Tru Breath, with Christina Velz

Unapologetically me:

I spent years apologizing for being me. I let people judge me, shame me and make me feel inferior.

My path and purpose always unclear because I couldn’t move until I felt like I was doing the “right” thing by the people around me.

I was unintentionally handing over my personal power on a regular basis.

I was letting people's opinions dictate how I saw myself.
Every little comment, or look of disapproval mattered to me-I was daily tormented by my need to please.

I am not that girl anymore.

I don’t know what happened, I guess it just finally dawned on me that people couldn’t make me feel like s**t without my consent.

I set out on a mission to fall in love with me and find the courage to stand in my truth. It’s been a long journey but I’m finally learning how to give myself permission to be all that I am. I am strong, intelligent, wild, confident and powerful.

I love me and no one can shame me anymore cause you can’t shame a woman who is unashamed.

Brooke Hampton
Art: Jowie Lim

After numerous requests, we are delighted to announce new registrations for an extra-long TRU Breath circle. To ensure the session can take place, a minimum of 5 participants is needed.

In a TRU Breath circle, gentleness and softness are fundamental. There is no need to force or push to get a reaction or to release anything; connecting softly to our breath with the medicine of music allows reconnection to body and heart.

Within this breathful space, I uphold values of ease, compassion, and gentleness, fostering a safe and intimate experience for each participant.

To ensure the safety and integrity, each circle will host a maximum of 8 participants. If the demand exceeds, another circle will be organized the following month.

Save the date: Saturday, 22 June, Time: 13:30 – 16:00 at Yoga Zuid, Antwerpen. Register and pay at www.yogazuid.be.

For any queries, reach out via email at [email protected] or WhatsApp at +32 476701355.

Curious about Conscious Connected Breathwork? Also known as rebirthing, holotropic, or shamanic breathwork, it is a therapeutic practice that involves deep, rhythmic breathing techniques designed to facilitate emotional release, spiritual exploration, and personal growth. For more information on the benefits of breathwork, don't hesitate to get in touch with me.

*The vision behind breathwork redefines the role of the healer. In this role, the healer safeguards, facilitates, and supports the patient's own profound natural healing process. In this revision, it is not the therapist or psychiatrists or healer who is wise, but the psyche of the individual whose innate wisdom is tended to and brought to flower. - Jack Kornfield

I will be honored to support you on this journey to rediscover your innate wisdom, your inner strength, and your TRU self with compassion and ease.
Warm regards,
Christina from Tru Breath

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- Start your weekend with a Touch of Compassion while we breathe into each sacred moment -

When we live in time, we spend our days seeking the meaning of life. In contrast, when we are present, we enjoy a life saturated with meaning.
~The Presence Process

Our breath is ordinary and extraordinary.
It's what we need and do automatically to live and survive.
However, when we surrender to each breath, we are given the invitation to surrender into presen.
By doing this, we acknowledge this moment.
We acknowledge every moment, as sacred.
It is the gift of our breath and presence that opens us to the infinite.

Gift yourself this moment to breathe into the present moment.
Every Saturday, come join me to breathe into each sacred moment.

Book your spot via www.yogazuid.be

The vision behind (holotropic) breathwork redefines the role of the healer. In this role, the healer safeguards, facilitates, and supports the patients own profound natural healing process. In this revision, it is not the therapist or psychiatrists or healer who is wise, but the psyche of the individual whose innate wisdom is tended to and brought to flower. - forward from Jack Kornfield

This approach greatly intensifies all the mechanisms known from traditional verbal therapies:
- Softening of the psychological defence mechanisms
- Remembering of forgotten or repressed trauma events
- Reconstructing the past from dreams or neurotic symptoms
- Attaining intellectual and emotional insights
- Analysis of transference

In addition, It makes available a large number of processes of extraordinary healing and transformative power (as yet unrecognized by academic circles):
- Actual reliving of traumatic memories in full age regression
- Reliving of the biological birth and prenatal traumas
- The experience of psychospiritual death and rebirth
- Past life memories
- Encountering of archetypal figures
- Feelings of cosmic unity
(Excerpts from Holotropic breathwork ~ Stanislav Grof & Christina Grof)

