Why Sitting With Yourself in Quiet Feels Uncomfortable (And Why That’s Not a You Problem)

Quiet sounds dreamy until you’re actually in it. Then suddenly it feels like you’ve been dropped into a room with your own thoughts, holding a lukewarm LaCroix, wondering who invited all this emotional clutter to the party.

Welcome to the sacred-chaotic moment known as being alone with yourself.

Here’s the truth: if the silence feels itchy, awkward, or like your brain keeps raising its hand with random nonsense… you’re not broken. You’re just human, and your nervous system is trying to recalibrate after living in a world that’s basically a never-ending group chat.

Your Brain Has Been Running a Marathon in Flip-Flops

Most moms I work with spend their days juggling responsibilities like they’re auditioning for a circus. Laundry, church callings, carpools, mind-reading toddlers, emotional labor… it’s a full-time sport.

So when you hit pause, your brain doesn’t know what to do with the sudden lack of chaos. It trips, face-plants, and immediately starts sending up forgotten emotions like little flare guns.

Stillness Removes All Your Favorite Hiding Spots

When life is loud, you can avoid the stuff bubbling under the surface. But silence? Silence is bold. It turns the lights on. It makes room for the truth. Don’t panic: truth isn’t here to bully you. It’s here to tap your shoulder and whisper, “Hey… can we talk about that thing you’ve been avoiding since 2019?”

Your Nervous System Thinks Calm Is Suspicious

Fun fact: if your normal speed is “frazzled-but-functional,” calm won’t feel calming. It’ll feel foreign. Unfamiliar. Maybe even unsafe. Your body has adapted to chaos, so slowness feels like someone changed the playlist without warning.

Research shows that the nervous system becomes more comfortable with regulation through repeated, small moments of mindful awareness. In other words, you have to practice calm while things are already calm. Just like fire drills in school—you don’t run them in the middle of an actual fire.

You Weren’t Taught How to Just… Be

Most of us didn’t grow up learning how to sit with ourselves gently. We learned how to hustle, serve, deliver, and “push through.” So sitting in quiet feels like stepping into a room where you’re the only one who forgot the script.

But Here’s the Psyched Coconut Magic: Quiet Is a Portal

It’s a doorway back to you. Not the “perfectly peaceful, Pinterest-board version” of you. The actual you. The one who’s tired and tender and doing her best with a heart that keeps showing up even when life is spicy.

Start with tiny pockets of quiet. Thirty seconds while your drink cools. One minute before you pick up your phone. A breath prayer.

A pause.

A soft, “How are we doing, really?”

Your nervous system will learn the rhythm. Your soul will stretch out on the sand.

And that uncomfortable silence?

Over time, it’ll turn into a calming, grounding exhale—your own personal beachfront.