Turning Inward Before Outward
Do you wake up already bracing?
Before your feet hit the floor, before the coffee brews, before the kids burst in with their pitter-patter and the pets demand their morning rituals—your stomach is already in knots. Your heart races. The day hasn’t begun, and yet your nervous system is already sprinting.
You reach for your phone. Scroll. Compare. Absorb the noise of a world that feels impossibly ahead of you. And then the cascade begins: the spilled cereal, the slow teeth brushing, the daycare drop-off, the 9 a.m. appointment. You’re giving, going, responding—all before you’ve had a moment to center.
And maybe, like so many, you wait for the quiet to come at 8, 9, 10 p.m. You wait for the house to settle so you can finally exhale. But what if that exhale came first?
Wake Up Earlier… to Do Nothing
I’m not here to preach productivity. I’m not encouraging you to wake up earlier to get more done. I’m inviting you to wake up earlier to do nothing.
To sit in stillness. To breathe. To tune in before the world tunes you out.
Breath is the first thing we do when we’re born. And the last thing we do when we die. Why do we ignore it so much in the in between?
What if your morning began not with chaos, but with quiet? Not with reaction, but with reflection? What if you met the day with meditation, movement, or simply a moment of inwardness before the outward demands arrived?
The Bubbling Volcano
When we skip this pause, we carry a bubbling volcano inside us. The lava simmers beneath the surface…irritation, comparison, overstimulation. And eventually, it erupts. Onto our kids, our partners, our pets, our work, the person driving a little “too slow” in front of us.
But when we start with breath, tuning in, we soften the magma. We soothe the fire. We become less reactive, more rooted.
Maybe your version of tuning in looks like movement, a walk with your dog, or hitting the gym…that counts. That’s sacred, too. Stillness isn’t the only path to presence.
What matters is that your morning begins with you, it just has to be yours.
You Don’t Have to Be a “Morning Person”
I know you feel this: “I’m just not a morning person.” But ask yourself, how do you define a morning person? Who decided that mornings belong only to the early risers?
Maybe you’re not a morning person because your mornings have never felt safe. Never felt yours.
Let’s redefine it. Let’s reclaim it.
Wake up earlier. Not for the world, but for your soul. For your nervous system. For your journey.
Because when you start inward, the outward becomes a little more bearable.