Practices: My Authentic Pauses

Spontaneous expansion

Since I was a child, I would spontaneously fall into these moments when I would focus my gaze on something in front of me; it could be a flower, a stunning landscape or water flowing into the gutter. Time would stop. Everything would get expansively spacious. Here becomes everywhere and I am everything. My breath would halt. Until the next breath came, a thought interrupted the stillness of my mind or a disruption from the outside would make me come back to reality.

These moments would happen from time to time throughout my childhood, youth and well into adulthood. I didn’t make anything of them. I thought everyone had them. I didn’t try to deny them or make them appear more often. They seemed so much part of my life that I did not question them. I enjoyed them when they occurred. They just happened and there was nothing more to it. But then I lost them. Not that I noticed.

A body attacking itself

The moments disappeared in my late 30s and 40s when I was juggling an academic career with intensive teaching, research, performance production and leadership roles, whilst keeping two homes in different states, and getting used to being a grandmother. Life was busy then. I was anxious and stressed.

My body trembled, literally! I thought it was because I was in a new city and in a new academic role - my dream job. Since I was teaching on stage, in a theatre, I thought it was performance anxiety. It wasn’t. The stress was so large, it triggered an episode of hyperthyroidism. My body was attacking itself.

I listened to my heart one night. It was racing, even skipping a beat, and yet, I was about to fall asleep. There was no time for taking it easy in those days. A diagnosis and medication followed. After a few years, the medication was gradually reduced and one day I stopped taking it. All was back to normal again.

I still couldn't sit still. I was always doing something, even if it was only running endless to-do lists in my head. Cognitive overload had become my normal. One year, working on different research projects in different knowledge areas, I got really sick. I didn't recognise how close I was to burning out. My mantra was “Keep going”. There were periods of rest, vacations, even yoga classes. Yet I’d lost my stillness. I’d lost myself in the doing and could not stop.

Intentional pauses

When Covid hit, everyone was shocked and trying to cope as well as they could. I started a new role and did not see my colleagues, working online. We worked for almost two years without ever meeting in person. With restructuring looming everywhere, everyone was doing their best to work more, produce more, be more helpful. My husband and I had to learn to stay home, including within the radius of five kilometres during lockdown for 262 days, when were used to frequent travel, working with our students and colleagues in person, and as researchers having time and space for ourselves.

Pressure then was of a different sort. It came also from within. My body was in perimenopause. Actually, it was not my body any more - it behaved strangely, grew into a plump soft ball and had a mind of its own.

I knew that if I didn't make time to rest, to be alone with myself in my own space, something would give. I could no longer wait. I had to make room. So I claimed my space and time, and began my practice of authentic pauses. I would sit on the floor, close my eyes and just stay there.

These moments of stillness and silence, at least externally, gave me something I had been missing: space to rest, to just be with myself and whatever was going on in my mind.

The sits were not very long at the start. Nevertheless, it was hard to sit still and do nothing. I persevered. Not being constantly expected to be doing something for someone was a relief. I had carved out for myself this space and time.

Gradually, I started to crave coming back to the practice and found an anchor in it, a confidence I could handle anything that is being thrown at me, even the hot flushes that would frequently come up like a volcano during these sits.

They would start with a sense of feeling not well at all, this would rapidly grow into panic, then tremendous heat would hit my heart and spread to every cell. Eventually, the wave would pass, having left me sweaty and exhausted. I would patiently breathe through the discomfort and wait for it to pass. I knew I was going to be there at the other end.

I learned this during one of those sits. I’d never actually observed a hot flush. Usually, the moment one came, I disregarded it and kept going. But during the sit, there wasn’t anything else to do besides endure and observe, observe and endure. I was fascinated to see how it rose and dissipated. One part of me was observing whist the other was feeling the acute discomfort of the body.

Authentic pauses

Authentic pauses can be deliberate or spontaneous. They are moments in which we step out of doing and allow ourselves simply to rest. Whether a mini pause or a longer morning and evening routine, they offer space to breathe and time to reset in the intimacy of our stillness, silence and solitude.

A pause can open space amidst the doing, attaining, achieving. A pause can interrupt the relentless current of thought before it has the chance to carry our attention away.

Authentic because this moment will never be experienced the same again. An authentic pause called into being by our very heart.

Later, I learned, the moments of absorption I experienced early in my life were spontaneous experiences of expanded consciousness. They came back again after years of study of Vedanta philosophy and steady contemplation and meditation practice. They came mostly because I consciously created my own practice of pausing.

Can what once was unbidden return through conscious invitation?

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If you would like to explore your own authentic pauses, I warmly invite you to join the Authentic Pause Collective, our free community for guided practice, reflection and connection.