It found me, I did not hunt for it

The day my entire life changed.

I wasn’t looking for coherence.

I was looking for relief.

For months—maybe longer—I’d been living with this constant hum. Not panic. Not meltdown. Just... tightness. Like my whole body was waiting for the next thing to go wrong.

It was early January 2025.

I had just lost my monthly income—the kind used to stretch my Social Security. For 18 months I’d walked a precious dog named Miss Lumi. Four walks a day around my beloved downtown. Often her owner would go away for days or weeks at a time, so Miss Lumi had a bed and toys here at the ready.

Now she and that extra income were no longer part of my life.

I could feel the worry moving over my entire being.

Now, I am not one to give in to worry. Instead, I began surfing the net looking for possibilities to earn extra money.

And that’s when I bumped into a video on YouTube about getting rid of anxiety.

I had never considered the idea that I had anxiety. But for some reason, this particular video grabbed my attention.

The person in it said: breathe in for 4 counts, hold for 4 counts, exhale for 6 slow counts.

Phew. Seemed easy enough.

What did I have to lose? Only my anxiety, worry, and fear. LOL.

So I committed to “trying” this new idea.

Initially, once a day. One minute at a time.

And soon I could feel a distinction in how I emotionally and physically felt.

So in my typical fashion, I went all in.

I began doing the breath practice at the drop of a hat.

Feeling fear? Sit and breathe.
Feeling anxiety? Sit and breathe.
Over and over and over.

---

The Shift

After a couple weeks, I noticed my brain wasn’t as loud.

I wasn’t spiraling. I wasn’t rehearsing arguments with people who hadn’t said anything yet. I wasn’t building disaster scenarios in my head while making coffee.

There was space between something happening and me reacting to it.

That space felt... weird.

Clean. Quiet. Almost boring.

So I kept going.

One minute. Many times a day. For months.

Not because I’m disciplined. Because I was obsessed with what was happening.

Things were falling into place. Opportunities showed up easier. My clarity sharpened. Decisions that used to feel like life-or-death felt simple.

I thought, This feels like magic.

Spoiler: It wasn’t.

---

The Thing Nobody Tells You

A few months in, I realized something wild.

I didn’t have anxiety anymore.

It didn’t leave dramatically. There was no breakthrough moment, no crying-on-the-floor release.

It just... wasn’t there.

No constant urgency. No internal voice screaming that I was behind, inadequate, about to fail.

Just steady.

And here’s the kicker:

Anxiety had been my engine.

For years it got me moving. Kept me sharp. Made me productive.

I thought that hum was me being alive.

When it left, I felt... nothing.

Not excited. Not relieved.

Neutral.

And neutral freaked me out at first because I didn’t know how to function without the pressure.

---

But then I realized something.

Without the noise, I could actually hear myself.

I wasn’t overriding my body anymore. I wasn’t forcing decisions. I wasn’t performing energy I didn’t have.

I was just... choosing.

From clarity. From rest. From actually knowing what I wanted instead of reacting to what I was afraid of.

That’s when I understood what had happened.

I’d stumbled into coherence.

---

What Coherence Actually Is

Not alignment with the universe.

Not manifesting your dreams.

Not some woo-woo concept you can’t touch.

Coherence is when your head, heart, and body stop fighting each other.

That’s it.

When your nervous system feels safe, it stops screaming. When it stops screaming, your thoughts settle. When your thoughts settle, your decisions get better. When your decisions get better, your life looks different.

It’s not magic.

It’s physiology.

And I learned all of that after I started breathing.

I didn’t know what I was doing when I began. I didn’t even know what a nervous system was. I just knew I was tired of feeling wound up all the time.

The understanding came later.

First came the relief.

---

Why This Matters

You can’t build a life you love from a body that feels under attack.

You can’t think your way to clarity when your system is convinced something’s wrong.

You start with the body.

You regulate first.

Then everything else becomes possible.

---

Four in. Four hold. Six out.

That’s it.

I found it by accident. On some random YouTube video about anxiety.

I knew nothing about nervous systems. Nothing about regulation. Nothing about coherence.

I just knew I’d lost my income and needed relief.

And I thought, What do I have to lose?

Turns out? Nothing.

And everything to gain.

Not because it’s magic. Because it works.

And I stayed because I liked who I was becoming.

Steadier. Quieter. Less reactive. More me.

Not because I forced myself to change.

Because my body finally felt safe enough to stop running.

---

So if you’re tired—if you feel that constant hum, if you’re sick of feeling like you’re always bracing for impact—try this.

Set a timer.

When it goes off: four seconds in, four seconds hold, six seconds out.

One minute.

Then go back to your life.

Do it again when you feel the fear, the worry, the tightness creeping back.

Don’t make it a thing. Don’t journal about it. Don’t post about your healing journey.

Just breathe.

And notice what happens.

Not today. Not this week.

But over time.

Because coherence doesn’t show up with fireworks.

It shows up quietly.

One regulated breath at a time.

And once you feel it, you won’t want to go back.

If this resonated—if you felt that hum while reading—you’re not alone.

I write about this every day in The Daily RE-WIRE. Not just the breathing. But what happens after you regulate. What life looks like when your nervous system finally feels safe.

How you make decisions differently. How opportunities show up easier. How coherence becomes your compass instead of anxiety.

Right now, I’m offering 20% off annual subscriptions.

When you subscribe, you’ll get immediate access to my BREAKTHROUGH Guide—the resource I wrote as a result of learning how to regulate my nervous system through breathwork.

It’s everything I learned about what becomes possible when you stop bracing and start choosing.

Here’s what you get:

• Daily essays like this one—honest, unfiltered, lived

• The BREAKTHROUGH Guide (yours immediately)

• Full access to the archive

• A community of women who are done performing and ready to live

• One weekly BEAKTHROUGH Workshop each week.

  This isn’t about adding more to your life.

  It’s about finally letting your body rest so everything else can fall into place.

  The breath practice is free. You can start that right now.

  But if you want to know what comes next—what builds in the space that opens when anxiety finally leaves—that’s what I write about every day.

  And there’s room for you here.

  —Monica