THE BREATH I LOST

A Lesson in Surrender
For over 35 years, I’ve walked the path of yoga.
Not just practiced it, but lived it.
I breathed through pain.
I taught others to breathe through theirs.
I learned how to move with life, to align with nature, to listen deeply.
Or so I thought.
But something happened that I didn’t expect.
Something I wasn’t prepared for.
I lost my breath.
Not the mechanical breath, not the in-and-out.
I lost the breath.
The breath that is spirit.
The breath that carries life, presence, joy.
And ironically, I lost it while trying to hold onto life.
It happened gradually, invisibly, beneath the surface.
A relationship that left me hollow.
A dream of a life I wanted, that kept slipping through my fingers.
A growing discontent I tried to cover with positivity.
Smiles that didn’t reach my organs.
Words that didn’t touch the truth.
And so I did what many of us do.
I forced it.
I forced my breath.
I forced my body.
I forced joy.
Because I thought I knew better.
I thought I had a special relationship with my body.
I thought, I’m the teacher. I know the path. I’ve walked it longer than most.
But that’s the illusion.
That’s the subtle arrogance of expertise.
And life—life doesn’t care about your titles.
Life doesn’t care how many years you've practiced.
It wants truth.
Not performance.
Not spiritual résumé.
Not your curated mask.
And when you stop listening, life listens for you.
It speaks in disconnection.
It whispers through fatigue.
It shouts through anxiety.
And if you still don’t hear, it takes your breath away.
I began to suffocate—not just emotionally, but spiritually.
I could no longer access the breathing I had found ten years ago.
The breathing that had once lit up my spine like a river of energy.
The breathing that had made movement feel like prayer.
It was gone.
And the harder I chased it, the further it slipped.
Because I didn’t want to hear what life was telling me.
I didn’t want to feel what my body was really feeling.
I just wanted to enjoy again.
To play again.
To bypass the lesson.
But life doesn’t accept shortcuts.
Life doesn’t tolerate half-truths.
It’s all or nothing.
You can’t cheat life and expect grace.
And so today, something inside broke.
Or maybe, finally opened.
I realized that my breath left not because I did something wrong,
but because I stopped being honest.
Because I started using my breath as a tool instead of a relationship.
I started using my body instead of listening to it.
I started using life instead of dancing with it.
And now, I am not here to fix it.
I am here to rebuild it.
Gently.
Intimately.
Honestly.
Not for performance.
Not for mastery.
But for connection.
I no longer want to force my breathing.
I want to let it find me again.
Like a lover who returns not when you beg,
but when you stop chasing and open the door.
This is not a story of failure.
It is a story of remembering.
Even after 35 years of practice, the real practice is always now.
And maybe, if I share this, someone else might stop forcing.
Might stop pretending.
Might stop chasing joy and start listening to what their body is whispering.
Because this body, this breath, this life—it is not ours to control.
It is ours to care for.
And when you surrender,
you realize that what you were looking for
was never far.
It was just waiting for you
to come back to yourself.