I built a nighttime ritual I actually do now. One prize wheel, one spin, whatever it lands on. The decision gets made before my brain is too far gone to make it. That’s it.
But let’s back up a but to how I got here. I‘ve been on a longer journey of learning to actually listen to my body, and one of the things that accelerated it was doing DNA testing with Valentina Bain. What came back was specific enough to change how I think about my whole day: when my cortisol spikes, it stays high. And that directly impacts my sleep.
The end of my day, unbeknownst to me until now, is a cortisol management situation. What I do, watch, engage with, and think about in those last few hours before sleep either supports that or works against it. So rude, right?
My mornings are dialed. I’ve built a routine I actually love, one I revisit every six months so it stays fresh, and I feel genuinely supported by how I ease into the day. At night? That’s a different story.
The evening is the next frontier.
By 4pm, my brain is done. I wake up around six, I go to sleep around ten, which means 4pm is already two thirds of the way through my actual day. My nervous system has done the math even when I haven’t. And asking my 4pm brain to choose a restorative evening activity out of the blue is asking it to do the thing it is least equipped to do at that moment. So it reaches for whatever has the lowest entry barrier.
For a long time, the default at the end of the day has been putting on TV and numbing. Currently in rotation: Love Island. It’s literally on like every day so it’s reliable as a default. And I’m watching, and I’m scrolling, and I just feel like I’m numbing.
The insight that finally cracked it came from a call with my somatic movement coach Sam (she’s incredible and trains you on how to process the stored emotions in your body in a way that feels safe and supportive).
We’ve been doing movement and visualization work and this week, we landed on the topic of rest. On my relationship with it. On where I learned that rest needed to be earned.
My mom self-abandoned to host every holiday. The days of prep, the hours in the kitchen with no help while everyone else enjoys themselves. Started as just Easter, became every single one. My dad, an entrepreneur and the bread winner, also built the house we grew up in with his own hands. Weekends were projects. The message underneath all of it was: there is always more to be done.
The belief I’m still untangling is “if I stop moving, I’ll fall behind.” And when I’m in a rest cycle, I feel guilty about it, which creates pressure, which creates freeze, which means I have to dig myself out before I can actually rest. By that point I’m just putting on Love Island and calling it a night.
What my body has been trying to tell me is that numbing and resting are not the same thing.
I already knew this. It’s not NEW information. The sauna is where I feel it most clearly. No book, no phone, just existing. I feel amazing after. I don’t struggle to know what rest feels like. The struggle is trying to decide how to do it when my brain is already mush.
Think about when someone is grieving…you don’t ask them what they need. The part of the brain that generates preferences and makes choices is offline. The most useful thing you can do is show up with a plan and remove the burden of deciding. You bring the soup. You make the call. You take the choice off their plate entirely.
My brain at 4pm is in a similar place. Rest requires a micro-decision: pick the thing, get up, do the thing. Scrolling requires zero decisions. That is where the whole evening goes.
Here’s how I solved this in the most fun way I could think of
So I happened to have this prize wheel from a conference event I did. Obviously. Who doesn’t have a prize wheel?
When I mentioned my plan in my HOT GIRL FNDR group chat, the ideas came in immediately. My friends sent ritual after ritual. I now have a full backlog I’m still sorting through. The crowd-sourcing happened so naturally because the premise was specific enough to make it easy to contribute and I happen to be surrounded by the most brilliant baddies who make me feel super supported.
So there it was. I had everything I needed. I put rituals on the wedges. One spin, that’s the protocol. Whatever it lands on, I do it. I can spin again and stack if I want more. I can swap wedges whenever the novelty wears off. I don’t have to generate the idea from scratch when I’m already running on empty.
The wheel is working. The gap between knowing what would help and actually doing it is almost never willpower. It’s friction. And friction at the end of the day, when your brain has already closed up shop, compounds everything that didn’t get processed.
Here’s what’s currently on my wheel:
Building Your Own Wheel
🔒 The full annotated backlog, plus a framework for building your own wheel based on your Moon sign and your actual depletion window, is below for paid subscribers.
The wheel works because it removes the decision. But what goes on the wheel matters too. A list of rituals that don’t actually fit how you’re wired will still sit there unused, just in a different format.
Two inputs: your Moon sign and the time your brain actually closes up shop (likely hours before you may think it’s maxed out).
Before we dive into each of these, let’s talk format.
