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

Man About Town by O. Henry — A Calming Bedtime Story for Sleep & Insomnia | Books at Bedtime

 

Drift off with this gentle bedtime story for sleep and insomnia relief, read aloud as part of Calming Anxiety's Books at Bedtime strand. Tonight's tale is Man About Town, O. Henry's wry, wandering search through turn-of-the-century New York for one elusive social type — first published in his 1906 collection The Four Million, long in the public domain, with Porter (1862–1910) having died more than a century ago.

 

For more calming audiobooks and sleep stories whenever you need them, download Anchored, the free companion app to Calming Anxiety, with offline-ready relaxation and Books at Bedtime sessions for any hour of the night.

Get it on the App Store at https://apps.apple.com/us/app/anchored-panic-anxiety/id6785035669 or on Google Play at https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.martinhewlett.anchored.

 

In this soothing bedtime audiobook, our curious narrator sets out to finally pin down exactly what a "man about town" is, quizzing a reporter, a bartender, a Salvation Army lassie and a critic along the way, before the city itself delivers the answer in typically O. Henry fashion. A gentle, unhurried classic, perfect for winding down, easing anxiety, and drifting off to sleep.

 

Hosted by clinical hypnotherapist and former paramedic Martin Hewlett, as part of Calming Anxiety's Coffee Break for the Soul and Books at Bedtime story readings.

 

And in everything, my friend, be kind.

 

 

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.

Pins and Needles Anxiety — A 10-Minute Meditation for Tingling Hands and Panic

 

You're sitting perfectly still and your hand doesn't feel like your own hand. That prickling in your fingers, a strange half-numb feeling in the palm — so you test it, open and close your fingers, hold your hand up and look at it, and the more you look, the stranger it feels. If you've been searching for pins and needles anxiety, or wondering about tingling hands anxiety, this guided meditation is for that exact moment.

 

For a place to return to when the sensation comes back, download Anchored, Calming Anxiety's free companion app — there's no symptom list inside, nothing to look up, just a voice for ten minutes and somewhere quiet to put yourself.

Get it on the App Store at https://apps.apple.com/us/app/anchored-panic-anxiety/id6785035669 or on Google Play at https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.martinhewlett.anchored.

 

Hosted by clinical hypnotherapist and former paramedic Martin Hewlett, this episode uses "walking the breath" — three steps in, four steps out, or gentle finger-taps if you're seated — to ground the body, then moves into affirmation work that reframes pins and needles as a sensation rather than a verdict on what's wrong with you.

 

⏱️ Time Chapters

* 00:00 – When Your Hand Doesn't Feel Like Your Own

* 00:42 – Welcome & Anchored

* 01:22 – Why Pins and Needles Happen

* 01:43 – Breathing: Walking the Breath (3 In, 4 Out)

* 04:16 – A Word From the Ambulance Days

* 05:14 – Warmth Spreading to Your Fingertips

* 05:50 – Affirmations for Tingling Hands

* 07:28 – Settling Deeper

* 08:38 – Three Daily Caring Tips

* 09:38 – Coming Back Gently

* 10:11 – A Note From Martin

 

🌿 Today's Gentle Affirmations

Settle in and repeat these gently to yourself:

My hands are safe.

Pins and needles are a sensation, they are not a verdict.

I can feel the tingling and still be perfectly well.

I do not have to watch my body to keep it working.

My body is not sending me a warning — it is simply sending me a sensation.

I can let this pass without looking anything up.

I am not the fear about my hands. I am the one noticing it.

I am here, I am safe, and there is nothing to fear right now.

 

💡 3 Daily Caring Tips

1. The next time your hands go tingly, stand up and walk to the end of the room and back before you do anything else.

2. If you've already looked this sensation up once today, that's enough — put the phone face down for ten minutes and let the ten minutes pass without it.

3. Once today, say out loud exactly what is true and nothing more: "my hands are tingling" — not "something is wrong." Just the sensation, named as a sensation.

 

📱 Take Calming Anxiety With You Anywhere

Download Anchored on iOS at https://apps.apple.com/us/app/anchored-panic-anxiety/id6785035669 or on Google Play at https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.martinhewlett.anchored. Access over 2,500 searchable, offline-ready audio sessions, sleep stories with Books at Bedtime, and built-in nightlight features for the small hours. If this episode helped, please share it and leave a quick rating or review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify — it genuinely helps more people find their way here.

 

And in everything, my friend, be kind.

 

 

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.

The Gift of the Magi by O. Henry — A Calming Bedtime Story for Sleep & Insomnia | Books at Bedtime

 

Drift off with this gentle bedtime story for sleep and insomnia relief, read aloud as part of Calming Anxiety's Books at Bedtime strand. Tonight's tale is The Gift of the Magi, O. Henry's much-loved Christmas classic about a young couple with almost nothing to spend and everything to give, first published in his 1906 collection The Four Million — long in the public domain, with Porter (1862–1910) having died more than a century ago.

 

For more calming audiobooks and sleep stories whenever you need them, download Anchored, the free companion app to Calming Anxiety, with offline-ready relaxation and Books at Bedtime sessions for any hour of the night.

