What Healing Actually Looks Like Between Chapters

“Healing doesn’t always look like movement. Sometimes it looks like waiting in the dark until the next door opens.”

TL;DR – The Heart of It:

• Healing in the “in-between” seasons of life often looks invisible—marked by nervous system shifts, quiet grief, and small acts of self-trust, not productivity or clarity.

• This phase isn’t a pause or detour; it is the transformation. Regulating your body, reclaiming your energy, and staying present in uncertainty is the work.

• You don’t need to be ready to move forward. You just need to stay with yourself—even when nothing feels resolved yet.

---

What If Healing Doesn’t Look Like Progress?

We like to picture healing as a clean arc—rock bottom, breakthrough, glow-up. It’s satisfying, linear, easy to map out. But in real life? Healing rarely announces itself so neatly.

Most of the time, it looks like… nothing. Or at least nothing "productive."

It looks like waking up tired even after a full night’s sleep. Cancelling plans. Crying while washing dishes. Feeling emotionally raw over things that didn’t use to touch you. It’s saying no a little faster, yes a little slower. It’s starting to feel uncomfortable in the spaces you used to contort yourself to fit.

That’s what this post is about—the kind of healing that happens between chapters.

Not the new beginning, not the rock bottom, but the blurry, liminal space in between. When you're not quite the person you were, but you’re not the new version yet either. Maybe you’ve left a job, a relationship, a home, a version of yourself you can’t go back to… but you’re still in the hallway. Still in the fog. Still becoming.

I’ve lived through those spaces more than once. And what I’ve learned is: healing doesn’t wait until life gets "stable." It doesn’t need perfect conditions. It just needs room.

This phase—this tender, disoriented middle—isn’t a pause between real life chapters. It is real life. And it’s sacred in its own right.

So if you're in the middle of a move, a breakup, a burnout, a career change, a quiet undoing… you’re not behind. You’re not broken. You’re not doing it wrong.

You’re healing. Even if it doesn’t look like it yet.

Let’s talk about what that actually means.

Why Is the In-Between So Uncomfortable?

There’s something uniquely disorienting about being between—between homes, relationships, identities, roles. The nervous system doesn’t do well with that kind of open space. It wants rhythm. Predictability. A map. Even if the old chapter wasn’t healthy or aligned, at least it was familiar. And our bodies—especially our survival systems—cling to the familiar like it’s safety.

When you’re in transition, that safety net disappears. You're no longer anchored to the person you used to be, but the new version of you hasn’t fully arrived yet either. There’s no "next step" to perform, no identity to return to. Just the liminal space. And that space can feel like freefall.

From a nervous system perspective, it actually is a kind of freefall. In Polyvagal Theory, developed by Dr. Stephen Porges, the vagus nerve plays a key role in regulating how safe or unsafe we feel in our bodies. When we lose access to routine, relationship, or environment-based safety cues—called "neuroception of safety"—our systems can drop into fight, flight, freeze, or fawn without us realizing it. Even if nothing is happening, the lack of external structure can be enough to trigger a background hum of anxiety or numbness [1].

And on top of that? You’re likely grieving something.

Maybe you left a job or a city. Maybe you walked away from a relationship, or it ended before you were ready. Maybe you’re not sure who you are anymore. Whatever it is, your body is carrying the weight of something lost… without a clear picture of what’s next to replace it.

This is why the in-between is so exhausting. You’re not just "waiting for the next thing." You’re actively holding the tension between two identities—mourning the old one while slowly building the next. Without fanfare. Without external validation. Often without support.

In a world obsessed with visible progress, this kind of invisible labor gets overlooked. But the work you’re doing—learning to regulate your nervous system in uncertainty, to hold space for grief without rushing it, to move through a shapeless season with even a shred of self-trust—is profound. It’s not glamorous. But it’s sacred.

And it’s not a detour. This is the work.

What Does Real Healing Look Like During a Life Transition?

It’s tempting to wait for a clear sign—to think healing will feel like lightness or look like finally having your life together.

