The Magic Hour
Practice to navigate the dark, worry-filled early morning hours when life is challenging.
It’s 3:30 am again.
In the dark, I reach over and place my hand on his pillow - which is still empty. It’s the middle of his day in Burundi, and I wonder if he is safe in the capital of Bujumbura, where a civil war is being waged, which is why we are here, and he is there. He had been gone for nearly a year at this moment in 2017, and we had another year plus to go. The 3:30 am wake-ups were wearing on me.
The anxious spinning, worry, and planning for another day of keeping things “normal” for my daughter and me, despite his long absence, consumed the dark, early morning hours, leaving me depleted and stretched thin before the days began.
“Maybe the early morning wake-ups are an invitation.”
At the time, I was taking a year-long breathwork facilitator training. During a mentoring session, I told my teacher about the relentless early mornings and their toll on me. She recounted her own experience with what ordinary people call insomnia but spiritual people call “the magic hour” - those hours of wakefulness in the early morning hours that are seen as an invitation to connect with the mystery.
My teacher’s response was infuriating (I was was so very tired), but I was also slightly intrigued. What wisdom might be available if I were to use those early hours of wakefulness to practice? If nothing else, I knew that a breath practice would be more restful than the churn of worry that dominated those hours when I wanted to be sleeping peacefully.
I sank into the breath.
When I woke up the next night, I put a pillow under my knees and lay back on my bed in savasana (the resting pose of yoga). Heart open, I lay in the dark and dropped into the comforting rhythm of my breath practice. The practice held my tension, my tears, and eventually brought me a sense of peace. No matter what, Erick, Clara, and I would be okay; no, we were okay. Better than okay, really.
The following day, I noted I was less tired, and, when Clara bound up the stairs I welcomed her into my arms. I didn’t sleep well for the remainder of our separation from Erick, but I had the magic hour, and my breath practice, to nourish and sustain me.
A beautiful reminder. Thank you, Nona. Though I sleep soundly most nights, it's the very early morning - 5 am, 6 am, when magic hour calls to me. And when, so often, I resist the invitation to sit by my morning window, close my eyes again and breathe. Your beautiful story resonates deeply.
Ohhh my. Those are loooong absences! Thank you for sharing how willingly you (ultimately) embraced the possibility of choosing differently, even in a situation that felt nearly unbearable or seemingly impossible to change (and not actually changeable for you, aside from how you responded.) 💗