As we move toward the end of the year, some will feel the familiar rise of tension that the holiday season so often brings. There can be pressure, expectations, old patterns, and the stories we carry from years past. And yet, I find myself asking: Do we really need to be anxious? Or is there another way to meet this time?

What if, instead of bracing ourselves, we softened into presence?
Presence brings us back home to what is real, to what is happening right here, right now. When we are present, we are no longer living in a future that hasn’t arrived or replaying a past that is already complete. We’re simply here, inhabiting this breath, this moment, this heartbeat.

So how do we stay in presence, especially when the world around us feels loud or demanding?
For me, it always comes back to the pause that brings us to a gentle awareness of the breath moving into the body and then leaving again. When we slow down enough to notice the sensations of our breath, the rise, the fall, the softening, something inside us shifts. Our mind quiets, our shoulders drop, and we remember that we are safe in this moment.

So as the holidays approach, give yourself permission to breathe, to pause, and allow yourself to rest in the peace that lives within you. You don’t need to hold everything. You don’t need to prepare for every possibility. You only need to come back to yourself, one breath at a time.  This is what we teach at Special Yoga.