Following on from last week, I was reflecting on my work with people, which is often about their goals in life and the challenges they encounter in all areas of their lives…
And the question arises ‘How do we move forward in life, embrace all the challenges and stretch for goals without losing ourselves…?
How do we stay connected to presence – to our true self – whilst living fully in the world?
There is always an inner journey unfolding.
Even as we: pursue big goals, work within organisations, create families navigate full and complex lives, there is something within us that is always aware.
A quiet witnessing presence.
And if we can stay connected to that, even if it feels it’s only a small thread at times, then we remain rooted in something deeper than the activity of our lives.
Of course, we can step away from the world.
We can retreat from the world, and live somewhere away from the hustle and bustle where we can into silence, into stillness, into pure awareness, and recognise that this is what we are.
But there is another way to practise the inner work… It is not only to find presence in stillness…
It is to remain present within life itself.
There is a story of a nun who retreated into silence for twelve years.
Eventually, she returned to the world and took a bus into the local village to begin working.
As she sat on the bus, she noticed irritation arising toward the other passengers.
And in that moment, she realised that her real practise had just begun!
There is another story of a man who would row his boat to the middle of a lake to meditate in peace.
One day, as he lay there with his eyes closed, another boat suddenly knocked into his.
He felt immediate irritation and sat up, ready to confront the person responsible.
But when he opened his eyes, he saw…
There was no one there.
The boat had simply drifted loose from its moorings.
In that moment, he saw clearly:
The reaction had come from within him.
To be human is not only to do, but to be.
And in every moment it is important that we remain aware of this being aspect, not just in quiet moments, but in the midst of life.
In fact, it is often in the most challenging moments that we come to know ourselves most deeply.
Because these are the moments where we may slip from awareness into reactivity, move into fear, become caught in stress or exhaustion
Stress often arises from a loss of presence.
It is connected to fear of what is to come, the belief that we cannot manage, the pressure of expectations, the feeling that we must live up to a standard in order to be worthy
And so we move away from ourselves.
It is also very common to measure ourselves against others.
But comparison is deeply unhelpful.
It takes us away from self-acceptance, awareness, self-love
Because the truth is that we are each on a unique path! And we cannot ever truly know what it is like to live another person’s life
And so always, the journey is always to travel inward – to connect with ourselves, to love ourselves, to accept ourselves, to forgive ourselves… Because from this place, something shifts.
We naturally begin to release judgement, both of ourselves and of others.
And we come back to the inner journey.
When we stay connected to presence, something very subtle but powerful changes.
Our thoughts, words and actions begin to arise not from conditioning, expectation, or ‘oughts’ and shoulds’, but from something deeper.
From our true self.
I have always loved running.
And for me, striving toward excellence or a goal has often been a doorway into inner awareness, even though, at times, I have also been caught in the illusion of achievement.
There is a beautiful teaching from Sri Chinmoy:
‘Run and become.
Run to succeed in the outer world.
Become to proceed in the inner world.’
And this speaks so clearly to the balance.
We can move forward in life.
We can engage, create, achieve.
But at the same time…
We can remain rooted in presence.
The path is not about withdrawing from life.
It is about being present within it! being present within it.
It is about noticing when we lose ourselves and gently returning – again and again – and over time, something becomes more stable.
We are no longer dependent on circumstances to feel grounded and present.
We carry that connection and ease within us. always
To move forward without losing yourself is not about holding tightly to an identity.
It is about staying connected to the awareness beneath it.
To the stillness.
To the presence.
And from that place, we can live fully.
We can engage with the world.
We can grow, create, and evolve.
Without ever truly leaving ourselves behind.