It's all about perspective 🪶

Sometimes someone’s perfect
Is another person’s flawed
Sometimes someone’s peaceful
Is another person’s bored

Sometimes someone’s freedom
Is another person’s trapped
And sometimes someone’s make-believe
Is someone else’s fact

One man’s trash, they often say
Is someone else’s treasure
And someone’s stormy forecast
Is another’s perfect weather

Sometimes someone’s scars
Can tell a very painful story
And sometimes they’re reminders
Of a celebrated glory

Because it all depends you see
On where you’re actually stood
On what you care to notice
And how far you dare to look

And there is sometimes someone
Standing just across from you
Who from the other side
Can see a very different view

Yes, all the time perspective
Will determine what we find
It’s how the number 6
Is sometimes someone’s number 9

And it is also how
You sit and count your flaws and scars
Whilst to someone just across from you
You’re perfect as you are

*****

Our own beauty and magic is often the hardest for us to see ✨

Becky Hemsley 2024

Even a single positive action lifting another person up creates a ripple effect that carries on far beyond the original act and has an impact that’s difficult to measure. When you lift another person up, you inspire others around you to do the same. And those opportunities continue to be passed on.

~ Molly Galbraith, Strong People Lift Each Other Up

~ Art by Rafael Lopez

“One day, it will be easy for me to do this.
But that day may not be today.
And so I will give myself permission
in this present moment
to do the best that I may,
and to step forward
in whatever small way I can,
even if that means only making slow progress,
focusing on where I wish to go
while embracing where I presently am.

And I will remind myself that just as it may take six people to open a jar,
and only the sixth person may get the credit,
it was truly the work of all six people
who assisted in the process.
And so rather than focusing only on my future self
who I wish to become,
I will remember that all versions of myself,
past, present and future
are equally as important and precious
in contributing to who I now am
and will become.”

Words by Tahlia Hunter

I honor your way, as you honor mine. ♥️

"We each have our own path in life.
My way is not your way;
it is merely another way.
It is not for me to tell you what your journey must be
nor for you to tell me what mine must be
but for me to honour the path that you have chosen
just as you may honour mine.
For while my path
may diverge at times
and contain detours,
for each of us,
there is more than one timeline that exists,
and more than one way of finding fulfilment,
and reaching our destiny."

Words by Tahlia Hunter

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"Some years are years of preparation. They are years that pave the way for brighter times to come. They are years of shedding and releasing past pain, wounds and trauma carried by you that were passed down to you or caused by challenges you faced in order to gain a new perspective moving forward.

While on the outside, things may not appear to have shifted, on the inside, things have dramatically transformed, for not all growth is immediate and can take time to show up in the physical world. And so, even if you are not yet where you wish to be in life, trust in each season of your life, and that though you may not understand it now, where you are in this present moment is exactly where you need to be.

And remember, not all success is immediately visible, sometimes success is daring to believe that a better future lies ahead beyond what you have previously known, and letting that vision drive you forward and inspire you to keep going."

Words by Tahlia Hunter

Artwork by Kate Morgan Art

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“Having many cats is good.

If you feel bad, you look at the cats and you feel better, because they know that everything is just the way it is.

You don't have to be nervous about anything. And they know it. They are saviors.

The more cats you have, the longer you will live.

One day, this will be known and people will have thousands of cats."

- Charles Bukowski

🐾

How brave you are for slowing down. For not finishing that to-do list. How courageous you are for not crossing that finish line because your body said "no, enough.”

How fearless you are for choosing the quiet of your soul over those voices driving you towards more.

How bold, you are,
honoring your own natural rhythm,
contrasting society’s breakneck speed.