But in the in-between, when your nervous system is still recalibrating and nothing feels resolved, healing shows up differently. It isn’t loud or obvious. It’s often subtle, quiet, and deeply felt rather than seen.

You might notice you’re breathing more deeply without trying to. Or that you finally slept through the night. Maybe you cry during a commercial and wonder where that softness came from. These micro-shifts don’t seem dramatic, but they matter. They’re signals that your body no longer feels the need to brace all the time. That safety is being rebuilt, quietly, from the inside.

Healing also brings emotional variability. One day, you feel grounded. The next, you’re overwhelmed with grief. Then you’re laughing again. This swing of sensations isn’t dysfunction—it’s nervous system rebalancing. What looks like chaos on the outside is often a body learning how to tolerate feeling.

And then there are the moments that feel sacred for no apparent reason. You sit in silence, surrounded by half-unpacked boxes, and something just feels okay. You light a candle, and for those few minutes, you remember yourself—not the version you were or the one you’re becoming, but the one that exists right now. These are the moments that anchor you.

Even if nothing looks "better," these embodied shifts mean healing is happening. And that counts.

“Even in motion, you can anchor yourself. Sometimes healing finds you mid-journey, not at the destination.”

Why Is This Stage Often Overlooked or Dismissed?

Because it doesn’t look like anything. Not in a way that sells. Not in a way that earns praise.

In Western culture, healing is often treated like a personal development project. If you're not improving, you're failing. If there’s no before-and-after moment, it doesn’t count. We expect productivity, proof, outcomes. But healing—real healing—doesn’t operate on capitalist time.

It’s slow. Uneven. Intimate. And that makes it nearly invisible.

On top of that, most people only share their breakthroughs, not their in-betweens. Social media is flooded with transformation stories, glow-ups, and timelines that feel impossibly fast. The tender, gritty middle part? That rarely gets seen. So we forget it’s normal. We assume we’re behind.

But your nervous system doesn’t heal on cue. It doesn’t care about optics. It only cares about safety.

So if you’re wondering why this season feels so invisible—why no one seems to notice the work you’re doing—know this: just because it isn’t visible doesn’t mean it isn’t valuable.

How Can You Tell Healing Is Actually Happening?

There’s no certificate or milestone that confirms you’re healing. But your body will tell you.

You stop betraying yourself to be loved. You cancel plans without overexplaining. You say "no" without guilt. You listen when your gut says something’s off—and you trust it. These aren’t dramatic acts of empowerment. They’re quiet acts of self-loyalty. And they change everything.

You also start listening to your body. You eat when you’re hungry. You rest when you're tired. You cry instead of holding it in. This attunement—this shift from overriding your body to partnering with it—is a key marker of regulation. Interoception studies show that awareness of internal states is directly tied to emotional resilience and self-trust [2].

And maybe most importantly, you feel discomfort and don’t panic. You sit with it. You breathe. You ride the wave. This is capacity. It doesn’t feel like triumph. But it is. Because now you can stay with yourself when things get hard—without running.

What Daily Practices Support Healing in the Unknown?

When life is shapeless, practices give it edges. Not routines to fix you, but rituals that root you. Healing doesn’t need a grand gesture. It needs repetition. Slowness. Reverence.

Nervous system rituals anchor you. Try grounding breathwork: inhale for four, exhale for six. Place your hand on your heart and speak gently to yourself. Use orientation—let your eyes land slowly around your space. These tools remind your body that you’re safe enough to soften.

Energetic hygiene helps you release what isn’t yours. Take intentional baths or showers. Set digital boundaries. Visualize cutting cords with what drains you. It’s not about being "high vibe." It’s about having space for your own energy to breathe.

Micro-rituals create rhythm. Light a candle at the same time each day. Journal without a goal. Drink your tea like it matters. These small, sacred acts give you something to belong to—especially when everything else feels unstable.

“Micro-rituals make meaning of the mess. Healing begins in these sacred, ordinary moments.”

How Do You Stay Grounded When Nothing Feels Solid?

You start small. You create anchors.

Play the same song each morning. Keep a phrase nearby: "I don’t have to know." Make a corner of your space into an altar, even if it’s just a candle and a feather. Let these tiny things hold you when everything else is uncertain.

