When Life Feels Complicated: A Path to Liberation with Breath

When life feels complicated, our breath is an undeniable resource to gain clarity. A steady tether to our body’s innate wisdom, each inhale and exhale beckons us to the “here and now” and to listen to the knowing that lives inside us all.

“When the mind isn’t clouded by unnecessary things, this is the best season of your life.” Wu Men

There is nothing outside of us that has the answers to our deepest questions. In today’s world of relentless external stimuli, our nervous systems can get hijacked into believing we don’t know the truth anymore. But “truth” is only certain when it comes from a grounded place of our own knowing and this requires quieting the bombardment of distraction and going deep within the recesses of our own being to RE-remember ourselves.

Turning inward can sometimes be a little bit scary at first, especially if we learned to “straighten up”, “keep up” or “stop expressing our emotions” in our own childhood homes. But returning to the intimacy of living from our own inner landscape, and through our own breathing, is a bit like reclaiming our own lost love language of the soul.

After spending a week in Norway (a delightful country rich with natural beauty), I am in awe of the vast wonder of this life. But in this vastness, I am also struck by the continual passage through the ups and downs of each moment that exists for us all.

Just before my own travels, I was called to support a family member during an unexpected hospital visit. Immersed in the western medical world for a few days, and with a host of my own internal emotions to reckon with arising out of concern and care, I turned to my breath to move some of the stickiest parts of the experience before me.

What I noticed within my own Breathwork Session, between each stretch and release/opening and integrating, that revealed to me was a deep wellspring of calm presence- an antidote to help me ride the uncertainty of the moment. The breath opening connected me to my own inner resource to help ride out the waves of time and uncertainty with greater clarity and presence.

Once my energy had cleared from my Breathwork, I noticed that my thoughts had cleared also and I recognized that my inner “felt sense” was restful and renewed- a sense of calm strength returned to offer my support- both internally and externally.

I am continually grateful for such a potent ally in my breath to return to again and again and again in this life to help navigate the ups and downs of this living world. And I am grateful for and humbled by the opportunity to support others to do the same by harnessing their life force energy for their own restoration and healing.  

With no pancea in anyone’s days to avoid the most painful moments of loss, fear, and inward struggle that can arise in a “life journey”, our breath offers us a place of silent respite underneath all the storms we may encounter.

Now, on the other side my own recent experience, and with them healing well and vibrant again, I have been reflecting on the layers of strength needed for this life (like that of Nordic Vikings!), and what a gift our breath really is as an ally.

This is often most often poignant when we take in a vast landscape of beauty or experience ecstatic bliss. We literally take in a deeper breath to welcome in this beauty and this gift of life- breathing a full moment into life’s full technicolor!

Even though we cannot avoid the storms of this life, we can develop healthy ways to navigate them all with more ease by opening up this resource within ourself to develop more personal freedom- and learn to breathe through moments of ecstatic joy and bliss and self doubt, worry and fear.

As Dana Faulds shares- “life isn’t a relay race and it only takes a moment to breathe”.

When we learn to harness our own pure space awareness with greater possibility and power- a sanctuary as vast and deep and ancient as the fjords of Norway opens up to us just beneath the surface of our being.

Breathwork is forgiving and abundant- and offers us a return to the self like no other- a re-inhabiting of ourselves, as if for the first time- beautiful, unique and vast...

I look forward to supporting you on this continued journey of self discovery and healing- as you deepen your relationship to self with breath- and help find renewed clarity in these times.

See you soon!