Breath work, Om and Hidden Healing

Charlotte Jefferson
Jul 22
3 min read

I went to yoga the other day for all of the usual reasons, to stretch, to move and to breathe. I wasn’t expecting what actually happened that rainy, Sunday morning.

I had felt discombobulated for days, restless and full of tension. An energy that was uncomfortably bouncing about in my body like a loose ping-pong ball. I was feeling exhausted whilst also endlessly restless. Boxes of unopened orders and bags of end-of-year school workbooks cluttered the space, the worktops full of piles of letters unread, emails unanswered and my to do lists ignored. I couldn’t bring myself to face any of it. I sofa-slouched, ate some crap, watched some mind numbing TV in the hope that rest would help, but the energy wouldn’t shift.

So, on Sunday morning I dragged my sorry self to yoga, I was tempted to stay at home and sleep but a wise part of my mind knew that that wasn’t what I actually needed. Sleep wasn’t satiating the need inside me. Yoga was good, my body felt that deep relaxation and stretch that only yoga can give but I still felt a little off. I was happy to take the peace however when, unexpectedly at the end of the class, the teacher said something that stopped me in my tracks. She told us there that she could feel that some stuck energy in the room, she could feel it lingering in her upper abdomen. As she said it, I realised: I could feel it there too. It was heavy and firm, knotted deep like something had rooted in that space, it was a strange feeling to suddenly be so aware of.

She invited us to chant — Om, and then one of those longer Sanskrit ones I always forget (Shanti? Samastah?). What mattered was the sounds. The vibrations. The breath work. And just like that, something in me surged to the top, I felt the energy travel.

I started crying. Not a delicate tear or two, but a breath-caught, shoulders-shaking sobbing that felt so core it was unstoppable, inescapable. It was like my body had been holding something in a secret space, waiting for a safe moment to let it out.

And in that moment, I was held. Literally. The teacher came over and gently wrapped me in a hug, without question. I didn’t realise how much I needed that, no the questions, or analysis, but the being-with. No fixing. Just presence. Co-regulation at its finest.

Here’s the thing: my elderly auntie died last week. She was an incredible human at 97, she was warm, strong, brave, fierce and so deeply loved. I’ve struggled to connect with my grief in the ways I thought I “should.” No tears. No dramatic moments. Just a quiet ache deep inside that I couldn’t quite reach.

The body knows. It always does.

From a psychological perspective, grief isn’t linear. It doesn’t stick to calendars or ceremonies. It lives quietly in the nervous system, in muscle memory, in breath patterns, in the places we clench without noticing. Sometimes it bypasses the mind entirely and lives quietly in the body until something soft enough, safe enough, sacred enough creates the conditions for release.

Today, yoga became that space for me. The movement. The breath. The chanting. Which, in case you’re interested, apparently also stimulates the vagus nerve and helps us drop into the parasympathetic “rest and digest” state, ultimately it all added up to one simple truth: I felt safe enough to feel.

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So, reader, if you’re here…

I wonder what your body might be holding right now… quietly, kindly, patiently waiting for you to notice.

Where are you feeling your energy?

Where does your grief live? Your joy? Your old stories?

What might shift if you gave yourself permission not to understand it but just to feel?

Healing doesn’t always happen in words.

Sometimes it begins with a breath.

Sometimes it sounds like Om. 🕉️

💛