Calm in the Chaos
Calm in the Chaos - Meditation & Transcript
Written & Read by Nicoline Huizinga
Let's start by making ourselves comfortable, closing our eyes if needed. If you want to, that's all good. Close your eyes or lower your gaze and take a long deep breath in through your nose and exhale slowly through your mouth. And let's do that again.
Inhale deeply, close your eyes, and if you want, put your hand on your heart and one on your belly. Inhale deeply and exhale with a soft sigh.
Right now you don't need to do anything. You don't need to solve anything. You're here with your breath, with all of us, and this is a safe space.
Now bring your attention to your breath and notice how it moves through you. Cool air in and warm air out. And let each breath be like a gentle wave rising and falling, like the waves of the ocean.
You know, the world may feel noisy, uncertain, perhaps even painful, but in this moment your breath is steady. Your breath is your safe place.
Inhale peace through the nose and exhale noise through the mouth. Inhale steadiness and exhale overwhelm.
Let your breath remind you: you are here. You are here among like-minded people. You are safe and you are grounded.
It's okay to feel heartbroken by the news. It's okay to feel helpless, angry, tired, or numb. This world holds beauty and pain, and we feel both because we care, because we're human. We don't need to carry it all. We were never meant to.
Now take a breath in through the nose, and as you breathe out, imagine placing all that heaviness beside you—not ignoring it, but also not letting it consume you.
Say gently to yourself: "I see what's happening and I choose to stay grounded."
You are allowed to take a breath even when the world is hurting. There is power in presence. Even when you can't change the world, you can change how you show up in it.
With every breath, you're practicing strength—the quiet kind, the rooted kind, the kind that says "I can be with discomfort and still be whole."
Inhale with a deep breath through the nose: "I am steady." And exhale: "I am resilient." Exhale through the mouth: "I am resilient." And repeat that. Inhale: "I am steady." And exhale: "I am resilient."
You don't have to have the answers. You don't have to fix everything. Just be here breathing, and that's enough.
Now let's bring to mind someone you love or something that you love—a reason to keep showing up with care even when it's hard. Perhaps it's a friend, your partner, a family member, a friend. Feel that warmth in your chest when you think of that person. Let it grow.
You're not alone. In this room there are others breathing with you right now, and not just in this room, but also in your village, your city, your country, the world. There are others trying just as hard as you are, and they are also breathing, and they are also building a better world one breath at a time.
And let that connection with those like-minded people root you. We do not carry the world alone, but we can each be a light in the dark.
Breathe in that truth: "I can be a light in the dark." And let that settle in your body.
Now let's begin to bring awareness back into your body. Wiggle your fingers and toes and feel the ground beneath you—solid, steady.
Take one deep breath in through the nose and slowly let it go through the mouth. And when you're ready, gently open your eyes.
And may you carry this peace with you into a world that needs your calm heart.