Sleeping This Way? Here Is How It Can Change Everything
For years, Mara slept curled into herself like a question mark.
Her spine bent, her knees drawn to her chest, her arms wrapped tight around her belly. It was the posture of someone protecting something—grief, maybe, or memory. Her bed was a raft in a storm she never named. No one asked why she slept that way, and she never offered an answer.
Until the night she turned over.
It happened without thought. A twitch, a sigh, a surrender. She rolled onto her back, arms open, chest exposed to the ceiling. Vulnerable. Unfolded.
She woke up different.
Not dramatically. Not like the movies. But subtly—like a door had been left ajar in her mind. The light crept in slowly.
She noticed things. The way her breath felt fuller. The way her dreams stretched longer. The way her body, once clenched like a fist, now felt like an open palm.
She told no one.
But the change continued.
She stopped apologizing for taking up space. She wore red lipstick to the grocery store. She laughed louder. She said no without guilt. She said yes without fear.
Her friends noticed.
“You seem… lighter,” one said.
“I slept differently,” Mara replied.
They laughed, but she didn’t.
She began to research. Not just sleep positions, but symbolism. Psychology. Ritual. She learned that fetal sleeping was common among trauma survivors. That sleeping on one’s back was associated with openness, trust, even spiritual alignment.
She remembered her childhood—how she used to sleep like a starfish, limbs splayed, dreaming of flight. That was before the silence. Before the secrets. Before the man with the heavy hands and the mother who looked away.
She hadn’t slept on her back since she was nine.
Until now.
It felt like reclaiming something.
She started journaling. Not about sleep, but about everything. The boy who broke her heart in college. The job she stayed in too long. The sister she hadn’t spoken to in years. The abortion she never told anyone about.
Each night, she lay on her back, arms open, heart exposed. And each morning, she woke up more herself.
She began to teach others.
Not formally. Just quietly. She’d mention it at brunch, at yoga, in line at the post office.
“Try sleeping differently,” she’d say. “It might change everything.”
Some rolled their eyes. Some tried it. Some came back weeks later, whispering, “You were right.”
One woman said she’d stopped having nightmares. Another said she’d finally left her toxic marriage. A man confessed he’d cried for the first time in years.
It wasn’t magic. It was metaphor.
To sleep differently was to live differently.
To uncurl was to unlearn.
To lie open was to let go.
Mara didn’t become famous. She didn’t write a book or start a podcast. But she became a quiet revolution. A ripple in the lives of those who dared to shift.
And one night, years later, her sister called.
“I saw your photo,” she said. “You were sleeping on your back.”
Mara smiled. “I do now.”
Her sister cried.
“I want to try.”
Mara said, “I’ll stay on the phone until you fall asleep.”
They didn’t speak much. Just breathed together. And when Mara heard her sister’s breath deepen, she whispered, “You’re safe now.”
That night, two women slept differently.
And everything changed.
