This is our 12th full moon episode. I wrote the first one last December, and then I wasn't sure I'd be able to do this. Create a new episode for every full moon. Sometimes I'd sit down and start to write and I would think, oh this is it. This month I won't think of anything to write, but something would always inspire me. Always.I never used to be someone who noticed the moon. A year ago I could have walked past a full moon and not really seen it. It was just the moon up there, doing its thing.Now I'm like a walking encyclopedia of moon facts. Of all the full moons I've worked with over the last 12 months, this one, this November full moon, speaks to me in a particular way. It's the last full moon of autumn.The bridge between harvest and hibernation. The leaves have fallen, the earth is hardening, and this moon watches over it all with a kind of ancient patience. They call it the beaver moon, because this was when beavers would be most active.They also call it the frost moon, for obvious reasons. The morning moon, some say, for the grief of summer's ending. But I think of it as the permission moon.The moon that says it's time to stop. Time to say no. Time to turn inward without apology.We live in a world that treats rest like theft. Like we're stealing time from productivity. Stealing value from our worth.The November moon knows rest isn't the absence of value, it's the foundation of resilience. When we rest, truly rest, our brains consolidate memories, our bodies repair cellular damage, our nervous system recalibrates. We're not doing nothing.We're doing everything necessary to continue. Tonight, we're going to help you find sleep and to give you permission to put yourself first. To rest when you need it, because you deserve that.But before we begin this journey, I need to make sure you're somewhere completely safe to fall asleep. This episode is designed to guide you into deep restorative sleep using gentle hypnotherapy and visualization. So please, be in your bed, just you, your bed, and permission to rest. And if this podcast has helped you, please don't hesitate to share it with your tired friend, with that person who's been complaining about insomnia, with anyone who's been lying away, wishing they could just rest. You might be giving them exactly what they need. Now, let's help your body remember how to truly rest.Make yourself completely comfortable. Adjust your pillows until your neck feels perfectly supported. Arrange your blankets around you, just the way you like them.And find that position where your body can completely let go. Then take a slow, deep breath in. Feel that cool air filling your lungs. And then release that breath slowly, letting your exhale be longer than your inhale. Let's do that again. Breathing in the quiet of the night.Breathing out the accumulated tension of your day. With each breath you take now, you're creating space. Space between you and today's demands.Space between you and tomorrow's obligations. Space that belongs only to you, only to this moment of rest. Your body has already begun to respond. Your heart rate is slowing. Your blood pressure is gently decreasing. Your nervous system is shifting from vigilance to restoration.With each breath you take now, imagine you're moving further away from the demands of your day. Your only job from this moment forward is to listen to my voice and let it guide you deeper into peace. Keep breathing with me. A slow, full breath in. And then release. You're moving into a beautiful state of receptive calm. Where my words can guide you into the deep rest you truly deserve. The November forest is preparing for night. The light has that particular quality of late autumn.It slants through the bare branches at sharp angles, creating long shadows across the forest floor. The sun is already low, already surrendering to the longer darkness that November brings. The air carries the scent of decomposition and promise.Fallen leaves now pass their colorful glory. Create a carpet of browns and grays. They're breaking down, returning their nutrients to the soil.Listen to the sounds. Or rather, notice the growing absence of sound. November forests are quieter than summer forests.No constant insect chorus. No rustlings of leafy canopies. Instead, there's the occasional crack of a branch, adjusting to the cold, the distant sound of water. Not flowing freely, but beginning to slow, beginning to feel the first touch of ice at its edges. A great horned owl settles onto his perch in an old oak. He's been hunting since before dawn, but now as the light fades, he grips the branch tightly, fluffs his feathers against the coming cold, and allows his large yellow eyes to close. He doesn't question this rest, doesn't push through exhaustion to hunt just a little longer. His body knows, rest now, hunt later. The temperature is dropping.He can almost feel it. That particular cold of November that's different from December's bitter freeze or October's crisp chill. This is the cold that creeps, that finds its way through layers. That announces winter's serious approach. In a hollow log padded with shredded bark and moss, a chipmunk has created her winter sanctuary. She's been preparing for weeks, gathering, storing, organizing.But now, as the November dusk deepens, she curls into the smallest possible ball, her breathing slowing, her tiny heart rate dropping. She's not quite hibernating, but entering a deep energy conserving rest, her body temperature will drop, her metabolism will slow to almost nothing. She's not lazy. She's brilliant. She knows that survival sometimes means stopping. The sky above is changing color.The silver light is becoming touched with gold, and then the faintest pink. It's the kind of sunset that only happens in November, when the air is so clear and cold that colors seem sharper, more defined. And in this changing light, the forest floor reveals its secrets, the intricate patterns of frost beginning to form on fallen logs, the delicate ice crystals growing on the remaining ferns, the way moisture in the air is starting to crystallize, creating tiny prisms that catch and scatter the fading light. Near a partially frozen stream, a beaver works steadily on his lodge. But even he, industrious, determined, the very creature this moon is named for, knows when to stop. As the light continues to fade, he makes his final adjustments and retreats into the warmth of his carefully constructed home.Inside, it's dark and warm, insulated by mud and sticks and clever engineering. He settles in with his family, their bodies creating shared warmth. Even the beaver, symbol of constant work, understands there's a time to build, and there's a time to rest.The forest is truly quiet now. The only sounds are the settling of wood as temperature drops, the whisper of wind through bare branches. And somewhere, far off, the call of a barred owl, not hunting, just announcing its presence to the night.And then through the lacework of bare branches, something begins to glow. The moon, November's full moon, rises slowly, deliberately, as if conscious of its weight and significance. It's larger near the horizon, an optical illusion that makes it seem close enough to touch.The color is not the white silver of summer moons. Or the harvest gold of September. But something in between, the color of candlelight.This is the frost moon, and it seems to pull the cold with it as it rises. Everywhere its light touches, frost begins to form more quickly. The moisture in the air crystallizes. Surfaces begin to glitter. The moonlight is different in November. Without leaves to filter it, it reaches the forest floor unimpeded.Every trunk casts a sharp shadow. Every branch is outlined in silver. Look how the light touches the owl on his perch.His feathers seem to glow. But his eyes remain closed. See how it finds the entrance to the chipmunk's hollow, painting the frost around it silver, but not penetrating the darkness where she sleeps. The moon knows that some rest requires complete darkness. Watch how it turns the beaver's pond into a mirror, reflecting its own light back to the sky, creating a double moon, one in the heavens and one in the water. Even the busy beaver's pond is now still, at rest under the moon's gaze.The November moon has witnessed this before. For thousands of years, it has risen over forests preparing for winter. It has watched countless creatures make the same choice, rest now, survive later.It has seen that rest is not weakness, but wisdom. In a small den beneath the roots of a white pine, a black bear has been dozing for hours. She's not in full hibernation yet. That will come with December's deeper cold, but she's practicing. Her breathing has slowed to just a few breaths per minute. Her heart beats with long pauses between each thump. She shifts slightly, her body adjusting, and then stillness returns. Complete stillness, the kind of rest that rebuilds, that restores, that prepares. The forest under November's moon is teaching us something.Every creature here could push through. The owl could hunt all night. The chipmunk could gather just a few more seeds.The beaver could reinforce his dam one more time, but they don't. They understand something that we've forgotten. Rest is not what you do when everything else is done.Rest is what makes everything else possible. When we rest, truly rest without guilt or justification, miraculous things happen in our bodies. Our cells repair damage.Our brains consolidate memories and clear out toxins. Our immune systems strengthen. Our stress hormones decrease.Our creativity regenerates. This moon has a message for you, carried on its ancient light. Your worth is not measured in your exhaustion.Your value doesn't increase with your fatigue. The moonlight is streaming now, full and bright. Every surface it touches seems to glow with quiet light.The frost is thick now. Each crystal a tiny moon in itself, reflecting and refracting the light into millions of small brilliances. Your body is responding to this moonlight.Feel how heavy, your arms have become. They've put down what they've been carrying. Your legs are completely relaxed now, sinking into your bed as if into soft forest moss.They've walked far enough today. They can stop now. Your shoulders release their grip on the day's tensions.Your jaw is unclenched. Your forehead is smooth, unworried. Every muscle in your body is saying yes to rest.The November moon continues its journey across the sky, and with each degree it travels, you sink deeper into this peaceful state. Think of all the things you said yes to today when you wanted to say no. All the energy you gave when your reserves were already low. All the times you pushed through fatigue because rest felt like failure.

