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Lying Still, Letting Go

The Healing Power of Stillness


When Laura lost her mother, the world seemed to move on, but she felt like time had stopped. The grief was so heavy it felt like a physical weight, pressing down on her chest and making it hard to breathe. She kept herself busy—work, errands, obligations—anything to avoid the quiet moments that reminded her of the empty space her mother used to fill.


A friend suggested yoga, specifically a restorative class, but Laura was skeptical. She had always thought of yoga as something people did to get fit, not to heal from grief. But with nothing to lose, she decided to give it a try. The thought of sitting in a room and doing “nothing” for an hour seemed almost impossible. The idea of stillness terrified her, yet deep down, she knew she needed to face it.


As Laura lay down for her first class, the instructor gently guided everyone into savasana—the final relaxation pose. “Close your eyes and just be,” the teacher said. “Let the weight of the world sink into the ground. There’s nothing you need to do right now. Just breathe.”


Lying there, Laura could feel the tension in her body as if it had been stored up for years. She hadn’t realized just how tightly she had been holding on. Her shoulders softened, her jaw unclenched, and as she sank deeper into the mat, she felt a knot in her throat that had been there for weeks start to release. A tear slipped down her cheek. Then another. It was the first time she had allowed herself to cry since the funeral.


In the weeks that followed, Laura made savasana her daily practice. She would lie down in the middle of her living room, close her eyes, and allow the stillness to wash over her. At first, it was uncomfortable—each silence brought with it a reminder of her loss. But over time, something began to shift. She stopped resisting the quiet and started to welcome it. In those moments, she felt connected to something deeper, as if her mother’s love was right there, in the stillness, embracing her.


Laura’s yoga practice grew to include meditation. At first, she could only manage a few minutes before her mind wandered, but she soon learned that the wandering was part of the process. She treated each thought with gentleness, acknowledging it and then letting it go, like leaves floating down a stream. She learned to sit with her grief, not as an enemy to be defeated, but as a companion on her healing journey.

The more time she spent in stillness, the more she began to notice subtle changes. She felt moments of peace that she hadn’t thought were possible. The waves of sadness still came, but they no longer threatened to drown her. Instead, she found a quiet place within herself where she could retreat when the world became overwhelming.


One day, during savasana, Laura realized that she no longer felt like she was carrying the weight of her grief alone. It was as though the earth beneath her was holding some of that burden for her, taking in her sorrow and giving back a sense of calm. It wasn’t a magical cure, but it was a reminder that even in the depths of loss, there could be moments of stillness that brought healing.


Laura learned that the healing power of stillness didn’t mean erasing the pain. It meant finding the courage to face it, to sit with it, and to be okay with whatever came up. It was in those quiet moments on the mat, in the deep breaths and the spaces between thoughts, that she found herself reconnecting with a sense of inner peace. She came to understand that healing is not about moving on, but rather about moving through, one breath at a time.


As she continued her practice, Laura noticed that she carried a bit more lightness in her daily life. The stillness she cultivated on the mat had started to spill over into everything else—she found herself pausing before reacting, taking deeper breaths during moments of stress, and even smiling more.

In time, Laura realized that savasana and meditation had become more than just practices—they were her sanctuary, the place she could return to whenever she needed to reconnect with her inner peace. And in that sanctuary, she found not only healing, but also a renewed sense of hope.

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