The Pause That Changed Everything: How one Simple Writing Exercise Unlocked Collective Courage

How Movement, Music, and Writing Merged to Transform Lives at Kripalu

Three weeks ago, my wife, daughter, and I packed our overnight bags and took a two-hour drive from our home in Connecticut to the Kripalu Center for Yoga and Health in Stockbridge, Massachusetts.

The winding two-hour journey through the Berkshire Mountains felt like a retreat in itself—each mile of single-lane roads and frozen lakes offering a quiet prelude to what lay ahead.

It was a big weekend for us—I was co-hosting my very first retreat alongside my friend Pilin Anice, a faculty member at Kripalu whose expertise in movement and meditation complemented my focus on writing. Completing our circle was Victor See Yuen, a percussionist and arranger whose instrumentation created the soundtrack for our transformative journey.

At certain points in our trip, we drove for miles without seeing another car. Our quiet drive was a much-needed respite from yet another busy week spent juggling parenting, work, and life responsibilities. In fact, it was quiet enough for me to worry about how my teachings would be received—how I would be received—in such an unfamiliar, intimidating space.

Simply put, Kripalu is a big deal—it’s the largest yoga retreat center in North America, with over 50 years of influence in the field. In 2024, Oprah Daily described Kripalu as “a giant in the yoga world.” As we pulled up to the welcome center that afternoon, I felt deeply aware of its towering presence.

Love.

Wholeness.

Unity.

Service.

Evolution.

These five values—Kripalu's guiding principles—stared back at me from a welcome brochure as I waited for my room key. Though I'd researched them before, now, standing in this space, they felt less like words on a page and more like promises waiting to be fulfilled. Pilin, who had embodied these values through years of teaching at Kripalu, had reassured me that the final word, "evolution," was a natural byproduct of the Kripalu dynamic. Little did I know how deeply that word would align with my experience in the days ahead.

Our retreat was called 'Pause and Reconnect.'

Over the next few days, we did just that, alternating between Pilin's soul-stirring movement sessions and my reflective writing exercises. Each practice enhanced and complimented the other—the physical opening creating space for deeper writing, the written insights finding expression through movement. Victor's intuitive percussion wove through it all, his drums and instruments creating a heartbeat for our collective experience.

"What happens in our retreat room stays in our retreat room."

Those were some of the first things I said to retreat participants during our opening night. That promise of privacy was essential for what followed. As our retreat progressed, Pilin and I worked together to build each session upon this foundation of trust. I won't violate the trust that we established that night, but I do want to share a remarkable collective shift that I observed during our "Transformative Writing" session.

Sixteen of us sat in a circle, journals open, pens in hand, ready to discover the power of our collective impact. Our bodies were already buzzing from Pilin's morning movement session, creating the perfect state for deep reflection. Victor's gentle percussion provided a meditative backdrop as we started with the easiest part of the process—free writing. I instructed each participant to spend seven minutes write down any limiting belief that came to mind. For those seven minutes, the only sound in the room was the quiet scratching of pencil against paper.

The next part of the process wasn't as easy, because it required a leap of faith. I saw people's brows furrow as I instructed them to choose a limiting belief that they were ready to transform. Being aware of your self-imposed limitations is a victory in and of itself, but coupling that self-awareness with the self-assuredness and self-control needed to release those limitations is a whole different ballgame.

Once pencils went down, it was time to begin the transformation process. I instructed participants to challenge the limiting belief they were transforming. We took limiting statements —mine was "I'm not good at asking for help"—and transformed them into statements that were equally honest but infinitely more empowering—"I have so many opportunities to ask for help in my future."

Do you notice how different those two statements feel?

After building out our opportunity statements, we took some time to think about evidence that contradicts our limiting beliefs. In my case, I thought back to moments when I had managed to not only ask for, but receive significant help from people who care about me—when my wife gave me journaling prompts to help me process grief, when my friend sent me a gift card for my favorite restaurant because I was too exhausted to cook, and when my creative peers helped me to pick the perfect color combination for my next "thing."

The next step of our journey was the most liberating. We broke into pairs started to imagine the new lives that we would live as a result of our new beliefs. How would we feel when walking into a room? What would shift in our most intimate relationships? How would we experience the world differently? Envisioning the ways that our new beliefs would shift our lived experiences reinforced their value.

I saw people's eyes light up as they imagined new possibilities. How often do adults get to spend time imagining a better future for themselves?

When the chatter died down, it was time for the last part of our transformation process. It was the most difficult, and off-putting, and necessary step.

It was time for each of us to share our new belief with the entire room, one by one. Here's the catch—this time, we couldn't share any additional context or seek to justify our new beliefs. We simply had to speak our new beliefs out loud, allowing them to exist in the presence of other people.

I asked for a volunteer to start us off, and the room fell silent for at least ten seconds. Eventually, someone slowly raised their hand and spoke their new truth. There was another long pause, and the person to their right shared theirs. As we worked our way around the circle, something interesting happened—the pauses got shorter. Voices got louder. People sat up more confidently. The energy shifted. As Victor's percussion built, so did our courage.

In that moment of collective courage, I understood why 'evolution' was one of Kripalu's core values. We hadn't just written new beliefs on paper—we had spoken them into existence in each other's presence. The transformative process that I had planned on paper paled in comparison to the experience that we co-created in real life.

I'll always remember my first retreat, for many reasons—perhaps most importantly, because it showed me that my ability to guide others towards transformation hinged on my willingness to evolve alongside them. Working alongside Pilin, I witnessed how movement and words could dance together, while Victor's percussion created the perfect container for both—a rhythmic space where transformation felt not just possible, but inevitable. Kripalu may be a "giant" in the yoga world, but its true power lives in the small, collective moments of transformation that happen within its walls.

The drive back home traced the same winding path through the Berkshire mountains, past the same frozen lakes that had witnessed our arrival. But this time, our quiet journey made space for a deep-rooted sense of peace, instead of fear.

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A note on my writing process: This piece was refined with the help of Type, an AI writing assistant that helped me to explore different ways to articulate my thoughts. Type didn’t write for me, but it did help me to sharpen my metaphors and strengthen my narrative arc. If you’re interested in elevating your own writing while maintaining your authentic voice, you can try Type at type.ai.