You're not meant to be endlessly productive. You're meant to ebb and flow, to work and rest, to give and receive.

Your breathing has found its perfect rhythm now—slow, deep, natural. Your heartbeat has slowed to its resting rate, that gentle, steady rhythm that sustains you without effort. Your mind is quiet, no longer calculating or planning or worrying.

You are, in this moment, perfect in your rest.

The November moon sees you. It sees your tiredness. It sees your need for rest. It sees you choosing to stop, to restore, and it bathes you in its approving light.

The forest is deep in its night rest. The chipmunk dreams small dreams. The beaver and his family breathe together in warm darkness. The bear has descended so deep into rest that her breathing is barely perceptible.

And the moon watches over all of it. 

You're floating now, suspended between waking and sleep. Your body is completely heavy, completely relaxed. Your mind is drifting, thoughts becoming dreams, dreams becoming the doorway to deep sleep.

The November moon will continue its journey across the sky as you sleep. It will watch over your rest just as it watches over the forest. And when you wake, you'll carry some of its wisdom with you—the knowledge that rest is not retreat but renewal, not weakness but wisdom.

Let yourself drift now. Let sleep come like frost—gently, naturally, inevitably. Let your body do what it knows how to do, what it's designed to do, what it needs to do.

I’m Suzanne. This is your ticket to snoozeville. Sleep now. Sleep deeply. Sleep well.