are you even listening?

do you know who you are or are you who the world told you to be?

I feel like I don’t have to educate this audience about how April is the real January. The real time for renewal and rebirth. Everything in nature is waking up—including my soul. But it’s not like Sleeping Beauty, gently stirring from a deep, restful slumber, eyelashes fluttering open like butterfly wings, awakening feeling light, renewed, and effortlessly alive.

No.

It’s more of a feral gasp.

Like I’ve been buried in loose dirt and have finally been uncovered, clawing at the earth, emerging stiff, spitting out chunks of soil, slowly brushing myself off, looking around like “what that fuck was that?”

Winter, I’ve noticed, leaves me a little disassociated. Like I’m hovering above myself, occasionally moving myself about like a puppet on a string. From the outside, it looks like I’m doing all of the “right” things, but I’m not really in my life. Going through the motions, checking things off lists, the things that once helped me feel like myself now feel hollow. Just white-knuckling it until temperatures get into the 60s and I can finally soften my grip.

It feels like I can finally return home after a long time away, but the home has been left unattended for the last 5 months. Cobwebs drape every corner, dust has settled over every surface, and the hinges creak.

Now is the time where I start to clean the house so I can settle in. Slowly reconnecting with the feeling of being in my life.

A lot of this is, yes, emerging from a proverbial hibernation—my body desperately craved rest but that was not an opportunity I was afforded (as is the case for so many of us), leaving my nerves fried and my soul shriveled—but I’ve also been coming to terms with the fact that I’ve been completely and utterly burnt out.

I’ve mentioned the feeling of it’s encroachment lately, but let’s cut the crap—I’m fully there. And truthfully, it’s better sitting in burnout than feeling like you’re watching it slowly descend. At least now I feel like I can begin to pick myself up and dust myself off.

So, how does one come back to themselves after a long winter?

You shut up and listen.

—

I’m not confident in a lot of things, but I’m confident in the fact that knowing yourself is of the utmost importance. If you don’t, the world will tell you who it wants you to be. You’re left with no choice but to conform to a reality that is not your own, effectively selling your human potential to a marketing company.

In a world of infinite choices, you have to tap into who you really are—to who you are at your core—and anchor yourself in that as you move through the world.

But the question becomes: how? How do you learn how to listen? It’s a skill we’re all born with, and over time has been stripped away by a world not meant for us.

via @laura.renaud

This is a question someone asked in the comment section of a recent post.

The truth is, it’s too big a question to respond to a comment, and too important not to be shared with the rest of the class.

So as I reemerge from the fog, these are the things that I’m thinking about to bring myself back. And if you, too, are feeling like you’ve been in a dissociative daze, watching your life happen but not really being in it, then, maybe, thing things can help bring you back to life too.

1. Cultivate presence

   If you want to hear the call of your soul, you have to listen. And in order to listen, you have to shut the fuck up. You need silence. You need space. Stop trying to do, and just allow yourself to be. It’s one thing to say “just be present”, but honestly—how obnoxious. The pace of the Western world renders presence and stillness impossible. Cultivating it is a deep act of rebellion. And to cultivate it, you need practice.

   You can do it right now (or when you’re done reading this). Go sit or lie down somewhere (outside is ideal but not required). Begin to notice all of the points of contact between your body and the surface beneath you. Notice the feeling of the air on your skin. Notice the temperature, texture. Sounds, smells. Notice your breath, how it animates your torso. Notice the air moving in and out through your nostrils. Notice how the air is slightly cooler on the way in and warmer on the way out.

   Alternatively (if that feels too intimidating or nauseating), you’ve got things like getting out in nature, playing music, making art, playing a game…anything that has no expected outcome or time constraints, and is done with no distractions (while you’re out there, throw your phone in the forest. Not really… unless…).

   In order to cultivate this in your daily life, you have to practice it in controlled conditions. You cant expect yourself to be present when you’re in the thick of it and your limbic brain is taking over and white-hot rage is overcoming your body. Get comfortable with silence and stillness. Learn how to cultivate it. Learn how to access states of deep rest and parasympathetic nervous system states.

   Between stimulus and response, there is a space (that’s Viktor Frankl). And by practicing presence, you cultivate the ability to expand that space. The Space is where you go to learn about yourself—what lights you up, what definitely doesn’t. The Space is what emerges when you finally let yourself out of fight-or-flight, giving you the freedom to choose a response rather than riding the whims of your knee-jerk reactions.

   You’ll find that when you do this, your aperture on life expands. There’s no limit to what you can notice. No bounds on the amount of space you can create.

   Being in the now = an authentic experience.

2. Get in your body

   Your physical experience is the doorway to your mental, emotional, and spiritual experience, and it’s full of clues.

   Truthfully, this and Cultivating Presence are two sides of the same coin.

   As The Space expands, you can start to notice how your body reacts to certain situations and cultivate a sense of curiosity about it. Keep a journal about it—or in the notes app of your phone—write down any physical sensation and the emotions that follow it. Or, the other way around: note how certain situations made you feel, and notice what sensation it was accompanied by.

   Over time, you’ll start to gain the ability to read your body’s cues and patterns and what they mean. You’ll actually be able to access and trust your intuition. Butterflies in the stomach, tightening of the chest, flushing of the face—this is the deep wisdom of the body. Instead of just reacting, you’ll be able to hear what your intuition is telling you.