You also let yourself go slow. Don’t confuse speed with clarity. Sometimes urgency is just fear in disguise. Let your body set the pace. Let life unfold without needing to race toward resolution.

And most of all? Let presence be enough. You don’t have to make the most of this season. You don’t have to turn it into a breakthrough. You just have to stay with yourself. That’s what healing asks.

Why Do We Resist This Phase Even When It’s Necessary?

Because it strips away everything we use to define ourselves. There’s no identity to cling to. No productivity to measure. No performance to hide behind.

The ego doesn’t like that.

We’re afraid of wasting time. Of being behind. Of having nothing to show for it. But grief, nervous system repair, and inner reorganization don’t move on visible timelines. They move in silence. In subtle rewiring. In becoming.

And of course, there’s grief. And fear. This phase asks you to mourn what was, without knowing what will be. It asks you to hold the ache of what you’ve lost, while opening to what might come. That’s brave work.

So if you're resisting? You're not failing. You're just human. Stay with it anyway.

Can You Trust This Chapter Even If It Feels Unproductive?

Yes.

Because healing isn’t always a breakthrough. Sometimes it’s compost. Still. Quiet. Nonlinear.

In somatic therapy, we call this pendulation: moving between discomfort and regulation. This back-and-forth is how your system expands its capacity. It may feel like nothing is happening, but this is often when the deepest shifts occur [3].

Your nervous system recalibrates in stillness. That’s when inflammation lowers. Stress hormones reset. The body begins to feel safe again. This isn’t wasted time. This is where you grow roots.

This is also where you develop resilience. Intuition. Self-trust. Not by pushing, but by listening. By not abandoning yourself. Even when you’re unsure. Especially when you’re unsure.

“This isn’t weakness. This is the body learning how to soften without collapsing.”

How Do You Know When It’s Time to Move Forward?

There’s no big reveal. But something shifts.

Maybe the stillness that once felt comforting now feels like stagnation. Maybe you feel a flicker of interest. A desire to reach out. To create. To say yes. That’s your signal.

You feel less afraid of beginning again. You stop needing all the answers. You start letting life in—not in a rushed way, but in a way that feels gentle. Curiously alive. That means you're ready. Or at least ready enough.

So if you're asking whether it's time to begin again, the fact that you're asking is a sign: you're closer than you think.

What If This Is the Sacred Part?

We’re taught to treat the in-between like a holding pattern. A waiting room.

But what if this is the chapter that changes everything? What if the softness you’re learning now, the patience you’re building, the nervous system capacity you’re slowly reclaiming—what if that is the transformation?

This isn’t a break from your life. This is your life. It matters. Even here. Especially here.

So if you’re between homes, identities, relationships, or versions of self—if nothing about your life feels clear or put together—you’re not broken.

You’re becoming.

You don’t have to be ready.

You just have to stay present.

Ready for Sacred Support?

If you’re in your own in-between season—and want to feel held, regulated, and reconnected to your body—Veluna Wellness™ will be opening to clients in Santa Fe, New Mexico later this fall.

I offer trauma-informed, nervous system-rooted bodywork for those craving more than just relaxation. This is healing designed for the ones in transition. The ones becoming.

✨ Spaces will be limited when booking opens, so if you’d like to be the first to know when my practice officially launches, join the waiting list here.

Let’s begin, when you’re ready.
Even if everything is still unfolding.

References

[1] Porges, S. W. (2011). The Polyvagal Theory: Neurophysiological Foundations of Emotions, Attachment, Communication, and Self-regulation. W. W. Norton & Company.

[2] Mehling, W. E., Price, C., Daubenmier, J. J., Acree, M., Bartmess, E., & Stewart, A. (2012). The Multidimensional Assessment of Interoceptive Awareness (MAIA). PLOS ONE, 7(11), e48230. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0048230

[3] Ogden, P., Minton, K., & Pain, C. (2006). Trauma and the Body: A Sensorimotor Approach to Psychotherapy. W. W. Norton & Company.