We tend to make heroes of those hungry with ambition, relentlessly doing, producing always more.
We applaud those who refuse to stop or rest, sacrificing at times their heart & soul in the process.
Those who push themselves so hard in the name of achievement that they ignore their body crying out.
We celebrate those who are ill or aging but never show it, never slow down, never reveal a moment of vulnerability.
Sure, this drivenness can be heroic, at times. It can, at times, be necessary for our survival.
But,
I want to make heroes of those who slow down.
I want to make heroes of those who listen to their bodies and do not strive for more than what the soul truly needs.
I want to make heroes of those who don't force or push but surrender to each moment as it opens.

I want to applaud those who may not be driven towards success as we know it, but instead are nurturing something deep and subtle and needed.
I want to celebrate those brave enough to cease all doing, even for a second, and sit with the ache in their hearts. A task many find harder than summiting the highest peak.

Let's make heroes of those who honor their limitations. Who are unable to keep up with the busy-ness of our times, yet show up to each profound, necessary moment.
Truly, it is an act of courage to do any such thing, in a world demanding you to resist your own self, your rhythm, your own soul.

The paradox is often when we cease our incessant doing, even for a minute, and listen to that quiet voice within, we discover what it is we absolutely must do and what can fall away.
We then hear the call towards what serves our soul, what then will serve the world.
Nothing more, or less.

So come, be softly brave.
Be a new, quieter, gentler kind of hero.
Few may applaud, it’s true, but your soul certainly will.

Words by: Leyla Aylin

CAN YOU LOVE THE ONE WHO...
( Leah Pearlman )

There’s one in you who’s sweet.
There’s one in you who’s mean.
Can you love them both?
Can you let them both be seen?

Can you love the one who tries?
And love her when she fails?
Can you love the one who lies?
And love the one who wails?

Can you love your tears?
Can you love your worry?
Can you love your darkest fears?
Can you love your fury?

Can you love indifference?
Love the one who clings?
Can you love the vibrant one?
Love the one who sings?

Can you love your addict?
Can you love your thief?
Can you love your vanity?
Can you love your grief?

Can you love your inner child?
And your body as you age?
Can you love your wild side?
Release her from her cage?
Can you love the one fulfilled?
And the one who’s not?

Can you love the one who’s chilled?
And whose temper’s hot?
Can you love the weakling?
The one who’s sometimes sick?

Can you love the warrior?
Who fights through thin and thick?

Can you love your crazy?
Can you love your sane?
Can you love your foolish heart?
Love your scattered brain?

There’s one in you who’s bored.
And one who’s often stressed
Can you love them both at once?
And she who tries her best?

If the answer’s “no.”
To some of the above
Then can you love the one in you
Who’s learning how to love?

PHOTO: another tale from the wonderland of Katerina Plotnikova Photography

“I hope that in this year to come you make mistakes because if you are making mistakes then you are making new things, trying new things, learning, living, pushing yourself, changing yourself, changing your world.
You're doing things you've never done before, and, more importantly, you're doing something.
So that's my wish for you, and all of us, and my wish for myself.
Make new mistakes.
Make glorious, amazing mistakes.
Make mistakes nobody's ever made before.
Don't freeze, don't stop, don't worry that it isn't good enough, or it isn't perfect, whatever it is:
art or love or work or family or life.
Whatever it is you're scared of doing, do it. Make your mistakes next year and forever.”~

~Neil Gaiman

This Christmas, give yourself permission 
to feel whatever you need to!

last night
I was visited by
the ghost of yuletide Heartbreak

she told me this:

it's okay to not be okay
on Christmas

it's okay to be melancholy
under the mistletoe

it's okay to come apart
while they are carolling

it's okay to trace your scars with your fingers
while others are humming ‘Holy Night’

it's okay to miss the presence of your beloved
amid the sound of opening presents

it's okay, my love,
to hurt during the holidays

don't stuff your stockings
with your suffering

don't hide your healing
during the holidays

give yourself the gift
of being authentic to yourself

it's okay to not be okay
during Christmas

it's okay to let the broken
pieces inside of you
be the only jingle bells you
hear

because, my love, because,

it means you are still fighting
to stay alive
and I can't think of anything
more to celebrate than that

~ john roedel

"In the end, the whole of life becomes an act of letting go." ~ Life of Pi (2012)

Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it. ~ Rumi ~

the wounds in our hearts
seem to ache a little deeper
during the holidays

don't feel like you
need to cover your wounded
heart in wrapping paper
this Christmas

you don't have to
tie the corners
of your lips with
garland to force
a smile

you don't have to
keep whistling
"silent night" to keep
people from noticing
your bottom lip is trembling

you don't have to blame
an allergy to nutmeg
for why you are walking
around with tears in your
eyes

for this Christmas
give yourself
permission
to feel whatever you
need to

last night
I was visited
by the ghost
of yuletide Heartbreak

she told me this:

it's okay to not be okay
on Christmas

it's okay to be melancholy
under the mistletoe

it's okay to come apart
while they are caroling

it's okay to trace your scars with your fingers
while others are humming ‘Holy Night’

it's okay to miss the presence of your beloved
amid the sound of opening presents

it's okay, my love,
to hurt during the holidays

don't stuff your stockings
with your suffering

don't hide your healing
during the holidays

give yourself the gift
of being authentic to yourself

it's okay to not be okay
during Christmas

it's okay to let the broken
pieces inside of you
be the only jingle bells you
hear

because, my love, because,

it means you are still fighting
to stay alive
and I can't think of anything
more to celebrate than that

~ john roedel

And on the path of self-acceptance,
These twelve illusions you shall shed:

The illusion of being unwanted:
For, in truth, there is no such thing as an unwanted soul.

The illusion of being unlovable:
For your true self is love.

The illusion of unworthiness:
For you are always deserving of love and success.

The illusion of being weird:
For there is no such thing as normal.

The illusion of needing external validation:
For your worth is never dependent on another's approval.

The illusion of being insignificant:
For your presence impacts all of humanity.

The illusion of being powerless:
For within you lies the strength to shape your destiny and influence the world.

The illusion of not being good enough:
For you were born good enough.

The illusion of being a burden:
For your existence is a precious gift, and your contributions add value.

The illusion of being unsuccessful:
For success is subjective, and your path is uniquely yours.

The illusion of being ugly:
Because that label only ever reflects the viewer being incapable of seeing beauty.

And the illusion that aging decreases your value:
For, in truth, you are not a body but a soul.

Words by Tahlia Hunter

Artwork by Katarína Vavrová Artist

You cannot save anyone.
You can be present with them,
offer your groundedness,
your sanity,
your peace.
You can even share your path with them,
offer your perspective.
But you cannot take away their pain.
You cannot walk their path for them.
You cannot give answers that are right for them,
or even answers they can digest right now.
They will have to find their own answers.

~Jeff Foster

"Many women do not even have the basic teachings about predators that a wolf mother gives her pups, such as:

If it is threatening and bigger than you, flee;
If it’s weaker, see what you want to do:
If it’s sick, leave it alone;
If it has quills, poison, fangs or razor claws, back up and go in the other direction;
If it smells nice but is wrapped around metal jaws, walk on by.

Early training to “be nice” causes women to override their intuitions. They are actually purposefully taught to submit to the predator. Imagine a wolf mother teaching her young to “be nice” in the face of an angry ferret or a wily diamondback rattler.

As long as a woman believes she is powerless and/or is trained to not consciously register what she knows to be true, the feminine impulses and gifts of her psyche continue to be killed off."
~ Dr. Clarissa Pinkola Estes

Time to gently Unfold my dear ❤️

"Look to nature, my dear, and you will see clearly
that everything happens at exactly the right time.
You cannot force a rosebud to open
before its time and expect to get a rose.
Yet, a human comes along and tries to force their life to move forward quickly instead of letting it gradually unfold and open. Instead, learn to be like a rose: to be gentle and gracious with yourself and to give yourself space to unfold and come into full bloom once the timing is right."

Words by Tahlia Hunter

Artwork by Catrin Welz-Stein

TRU Breath invites you to another transformative breathwork journey!

During this breathwork journey, you will be compassionately guided to journey deep within yourself.
With the support from myself as your guide, different rhythms of music, frequencies, sensory exploration, and your conscious connected breath you will be able to gently explore what your body wants to tell you and softly come back to your wholeness, which is your authentic awesome self.