Don’t have a wheel? Here’s the one I have:
Don’t want to invest in a wheel? That’s ok! I could see this working well in other formats. You could:
Write each ritual on a piece of paper, fold them and put them in a jar or bowl to draw from each night
Rotate through the list in order and do one each day (easily something that could be plugged into your calendar)
Use a virtual wheel or randomizer like this one: https://wheelofnames.com/
Make your own set of ritual cards (index cards would work well) and pull one each night
Finding Your Actual Depletion Window
I learned this from my first design job. My boss asked me to track my day for three days in a row in my notes app. Not my tasks → my energy. When did I feel most creative and dialed in? When was I better suited for admin or busy work? When was my brain actually done?
The instructions were simple: every hour or so, open your notes app and log how you feel. Creative, focused, foggy, wired, flat, restless. Just the honest word for the state you’re actually in. Do it for three days and look at the pattern.
Most people are shocked by what comes back. The window where you’re genuinely sharp is narrower than you think. And the window where your brain has quietly clocked out, often while you’re still sitting at your desk telling yourself “just one more thing,” starts earlier than you’d expect.
For me, clock out is usually 3pm → 4pm at the latest. That used to feel like a personal failing. Now it’s just data. My wheel is built around the reality of that window, not the version of myself I wish existed at 7pm.
Track your days. Find your number. Build your wheel around that time, not around when you think you should be done.
Your Moon sign tells you what kind of nourishment your nervous system is actually asking for.
Your Moon sign is in your natal chart, which you can pull for free at astro.com using your birth date, time, and location. Locate the Moon symbol and look at the zodiac sign assigned to it.
Once you have it, here’s how to read it for ritual building:
🔥 Fire Moons (Aries, Leo, Sagittarius)
Your nervous system restores through movement, spark, and doing something that feels alive. Passive rest often makes you more restless. Good wedges: a short walk, stretching with music that actually moves you, something creative with your hands, switching your environment entirely, candles or fire gazing, anything that feels like a small adventure even if you don’t leave the house.
🌿 Earth Moons (Taurus, Virgo, Capricorn)
Your nervous system restores through the physical and the sensory. You need to come back into your body and feel something grounding beneath you. Good wedges: a bath with salt and candles, skincare with slow intention, a magnesium drink, tidying one small space, something that smells good, anything that makes your body feel tended to.
💨 Air Moons (Gemini, Libra, Aquarius)
Your nervous system restores through a shift in mental texture, something that engages your mind differently than work did. Good wedges: a show that sparks genuine delight, a chapter of something you’re reading for pleasure, a card pull with journaling, binaural beats with a brain dump, a voice note to a friend, anything that moves your thinking somewhere it wasn’t.
🌊 Water Moons (Cancer, Scorpio, Pisces)
Your nervous system restores through immersion, depth, and emotional release. You’re wired to go somewhere internally, and the rituals that work best give you a container for that. Good wedges: a bath with a bath bomb or bubbles, anything with water, creative work that absorbs you fully like embroidery or drawing or anything with your hands that requires no outcome, a channeled voice note to yourself, card pull and free verse, fire scrying, crystals, self-reiki, anything that feels like going deeper rather than winding down.
My Moon is in Scorpio in the fifth house, which is why my most effective wedges involve water, creation, or something that pulls me into a feeling rather than away from one. Legs up the wall works for me because it feels like an action even in stillness. Fire gazing works because Scorpio is a water sign ruled by Mars, so there’s fire underneath all of it. Embroidery works because it absorbs me completely and produces something, which my fifth house needs.
The Full Backlog
These came from my friends (1 water moon and 1 earth moon) after I posted about the wheel. I’ve added notes where I have them. All of these are real, all of them have been suggested by actual humans, and some of them are going on my wheel as I test them.
Soak in a bath with candles, salt, and bubbles
Skincare, slow and intentional
Face brush
Red light mask
Tart cherry juice or Calm from Absorption Company (genuinely recommend both for sleep)
Sleepytime tea
Magnesium drink
Moon milk from Stardust Teas
Vocal toning
Yin stretching
Legs up the wall
Card pull and journal
Free verse poetry, no prompt, no editing
Read a chapter of a book
Record a channeled message for yourself (voice note, no audience)
Give your crystals a job for the night
Clear your chakras or do a short self-reiki sequence
Hypno elevation (look up hypnotic sleep recordings if this is new to you) Kelsey is an amazing resource for this
Binaural beats with a brain dump
Embroidery or any hands-on craft: I’m currently working on this sardine one
Spiffy up your altar
Fire magic or fire gazing
White pajamas, purely for the ritual of it
Watch something that sparks actual joy, intentionally chosen
Say your prayers
A weed gummy, if that’s your thing and your body likes it
Build your wheel from whatever resonates for your Moon sign and your actual depletion window. The goal is a list where every option would genuinely restore you, so whatever it lands on, you win.
One spin. That’s the whole protocol.
Tell me in the comments what rituals should be added to the backlog or if you have any tricks to build new routines!
