Somewhere Between Fine and Freaking Out

Dear Yoga Therapist,

I know the answer to anxiety about aging is supposed to be "stay present," but I'm finding this nearly impossible. Help!

— Somewhere Between Fine and Freaking Out

Dear Somewhere Between,

Oh, friend. Pull up a chair.

Can we just take a moment to appreciate the fact that you know the answer — stay present — and it's still not working? That is not irony. That is yoga. Welcome to the club. We meet weekly, we breathe a lot, and we still lie awake at 3 a.m. wondering where all that time went.

Here's the thing: the fact that presence is hard doesn't mean you're doing it wrong. It means you're paying attention. The mind that worries about aging is the same mind that loves deeply, plans carefully, and shows up for the people it cares about. It's a very devoted mind. It just needs a little redirection.

The yoga tradition actually has a name for what you're experiencing. Patanjali, the sage who gave us the Yoga Sutras, defined the entire goal of yoga as chitta vritti nirodaha — the settling of the mind's fluctuations. Not the elimination of thoughts. The settling. Which tells us something important: the spinning, worried mind isn't a bug. It's the whole reason yoga exists.

And those anxious thoughts about aging? Yoga has a name for that too.

Meet the Kleshas

The kleshas are the five fundamental sources of human suffering — not your suffering, not my suffering, but the suffering. The stuff baked into the human condition. Think of them as the original factory settings we're all born with.

The fifth klesha is called abhinivesha, and it is simply this: the deep, instinctive clinging to life as we know it. The fear of loss. The fear of change. The fear of death. Patanjali says this klesha lives even in the wise. Even in the learned. It is, quite literally, hardwired into us.

So if you've been quietly wondering what's wrong with you for feeling this way — nothing. Absolutely nothing. You are running the standard human software.

So What Do We Actually Do?

"Just stay present" is lovely advice that helps approximately no one who is already spiraling. So let's get practical.

The first move is simply noticing the moment you leave. Not beating yourself up about it. Just catching it. That little click of awareness: oh, I'm not here right now. I'm somewhere in the future, catastrophizing about the “golden years”. That noticing? That IS presence. You just did the thing. The return to now begins the moment you recognize you've left it.

From there, the single most effective thing you can do is lengthen your exhale. This is not a metaphor or a yoga-ism.  Breath happens NOW. Not in the past or imagined future. Breathe in for four counts, breathe out for six or eight. Repeat three times. This simple shift activates your parasympathetic nervous system — a physiological signal to your body that you are safe, right now, at this moment. You cannot maintain high anxiety with a long, slow exhale.

Presence doesn’t develop overnight and sometimes it is easier than others. The practice is the return, how often can you come back.  Breath by breath. That's all any of us are doing. 

— Your Yoga Therapist