Twenty-five years

Twenty-five years ago today.

I was there.

I had recently arrived in the United States. That morning I was sitting on the PATH train from New Jersey into the city — World Trade Center, the last stop.

What I saw when I came out of that station, I cannot describe.

A single girl, from another country, alone in the city. Alone in the middle of one of the most horrific events I have ever lived through. All I could think of was my parents, my brothers, and my sisters. I started to pray.

Then everything turned gray.

For years afterward, my body would react to a sound before my mind knew why. I thought that was in my head. I was wrong.

Here is what I have learned since, and why I do this work.

Your heart has its own nervous system — about forty thousand neurons of it. Cardiologists call it the heart’s little brain. And the nerve connecting it to your head carries far more traffic upward than down. Your heart is not mostly taking instructions. It is mostly giving them.

It means what you carry in your heart is not separate from your biology. It is your biology. The grief, and the gratitude too.

One thing for today: box breathing.

Four counts in. Hold four. Four counts out. Hold four. Repeat for two minutes.

It works because a slow, even exhale is the most direct instruction you can give that nerve — it tells the body the emergency has passed. Soldiers and emergency physicians use it before they go in. I use it when my body has reacted to something before my mind has caught up, which on a day like today happens more than once.

Two minutes. No equipment. Nobody in the room needs to know you are doing it.

If you would like someone to count for you, there is a guided session here.

We have a word in Portuguese. Saudade. There is no English for it. It is the presence of someone who is absent — longing and love in the same breath.

That is what today is for me. Not only what was lost. What remained.

I am still here. So are you. That is not a small thing, and I have never once taken it for granted since.

Com o coração cheio.

Cheers to a bella vita, sempre.
Maria Antonietta
Sempre Bella · The Executive Aesthetic™