..mastering the art of the ‘pause’ – ‘heal’ – ‘breathe’..
There are days when a feeling arrives before there is any reason for it. It settles quietly in the chest: a sense of foreboding, a small inner voice saying that something is not quite right. Nothing may have happened. The morning may look ordinary; people may be going about their lives. And still, somewhere beneath the surface, we feel an ache we cannot name. Working for ideas and programs which mean too much to you can often lead to being in a state of meloncholy because somehow its just one’s passion and a few kindred souls like you who trudge the path with you.
We tell ourselves not to think about it. We fold the feeling away and tuck it into some hidden corner of the mind. We make tea, answer a message, finish the work in front of us. We remind ourselves that perhaps we are tired, perhaps we are worrying too much, perhaps everything will be fine. For a little while, the feeling recedes. Then, unexpectedly, it returns. It comes back in the quiet between two conversations, on the drive home, or just before sleep. It comes back when we look around to do more good but we feel a financial crunch, or we see the wrong around, the changing world, the life we never thought we would have to live, yet we push it away again, hoping that if we do not look at it, it will lose its shape. We want the ache of the things that are not right to disappear. We want certainty, a clear explanation, a promise that the worry has no substance. But life does not always offer answers at the moment we ask for them.
Perhaps this is where the thought, “Give time, time,” begins to matter. It is not a command to be patient in a way that denies what we feel. It is not an instruction to sit still and pretend that everything is well. It is a gentler invitation: let the feeling have room to speak, without asking it to explain everything at once. We often expect ourselves to understand our lives immediately. We want to identify the source of every unease, decide what it means, and know what to do next. Yet some things become clear only after we have lived through a few more ordinary days. A conversation finds its way to us. A piece of news arrives. Our own thoughts settle enough for us to see what they were trying to tell us. Time does not always solve what is difficult, but it can change the way we are able to meet it. To give time, time is to acknowledge that healing and understanding have their own pace. We cannot hurry the heart by scolding it. We cannot reason every fear away. Sometimes the most honest thing we can say is, “I feel something, and I do not yet know what it means.” There is courage in that sentence. It leaves space for uncertainty without allowing uncertainty to become the whole story.
The Japanese idea of ikigai is often spoken of as a reason for living, a sense of purpose found in the things that give life meaning. I find that purpose is not always grand or easily named. Some days it is simply the reason we get up and continue: the people we love, the work we care about, a promise we have made, the small rituals that bring us back to ourselves. And sometimes it is the quiet faith that even this unsettled moment belongs to a life still unfolding.
When foreboding returns, perhaps we need not treat its return as proof that something terrible is certain to happen. A feeling is real because we feel it; it is not always a forecast. We can listen without obeying every fear. We can ask ourselves what needs attention today, what can wait, and whom we might trust enough to speak with. If there is a practical concern, we can take one small step towards it. If there is no clear answer yet, we can breathe, rest, and let the question remain open for a while.
This is not easy. Some aches do not fade simply because we have named them. Some situations remain unresolved; some days the heaviness comes back with the same familiar insistence. Giving time, time does not mean abandoning hope or accepting what harms us. It means allowing ourselves to move at a human pace while we seek the clarity, support or change we need.
Maybe, then, the practice is modest: notice the feeling; do not shame yourself for having it. Let it sit beside you, not rule over you. Do the next kind, sensible thing available. And when the mind begins demanding an answer for everything, whisper, “Not yet. Let time show me what it can.”
We may not know today why the ache has come, or whether it will leave soon. But we can meet ourselves with tenderness while we wait. We can trust that not every unanswered question is a warning, and not every pause is a dead end. Some understanding takes the long road.
Give time, time. Let the heart arrive at its own knowing.
