Breathe...In...out... gallbladder gone!.

 Breath In... Breath Out... Pause!

Emotions in... gallbladder out.

The Sacred Pause.

There was a time I thought pausing was dangerous. If I stopped, wouldn’t everything fall apart?

The house, the people, the drama, my own mind?

Turns out, things fall apart anyway.

And sometimes, that’s a gift.

My pause came with gallbladder surgery.One organ down? 

Yes—life literally yanked an organ out of me to make a point.

Apparently, when you ignore emotions long enough, your body files a formal complaint.

So there I was—horizontal, stitched up, with enough painkillers to temporarily like my family.

No energy to fix anyone. Not my father. Not the broken ceiling fan.

And certainly not the country.

And honestly? Bliss.

My garden... the gardening... the gardener—an unexpected blessing.Their quiet presence watered something deeper in me.

I stopped being useful. I stopped being pleasant. I stopped brushing my hair

I Let go an organ.

I paused.

And strangely, I started to feel the feelings more.No dramatic background music.

 Just quiet.

Listening to my heart beat ...my favourite podcast. 

My kind of quiet—the one that tastes like cooling chai and sounds like nothing being demanded of me.The kind where I could actually hear my own thoughts before someone interrupted them.

The second chapter of the Gita—the only thing that didn’t pause.

My morning tea became my ritual of resistance.A force-fed faith in stillness.Nothing is more urgent than sitting still.

Okay... also... When you’re a menopausal woman—one organ short, several hot flashes in, and absolutely done with everyone’s emotional baggage?

What am I now?

I’m like a minimalist sculpture: fewer parts, but far more valuable.

Forget gallbladders.

I’ve got guts.

How I prepared for the surgery?

Let’s just say… it was less “graceful goddess” and more “Yo Yo Honey Singh meets Deepak Chopra.”

And if anyone now dares to question my pause?I give them the stare—the one only a hormone-fueled, therapy-trained, fifty-year-old woman who’s survived Indian family politics can deliver.

That stare has shut down arguments, silenced tattlers, and once made a reckless driver apologize twice.

When I asked the doctor if some beer or red wine could fix all this....the stare said it all.

So yes, this pause? It’s not a break.

It’s a service to my own self.

I learned that pausing isn’t weakness.

It’s wisdom.

It’s reclaiming space in your life—not because you earned it, but because you exist.

So here’s to the sacred art of doing nothing.

To breath becoming air.

To being a woman who finally knows:

I am precious.