Today I felt it.

Not just mentally—physically.

After conversation after conversation with individuals carrying anxiety, uncertainty, mistrust… my body crashed.

It wasn’t subtle.

My nervous system felt like it was vibrating.
My chest tight.
My mind trying to keep up, but my body already saying, enough.

And maybe it was a mix of things.

A weekend of traveling.
A lunch that consisted of whatever I could grab and go at a gas station.
A little run-down.

But if I’m being honest…

it was more than that.

It was the weight.

Not mine—but still felt.

When you sit with people in their fear, their uncertainty, their overwhelm…

if you’re not careful, you carry it with you.

You start to feel responsible.

To fix.
To soothe.
To make it better.

And if you’ve spent any part of your life being a people pleaser…

that pull runs deep.

So today, I noticed it.

Instead of pushing through, I stopped.

I drew a hot bath.
No television.
No distraction.

Just me… and my breath.

And this is where everything shifted.

Because breath is one of the most powerful tools we have—and one of the most overlooked.

It’s always there.

But most of us don’t use it intentionally.

When I slowed my breathing—deep, steady inhales… longer exhales—

my body started to respond.

My heart rate softened.
My shoulders dropped.
The noise in my mind quieted.

That’s not random.

That’s your nervous system regulating.

When we’re in stress, fear, or overwhelm, our body shifts into survival mode.

Fast breath.
Tension.
Alert.

But when we slow the breath—especially the exhale—we signal safety.

We tell the body:

you’re okay.
you can come back.

Slow, intentional breathing has even been shown to calm the nervous system, lower stress, and shift the body out of that fight-or-flight response.  

And that’s what I needed.

Not more thinking.

Not more processing.

Just a way back to center.

I also had to remind myself of something simple—but not always easy:

Not everything I feel… is mine.

When you’re deeply empathetic, when you care, when you want to help…

it’s easy to take on what others are carrying.

To hold their fear like it’s your responsibility.

To believe, even subtly, that you should be able to fix it.

But that’s not your role.

And it’s not sustainable.

So I asked myself:

What is mine here… and what isn’t?

And slowly, I let it go.

Not with force.

Not with resistance.

Just a quiet release of what I don’t need to carry.

Because I can support someone…

without absorbing them.

I can care…

without taking ownership of their fear.

And then I came back.

Back to my breath.
Back to my body.
Back to the present moment.

Because that’s the path.

Not perfection.

Not avoiding overwhelm completely.

But knowing how to return.

To center.
To self.
To what’s actually mine.

And if this is something you want to understand on a deeper level, I highly recommend reading Breath: The New Science of a Lost Art by James Nestor. It completely changed the way I think about something we do every single day without realizing its power. The book explores how most of us are actually breathing incorrectly—and how simple shifts, like slower and more intentional breathing, can transform our health, anxiety levels, and overall well-being.  

So if you’re feeling it too—

that heaviness, that tension, that sense of carrying too much…

start here.

Take a breath.

A real one.

Slow it down.
Let the exhale be longer than the inhale.

And then gently ask yourself:

What am I holding that isn’t mine?

You don’t have to carry it all.

You don’t have to fix everything.

You just have to come back to yourself.

One breath at a time.