Quiet People See the World Clearly, Episode 3: 'How to Create White Space—On the Brain, Energy, and Breathing'
In the first episode, I talked about this.
People without white space in their brains find it harder to see what is around them.
Lucky people have a wide vessel of attention.
In the second episode, I talked about this.
Experience only becomes an asset to those who reflect on it.
Metacognition makes people resilient.
So, how can we create white space?
The answer has always been inside your own body🪷
📍What does it feel like to have no white space?
Please try to imagine it for a moment.
A smartphone where notifications never stop ringing.
Even if you close the apps, something keeps running in the background.
Before you know it, the battery is dead.
The brain is exactly the same.
Worries...
Things to do...
Regrets from the past...
Anxieties about the future...
Even if you are not conscious of them,
they keep running in the background of your brain the whole time.
That is why you feel tired at night, even though you haven't done anything...
That's why, from the moment you wake up in the morning, you already feel heavy...
What it means to have no space
It means your brain's background processes are running constantly.
📍 The special power that only breathing possesses
You cannot control your autonomic nervous system yourself.
Heart rate, digestion, and body temperature regulation—
your body does all of it automatically.
But breathing is different.
It can be done unconsciously, and it can also be moved consciously.
This characteristic of being able to be both
actually holds a very special meaning for the brain.
Breathing is the only manual switch for the autonomic nervous system.
By consciously changing your breathing,
you can directly access your own nervous system.
This is something nothing else can do.
📍 The Vagus Nerve and Polyvagal Theory
There is a concept proposed by neuroscientist Stephen Porges called
**'Polyvagal Theory'**.
Our nervous system has three main states.
🔴 Fight-or-flight mode
When you feel danger,
your sympathetic nervous system becomes dominant.
Your heart rate increases, and your breathing becomes shallow and rapid.
While your brain may seem to be running at full capacity,
in reality, your field of vision has narrowed significantly.
🟡 Freeze Mode
When you have exceeded your limits,
you enter a state close to a shutdown.
Your senses become numb,
and it becomes difficult to feel anything.
🟢 Safety and Connection Mode
A state of being calm and connected to those around you.
When you are here,
you are at your most observant.
The "person with space" I spoke about in Episode 1
is exactly in this 🟢 state.
And the most direct way
to return to this 🟢 state is by influencing the vagus nerve—
in other words, through breathing.
By exhaling slowly and deeply,
the vagus nerve is stimulated,
your nervous system feels "safe,"
and you transition into 🟢.
This is why exhaling comes first.
📍 What Eastern medicine has been saying for thousands of years
In Eastern medicine ☯☯,
breathing is not merely an exchange of oxygen.
The lungs are the 'gateway for qi' and
the organ where the 'haku' (corporeal soul) resides.
The haku refers to the instinctive senses rooted in the body.
Intuition, tactile sensations, the ability to read the atmosphere of a room—
all of these are considered to be functions of the haku.
When the qi of the lungs is balanced, the haku becomes stable.
When the haku is stable, your senses become sharpened.
When your senses are sharpened,
you begin to see your surroundings more clearly.
The 'person who notices the posted notice' that I mentioned in Episode 1
might be someone whose haku is functioning properly,
one could say.
Qigong, yoga, and meditation—
when you get down to it, they all return to the subject of breathing.
For thousands of years,
humans have known this through their bodies✨✨
That space can be created through breathing😊
📍What Ancient Egypt Knew
In ancient Egypt,
the human soul was thought of as being divided into
**'Ka' and 'Ba'**
.
Ka is the breath of life that resides in the body.
Ba is the soul that possesses individuality and consciousness.
For the breath to stop is for the Ka to leave the body.
That is precisely why the priests
treated breathing as something very sacred.
And what is interesting is
that the breathing techniques said to have been practiced by Egyptian priests
are, in terms of rhythm,
almost identical to the breathing recommended by modern Polyvagal Theory.
Exhale first, long and slow.
Across thousands of years,
ancient wisdom and modern science quietly overlap.
That sense of overlap is something
I, Nefertiti, absolutely love💗💗
📍So, how do you do it specifically?
You don't need to overthink it😊
You don't need special time, a special place, or any tools.
🌿'Breathing for Space'—Things you can do starting today
1. First, exhale completely
(Exhale first. This is the signal to the vagus nerve)
2. Inhale slowly through your nose for 4 seconds
3. Exhale slowly through your mouth for 8 seconds
4. Repeat this just 3 times
When you wake up in the morning.
In the privacy of a restroom stall.
In the split second before you talk to someone you care about.
At night, while in bed.
Anywhere, three times is enough.
With three times, the vagus nerve begins to activate.
With three times, the background of your brain becomes a little quieter.
With three times, the way you see the world changes just a little.
♦️ As a nurse, to be honest
Looking back at my most difficult period
my breathing was truly shallow.
I was breathing with my shoulders, constantly thinking about what was next,
and my brain was running at full capacity all the time.
There was zero space left.
What I realized then was
it's not that you forget to breathe because you're busy,
but that you become busy because you forget to breathe.
The order was reversed.
🔹 Space is not something you create, but something you remember.
In truth, within everyone
there is already a vast, quiet space.
It's just that, before you know it,
You are simply filled up with too many things.
Breathing is the
closest path back to that space.
Brain science, Eastern medicine, and ancient Egypt
despite the differences in eras and languages
have all been saying the same thing for a long time.
Exhale, and inhale.
Just by doing that, the way you see the world changes.
Tonight, just once before you go to sleep
try exhaling everything, and then inhaling slowly.
That is all you need to do.😊✨✨
Because the space for your tomorrow will be a little wider than it is today.🪷
Thank you for reading through this three-part series.😊✨
Have you all had experiences like this too?🌱🌱
#Breathing #VagusNerve #PolyvagalTheory #AutonomicNerves #CreatingSpace #BrainScience #EasternMedicine #Haku #FlowOfQi #ActiveNurse #Nefertiti #AncientEgypt #Ka #Ba #Spiritual #Manifestation #Aligning #ParasympatheticNerve #Meditation #ChangeFromWithin #RefiningIntuition #SelfGrowth #QuantumMechanics #ExpandingConsciousness