 Get it on the App Store at https://apps.apple.com/us/app/anchored-panic-anxiety/id6785035669 or on Google Play at https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.martinhewlett.anchored.

 

In this soothing bedtime audiobook, Della has just one dollar and eighty-seven cents to buy her husband Jim a Christmas present worthy of him — so she makes a sacrifice of her own most treasured possession, setting up one of literature's most tender surprise endings. A gentle, unhurried classic, perfect for winding down, easing anxiety, and drifting off to sleep.

 

Hosted by clinical hypnotherapist and former paramedic Martin Hewlett, as part of Calming Anxiety's Coffee Break for the Soul and Books at Bedtime story readings.

 

And in everything, my friend, be kind.

 

 

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.

Why Does September Feel So Heavy? — A 10-Minute Meditation for End-of-Summer Sadness and Seasonal Low Mood

 

You're standing in the kitchen and it's already getting dark. A few weeks ago there was still plenty of light at this time. The summer's gone, the children are back at school, the diary's filling up again — and somehow you're feeling worse, not devastated, not falling apart, just flat. That can be the frightening part, because nothing bad has actually happened. If you've been wondering about September sadness, or asking yourself why do I feel sad when summer ends, this guided meditation is for the next ten minutes of your day.

 

For company on the darker evenings ahead, download Anchored, Calming Anxiety's companion app, with Books at Bedtime sessions to fall asleep to and a timer that switches off on its own.

Get it on the App Store at https://apps.apple.com/us/app/anchored-panic-anxiety/id6785035669 or on Google Play at https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.martinhewlett.anchored.

 

Hosted by clinical hypnotherapist and former paramedic Martin Hewlett, this episode uses alternate nostril breathing (nadi shodhana) to settle you, then works with the specific fear that comes from low mood with no obvious cause — reframing it as the season changing, not you failing.

 

⏱️ Time Chapters

* 00:00 – Why Does September Feel So Heavy?

* 01:12 – Welcome & Anchored

* 02:24 – Breathing: Alternate Nostril (Nadi Shodhana)

* 04:53 – Putting Down "What's Wrong With Me?"

* 06:45 – Affirmations for the Season Turning

* 08:38 – Three Daily Caring Tips

* 09:33 – Coming Back Gently

* 10:11 – A Note From Martin

 

🌿 Today's Gentle Affirmations

Settle in and repeat these gently to yourself:

This is the season changing, not me failing.

I do not need a reason to feel low.

September sadness does not mean there is something wrong with me.

I can notice how I feel without judging how I feel.

I am allowed to slow down when the year does.

The light is changing, and I can change gently with it.

I do not have to force myself to feel differently today.

I can simply be kind to myself.

 

💡 3 Daily Caring Tips

1. Get outside for 10 minutes before 10am if you can — no phone, no podcast, no scrolling, just daylight.

2. Say this one out loud, once, today: "This is the season, not me" — not as a diagnosis, just a gentle reminder that change in the world around you can affect how you feel.

3. Put one small pleasant thing in the diary for this week — not for December, not something you have to wait months for. A coffee with someone you like, a walk somewhere beautiful, ten minutes with a book.

 

📱 Take Calming Anxiety With You Anywhere

Download Anchored on iOS at https://apps.apple.com/us/app/anchored-panic-anxiety/id6785035669 or on Google Play at https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.martinhewlett.anchored. Access over 2,500 searchable, offline-ready audio sessions, sleep stories with Books at Bedtime, and built-in nightlight features for the small hours. If this episode helped, please share it and leave a quick rating or review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify — it genuinely helps more people find their way here.

 

And in everything, my friend, be kind.

 

 

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.

After Twenty Years by O. Henry — A Calming Bedtime Story for Sleep & Insomnia | Books at Bedtime

 

Drift off with this gentle bedtime story for sleep and insomnia relief, read aloud as part of Calming Anxiety's Books at Bedtime strand. Tonight's tale is After Twenty Years, O. Henry's quietly moving story of an old promise kept between two childhood friends, first published in his 1906 collection The Four Million — long in the public domain, with Porter (1862–1910) having died more than a century ago.

 

For more calming audiobooks and sleep stories whenever you need them, download Anchored, the free companion app to Calming Anxiety, with offline-ready relaxation and Books at Bedtime sessions for any hour of the night.

Get it on the App Store at https://apps.apple.com/us/app/anchored-panic-anxiety/id6785035669 or on Google Play at https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.martinhewlett.anchored.

 

In this soothing bedtime audiobook, Bob waits alone in a darkened New York doorway for the friend he agreed to meet at this exact spot, exactly twenty years to the night since they last parted — and a passing policeman's chat with him sets up one of O. Henry's most quietly devastating twists. A gentle, unhurried classic, perfect for winding down, easing anxiety, and drifting off to sleep.

 

Hosted by clinical hypnotherapist and former paramedic Martin Hewlett, as part of Calming Anxiety's Coffee Break for the Soul and Books at Bedtime story readings.

 

And in everything, my friend, be kind.

 

 

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.