I will be honored to support you on this journey to rediscover your innate wisdom, your inner strength, and your TRU self with compassion and ease.

Date: 22/10
Time: 14:00 – 17:00
Agenda:
• Introduction + opening circle.
• Exploration of our intention, while
compassionately & with curiosity inquiring what our body wants to tell us
• Breathwork journey + integration
• Closing sharing circle

Here are just a few of the amazing benefits breathwork can support you with:
• Cleanse the organs
• Balance the endocrine system
• Calm the nervous system
• Expand our awareness
• Elevate the energetic body
• Release trauma and pain from the physical body
• Break through restrictive thought patterns
• Increase creativity
• Gain insight and clarity in your life

Location: Yoga Zuid, Antwerpen only 10 spots available, registration is necessary to participate:
DM me for registration

Price: 45 euro*
* I truly believe Breathwork is an amazing gift for all & should be made accessible for everyone. So for anyone that has fallen on hard times financially, and the price is above your current budget, if you also believe that breathwork can help support you in your healing journey, please contact me & we can arrange a price that will suit your budget.

Any questions?
Email -> [email protected]
WhatsApp -> +32 476701355

*After signing up, you will receive a confirmation email with more info

This workshop will be held in Dutch or English, depending on the participants. No prior experience is necessary.
Just come with an open heart, & you can be transported through an amazing

"Grandma, I'm tired. So tired of this life..."

"Take your tiredness, my child, and wrap it around yourself.
Like a blanket in the cold winter months.
Tiredness comes to make you a nest, to bring you to wear comfortable clothes, to make you sink into its warm embrace.
I invite you to stay within yourself. Without strength, without thoughts, without actions. Like the snow that covers everything to soften the world, to make it muffled, to protect it from noise. Accept the flakes of your tiredness and let yourself be completely covered by them."

"I could die buried under there..."

"You will be reborn instead. Like the seed in the ground. Do not resist your weariness, do not reject it with a thousand actions, a thousand intentions, a thousand feelings of guilt. It just wants to take you by the hand and lead you to sink into the void. Right there, where the source of every inner strength lies. They taught us to be strong by resisting. But it is in surrendering that the true heroes emerge."

"I'm afraid, grandmother. What if fatigue will annihilate me?"

"My child, you are not afraid of tiredness but of losing control of yourself. The time has come for you to give yourself to life. And to generate together with it the most wonderful children: the fruits of your soul!"

Author: Elena Bernabè

Art by Eloy Bida

Said the healing one to the hurting one:
"I will cradle your tears,
For I, too, have known sorrow.
I will listen to your heart,
For I, too, have felt loneliness.
I will warm you with love,
For I, too, have known coldness.
I will lift your spirit high,
For I, too, have faced darkness.
I will hold your hand tight,
For I, too, have been adrift.
I will stand with you boldly,
For I, too, have faced challenges.
I will share your passions,
For I, too, have felt yearning.
I will comfort you and hold you close,
For I, too, have known loss.
I will calm your restless mind,
For I, too, have felt confusion.
I will lend you my strength,
For I, too, have felt weakness.
I will offer you solace,
For I, too, have felt despair.
And I will help you rebuild your life,
For I, too, have felt broken.

Yet, as I am healing,
so too shall you rise from these experiences
And rediscover what it means to feel whole,
For the storms of life do not define you
But are simply seasons that you pass through,
And nothing is capable of breaking
The unbreakable spirit within you."

Words by Tahlia Hunter

"With the opening of breath comes a spaciousness or a healing quality which is that we can allow ourselves to hold in compassion, with a kindness of heart, all that arises." – Jack Kornfield

The Power of Grieving!

This topic of grieving what once was, has come up quite often recently with clients of mine and even with myself as I learn to embrace my healing journey.

Are we able to allow ourselves to grieve the loss of friendship?
The loss of past lives we lived? Homes we left?
Identities, we thought were ours?
A break in the family?