   Yes, to tap into this, you need presence and Space, but you also need to tend to your physical experience and treat your body well. How do you move? Are you stiff, rigid, and contracted? Add in some fluid movement, some massage, a warm bath. Give yourself a scalp massage (magical), dance, spend time on the floor, play a sport or a game. These things will take your body from a defensive state to an open state.

   Honestly, there’s so much more I could go into here and I’ll probably write another article soon all about it, but for now, trust me when I say: your physical experience is impacting your mental experience more than you could possibly imagine.

   Tension in the body = tension in the mind.

3. What do you actually give a fuck about?

   I hate to break it to you, but you can’t care about everything.

   We’re hard-wired to fit in with the tribe. For most of human history, belonging and being accepted by the group were the ultimate means of survival. Feeling like we belong helps us form our sense of self in the world. If we’re too different, too often, it can feel unsafe or destabilizing. When we’re around others, mirror neurons in our brains light up and we begin mimicking behaviors, expressions, and moods as a means of helping us fit in.

   As a result, we adopt the thoughts, feelings, and values of those around us. The problem is, we spend so much time online, exposing ourselves to the opinions of billions of people around the world. Do we even want to be in their tribe? We don’t even know them. And yet, we often take on their feelings and opinions just the same, completely out of context. This results in an integrity hangover—a values whiplash. Your authentic experience gets drowned out in a sea of hot takes.

   You might have a sense of the things that matter to you, but have you ever sat down and considered what your values are? To me, this is the most grounding, anchoring practice a person can do. I did it for the first time 5 years ago and revisit it often. There’s no substitute for knowing who you are, what you’re about, and standing firm in that. This is uncompromising authenticity.

   This is something you can do once you’ve begun to expand The Space: Recognize the impulse to belong, and come back to your essence. Know your top core values and always reference them when making decisions. (PS I’ve included an exercise below to help you figure it out).

---

If you’re anything like me, you have to write to organize your thoughts and get to the meat of what you’re actually thinking and feeling. So, here are some journal prompts to get closer to yourself.

There are no rules for journaling except for one: ask the questions and listen to the answers. Don’t worry about the “right” answer. This is your first exercise in listening.

• What is my current relationship with stillness and silence? How do I usually respond to it?

• What moments in my day feel the most “alive”? What about the most numb or dissociated?

• What’s my current sensory baseline? (How does my breath feel, my body feel, my thoughts sound right now?)

• What’s one small ritual I can do each day that brings me into the now?

• When I think of safety, what sensations arise in my body? Where do I feel them?

• What physical signals tend to accompany my feelings of stress, anxiety, or disconnection?

• What movements, environments, or experiences bring me back into my body?

• What parts of my body feel neglected or overworked? What are they trying to tell me?

• What topics, issues, or causes make me feel something deep and real, not performative urgency, but actual resonance?

• What opinions or beliefs have I adopted that don’t actually feel like mine?

• Who am I trying to impress or appease? What would I choose differently if no one was watching?

• What does “enough” feel like to me? Not the world’s version—my version.

• What am I avoiding about myself?

• When do I feel like I’m “too much” or “not enough”? Who told me that?

• What emotions or parts of me do I tend to repress or push away?

• What have I judged harshly in others lately—and what might that be reflecting back to me?

Identifying Your Core Values

This one takes a little time, but it’s one of the most clarifying exercises you can do. Don’t rush it.

Step 1: Review this list of common values. Circle or highlight every one that resonates.

Values List:

Acceptance, Accountability, Adventure, Ambition, Authenticity, Autonomy, Balance, Beauty, Boldness, Bravery, Calm, Care, Challenge, Collaboration, Commitment, Compassion, Confidence, Connection, Consistency, Contribution, Courage, Creativity, Curiosity, Determination, Discipline, Discovery, Empathy, Energy, Enjoyment, Excellence, Fairness, Faith, Fame, Family, Fitness, Flexibility, Focus, Forgiveness, Freedom, Friendship, Fun, Generosity, Grace, Gratitude, Growth, Happiness, Harmony, Health, Honesty, Hope, Humor, Impact, Independence, Influence, Innovation, Integrity, Intimacy, Joy, Justice, Kindness, Knowledge, Leadership, Learning, Legacy, Love, Loyalty, Mindfulness, Nature, Openness, Order, Originality, Passion, Peace, Play, Power, Presence, Progress, Purpose, Recognition, Reliability, Respect, Responsibility, Risk, Safety, Security, Self-Expression, Service, Simplicity, Spirituality, Spontaneity, Stability, Strength, Success, Support, Sustainability, Teamwork, Trust, Truth, Understanding, Vitality, Vulnerability, Wealth, Well-being, Wisdom

Step 2: Narrow it down.

• From your list, choose your top 10 values.

• Then narrow it to 5. Then choose your top 3. These are your core values—the ones you cannot live without.

Step 3: Reflect.

• What patterns do you notice in the values you chose?

• How do these core values show up in your life right now? Are you honoring them, or betraying them?

• What changes would I make if I prioritized these values every day?

Want to support my work but don’t want to commit to yet another subscription?