Etty Hillesum

Finding Life in the Pause Between Breaths

After creating a sliver of space, the next step is what that space allows: a different kind of action. The pause is where impulse loses its monopoly. A sharp remark can be withheld, panic can soften, compassion can re-enter the frame—not because circumstances changed, but because the person did. This is why the “rest” can be the most important thing: it is the hinge between stimulus and response. Viktor Frankl later framed a similar idea in *Man’s Search for Meaning* (1946), describing a space in which one can choose one’s attitude. Hillesum’s breath-pause is a daily, bodily way of entering that space. [...]

Finding Meaning in the Pause Between Breaths

Hillesum’s words gain depth in light of her diaries and letters, written during the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands and collected in Etty Hillesum’s *An Interrupted Life* (written 1941–1943). Amid escalating danger and deprivation, she cultivated an interior steadiness—often describing the need to create space within herself even when external circumstances offered none. Seen this way, the pause between breaths is not a luxury but a lifeline. It suggests that even under extreme strain, a person can preserve a pocket of freedom: the ability to settle, to witness, and to choose a response rather than be driven solely by fear. [...]

The Quiet Power Between Two Deep Breaths

The phrase “between two deep breaths” highlights the overlooked middle—the gap where we stop pushing and simply are. That middle can be where insight arises, because it interrupts momentum long enough for awareness to catch up. Many people recognize this in ordinary life: after a tense phone call, a single quiet exhale can reveal what they truly feel and what they want to do next. As a result, the quote invites a shift from intensity to rhythm. Life is not only made of effortful inhalations; it is also made of receptive spaces where the nervous system and the mind settle. [...]

The Quiet Power Between Two Breaths

Finally, the line offers a simple discipline: notice the pause, and let it lengthen your sense of time. You can try two slow breaths and then deliberately attend to the still point after the second inhale—no analysis, just awareness. Over days, this trains a steadier relationship to stress, because you begin to trust that a refuge exists inside the flow of events. Hillesum’s insight is that life’s weight is not carried only by effort; it is also carried by the tiny rests that prevent the soul from being crushed. Between two deep breaths, we remember we are more than what presses on us. [...]

The Quiet Power of Rest Between Breaths

Moreover, the line captures something psychologically practical: brief pauses can interrupt spirals of stress. A single conscious breath can slow a racing mind, soften reactivity, and create just enough distance to prevent an impulsive word or action. What looks like “doing nothing” is, in fact, a rapid recalibration. Consider an ordinary anecdote: someone about to send a heated message stops, inhales, and waits a heartbeat before exhaling. That sliver of rest may be the difference between escalation and repair. Hillesum’s insight dignifies that small self-interruption as a daily turning point. [...]

The Quiet Power of Rest Between Breaths

Hillesum wrote her diaries and letters amid the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands, later collected in Etty Hillesum’s *An Interrupted Life* (1941–1943). With that context, “rest” is not mere comfort; it becomes a moral and spiritual stance—refusing to let external brutality fully colonize one’s interior world. Seen this way, the pause between breaths carries quiet defiance. Even when life cannot be made safe or fair, a person can still reclaim a sliver of sovereignty: a moment to settle, to witness, and to choose a response rather than be driven solely by fear. [...]

Finding Life’s Meaning Between Deep Breaths

Moving from biography to experience, the rest between breaths functions like a doorway into presence. Breath is constant and bodily; it anchors attention in what is real rather than imagined. When you attend to the tiny suspension after an inhale or exhale, time seems to widen, because you are no longer measuring life only by tasks and outcomes. This is why the pause can feel unusually vivid: it sits at the boundary between doing and being. In that boundary, sensation becomes clearer—sound, posture, emotion—allowing you to meet your day as it is rather than as a story you are racing to complete. [...]