Are we able to give space for the loss of an idea that we were striving for, but now is no longer possible?
Like the loss of being a mother, a father, or having a certain lifestyle we thought was for us?

We are told many times to just accept what is, let it go, and move on.
I know for many, including myself, it just isn't that simple.
There is a deep heartache of having to just move on.
Because we feel guilty for how much sadness we hold on to, but because it isn't as bad as someone passing,
So this heartache holds us limbo!
Keeps us stuck.
So, we push it away and tell others 'I'm okay' and 'I can handle it.

But can we really handle it when we ignore how deep this loss is?

As I learn the gentle art of letting go and easing into acceptance,
I can see a richness in the process of grieving what no longer is.

This gift of grieving can be powerful when we hold space for it.

Where we gently are aware of the emotions that were once present and maybe still are, and we allow them to be held and truly respected for the place they held in our hearts.

Then, just allowing ourselves to know that it is okay to feel sad!

Sad for our losses, allowing the tears to flow and our hearts to feel what no longer is. Giving it all the space it so dearly deserves.

I believe it is in this process of knowing it is okay to grieve, that we create an opening of gently letting go and easing into a present acceptance.

With this, I invite you to grieve what no longer is! ❤️

The Redefinition of Success

I think it is time to redefine what success means to many of us.

When talking about success, we usually equate it to ‘making it’ in life. Having that dream job, owning a profitable business, becoming that power couple with the perfect partner, building a dream home, while still traveling the world, living it up... etc.

How often are we asked, what do you do for work? What are you building? What are you achieving? What sport do you do? How are you improving yourself? How are you building your success story? Etc.

There seems to be a certain admiration of reaching this type of successful statuses. So much, that we rate our own success story only when we achieve these above mentioned levels of prosperity and good fortune.

When seeing friends, family and acquaintances reach this certain level of success, it is easy to start comparing, and feel inadequate, or that our journey to ‘Making it’ still seems so far off and at times often unattainable.

This topic has come up several times in the last few months, and each time I notice the struggle and fear in so many voices, mine included, when we are working on reaching a certain level of success.
With all the will power within us, with the dire hope that we will one day gain that level of success, be financially free, have that amazing partner, run an amazing business/charity or whatever it is, while still coping with what comes across our daily path, this level of success just seems out of our feeble grip. We then tell ourselves, we need to work that much harder and have that little bit more patience before we are SUCCESFUL and have made it. Which many times what follows is us berating ourselves and the immense feelings of inadequacy.

Which I can tell you from experience, does not feel good in anyway and rips away what positive energy that there is left.

Last night, after talking with a childhood friend, where we reminisced the past 20 years. We talked about the changes, hardships, new understandings and how our lives are at the present.

When I came home, I sat by my window admiring the most amazing huge moon. I started thinking about who I was those many years ago, the journey I have been on, where I am now and the mystery of where I will be going.

And wow, even through so many heartaches and struggles, there have been so many redirections, rebirths, insights, process, healing moments, and most importantly sacred pauses.
The woman that I once was, is not who I am now.

When I notice how my health has immensely improved, to what it was not just 20 years ago but 5 years ago. The difference is to me amazing.

How I have made the daily commitment to embrace the path of re-discovering and reconnecting with who I really am.

How I have found solace and healing in breathwork, yoga, mediation, and above all divine solitude.

How I am taking the time to understand what my body is holding on to and what It needs healing from, and allowing myself the time and space to slowly heal my trauma wounds that have been bound in my physical and emotional body for so many year.

How much I have learned to practice letting go of struggles and chronic stress. Which is also a daily practice.

How I am patiently learning to listen to my inner voice, to listen and see with my heart instead of my head.

How I am allowing compassion to take the lead in my daily interaction, including towards myself.

All this and so much more, while allowing myself to learn to FEEL again. (Thanks to Gabor Mate and the journey with Compassionate inquiry)

These my friends are huge SUCCESSES.

Even if I do not have all the things the world defines success with, I can say with confidence that I am successful and each and every day I know I have ‘Made It’.