or one of these nights — you need more than ten minutes, 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/us/app/anchored-panic-anxiety/id6785035669)

 

If today's session helped, please share it with a friend, family member, or colleague — and a 30-second rating or review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify helps more people find this when they need it most.

 

…be kind.

 

 

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

 

Support the Show:

 

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

Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/calming-anxiety-guided-meditation-sleep-hypnosis-panic-attack-relief--4110266/support.

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.

A Man and His Dog by Katherine Mansfield — A Calming Bedtime Story for Sleep & Insomnia | Books at Bedtime

 

If sleep feels far away tonight, let Katherine Mansfield's A Man and His Dog carry you gently there. Tonight's Books at Bedtime sleep story follows Mr. Potts, a small, unassuming man weighed down by a difficult night at home, and Lino, the loyal dog waiting for him at the gate, in a quiet, wistful sketch read slowly to ease you toward sleep.

 

This is a Calming Anxiety production, read by host Martin Hewlett as part of our nightly Books at Bedtime and Coffee Break for the Soul series of classic short story readings for insomnia relief and relaxation.

For more calming bedtime stories and relaxing audio whenever you need it, download Anchored on iOS, with Android arriving September 2026.

👉 Download Anchored on the App Store Today: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/anchored-panic-anxiety/id6785035669

 

Written around 1921 as one of Katherine Mansfield's unfinished sketches and first collected posthumously in The Dove's Nest and Other Stories (1923), A Man and His Dog is now in the public domain in the US. If you enjoyed our earlier readings of Miss Brill, The Singing Lesson and The Canary, this gentler, more understated Mansfield sleep story is a lovely one to drift off to.

 

Let Mr. Potts' quiet, weary evening settle slowly around you as a calming audiobook for bedtime, and let your own thoughts soften into sleep. If you enjoyed this reading, explore more relaxing sleep stories and classic audiobooks in our Books at Bedtime and Coffee Break for the Soul archive, available wherever you listen to Calming Anxiety.

 

 

Support the Show:

 

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

Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/calming-anxiety-guided-meditation-sleep-hypnosis-panic-attack-relief--4110266/support.

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.

Monday Morning Anxiety — Calm the Dread of the Week Ahead | Vagus Nerve Breathing Meditation

 

 

Monday morning anxiety has a weight all of its own — that heavy, anticipatory dread that arrives before your feet have even touched the floor. In this 10-minute guided meditation, Calming Anxiety host Martin helps you put the whole week down and meet Monday with a nervous system that is working with you, not against you.

 

Today's practice uses vagus nerve breathing — a slow nasal inhale, a gentle hold, and a long, soft exhale — to press the brake pedal on your stress response. Three guided rounds, followed by a warm golden-light body scan and a set of gentle affirmations for anxiety relief, work anxiety and the Sunday scaries that spill into Monday. It closes with three practical daily caring tips you can carry into the day.

 

Whether you're listening in bed, on the train, in the car park, or in the ten quiet minutes before you walk in through those doors — this is deep relaxation and breathwork you can use anywhere. Hosted by clinical hypnotherapist and former paramedic Martin Hewlett.

 

 

⏱️ Time Chapters

 

* 00:00 – Cold open: the weight of a Monday morning

* 01:06 – Welcome to Calming Anxiety with Martin

* 01:23 – Anchored: over 3,000 searchable sessions

* 02:00 – Finding your quiet place and settling

* 02:47 – Vagus nerve breathing: three guided rounds

* 05:01 – Warm golden light body scan

* 06:10 – Today's gentle affirmations

* 08:30 – Your three daily caring tips

* 09:17 – Coming gently back into the room

* 09:38 – Closing thoughts and sign-off

 

 

🌿 Today's Gentle Affirmations

 

Say these quietly in your own mind, or out loud if you're somewhere you can:

 

• I am safe. I am here. There is nothing to fear right now.

 

• I meet this week one hour at a time.

 

• I am not the clouds. I am the sky. Thoughts about Monday will pass across me, and I will still be here.

 

• My calm does not depend on my calendar.

 

• I release the weight I've been carrying since yesterday evening.

 

• My nervous system knows how to settle, and I am helping it settle right now.

 

• I am allowed to begin this week gently.

 

 

💡 3 Daily Caring Tips

 

1. One Thing First — Before you look at your phone this morning, write down the single most important thing you need to do today, and let everything else be optional.

 

2. Breathe In The Doorway — Take one slow vagus nerve breath, four in and six out, in the doorway before you walk into any room that makes you tense.

 

3. Protect Ten Minutes — Take a 10 minute gap in your diary this afternoon and label it "nothing", then protect it as fiercely as you would a meeting.

 

 

📱 Take Calming Anxiety With You Anywhere

 

If today helped, 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

 

And if you'd do one more thing for me — share this episode with someone you know who finds Mondays heavy, and leave a 30-second rating and review on Apple Podcasts. It takes moments, and it might be the reason their week goes differently.

 

Until tomorrow — go gently, take care my friend, and to yourself and everyone else, 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.

The Canary by Katherine Mansfield — A Calming Bedtime Story for Sleep & Insomnia | Books at Bedtime

 

If sleep feels far away tonight, let Katherine Mansfield's The Canary carry you gently there. Tonight's Books at Bedtime sleep story is a quiet, tender monologue: a lonely woman remembers the pet canary who once filled her home with song, and the small, aching space he left behind, read slowly to ease you toward sleep.

 

This is a Calming Anxiety production, read by host Martin Hewlett as part of our nightly Books at Bedtime and Coffee Break for the Soul series of classic short story readings for insomnia relief and relaxation.

 For more calming bedtime stories and relaxing audio whenever you need it, download Anchored on iOS, with Android arriving September 2026.

👉 Download Anchored on the App Store Today: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/anchored-panic-anxiety/id6785035669

 

First published in April 1923 in The Nation and Athenaeum and later collected in The Dove's Nest and Other Stories, The Canary was the last short story Katherine Mansfield ever completed and is now in the public domain in the US. If you enjoyed our earlier readings of Miss Brill and The Singing Lesson, this gentle, wistful story is another beautiful Mansfield sleep story to drift off to.

 

Let this quiet story of love and loss settle slowly around you as a calming audiobook for bedtime, and let your own thoughts soften into sleep. If you enjoyed this reading, explore more relaxing sleep stories and classic audiobooks in our Books at Bedtime and Coffee Break for the Soul archive, available wherever you listen to Calming Anxiety.

 

 

Support the Show:

 

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

Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/calming-anxiety-guided-meditation-sleep-hypnosis-panic-attack-relief--4110266/support.

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.