Everyone has their own personal reality from which they live and see the world. No two are identical, like a fingerprint, we all have our own individual lens. I think a fundamental issue in society is thinking that people view things the same and if not, that they should. Rather than inquisitive curiosity at uncovering and celebrating all the unique things that characterise us, we try to convince each other of rights and wrongs and segregate ourselves into boxes. 

Silence is something that I have been exploring a lot in my sobriety. From a place of feeling and honoring who I truly am and what I want, I have been making a conscious decision to honor when I don’t want to speak.  

What happens in the silence is a query that used to come up a lot in my therapy. My mind used to go to a place of fear, discomfort, anxiety. Fear of the unknown of the silence, what was going to happen and was I prepared for it, anxiety over sitting in it not knowing when it would end. To most people I am super chatty and extroverted, to some it’s attention seeking and that I love the sound of my own voice, to a few its avoidance of sitting with the unknown and the discomfort in the silence. 

A testament to the healthiest happiest relationships of my life is being comfortable and at ease in the silence. Reality is that for a lot of my life I have spent a lot of energy filling the silence. Whether it be for others to be entertained, relaxed, or at least a little amused, I have poured out my precious energy into situations, by my own free will, denying myself what I truly wanted. To sit comfortably in the silence. 

Alcohol was a big fuel for escaping the silence for me. I love people, interesting deep conversations, connecting over the important things in life. But small talk, conversation for the sake of conversation, filling silence is something does the opposite of serve my soul. Alcohol used to help me engage in unnatural ways and fill those silences with great ease. Only to be left drained and with no option other than to go into a little protective cocoon to recuperate from wasting energy like I’ve wasted money buying the whole bar shots at 3am. 

I have started to sit in the silence. It’s a confusing place at times. Upon reflection, I think its one of the reasons for spending so much time alone. I am safe in my own silence. I can control my surroundings and environment and don’t have to be impacted by a request to give anything I don’t want to give.  

With increasing confirmation by experience and awareness that everything is a mirror, I recognise that everything that comes into your field is just actually about your relationship with yourself. Relationships in your life are gifts, divinely assigned to you in your journey on time and on purpose. 

I recently had a friend come to visit me which whilst I was very excited, I was also nervous about. I am aware that I have historically had a tendency to put other people’s experience ahead of my own and put a lot of pressure on myself to ensure they have the best time. Especially given they have made the effort to come and visit me in my world, which very few have done and at times I have truly longed for. So, I saw this as an exercise of putting into practice all that I’ve learnt and become. Honoring myself and allowing my true self to be seen.  

Its very easy to fall back into old patterns and dynamics. To slip into an old coat and play a role in a relationship. Easy, at least in the short run, in that moment. Its become a lot harder in my head though. When I go off course and fall back into old habits such as filling silence, my mind will now start having words with me.  

It’s funny how we can want something and then when we get it we don’t know what to do with it. This is an example of a conversation I have in my mind surrounding silence… 

…happily chatting away 

Everyone has stopped speaking 

Silence 

Thinking about the conversation 

Silence 

I kinda finished all I had to say 

Silence 

Are they not going to say anything? 

Silence 

Shall I say something? 

Silence 

I don’t really want to say anything 

Silence 

Well if you don’t say anything then what are we going to talk about? 

I don’t want to just say something for the sake of it 

Silence 

It doesn’t look like they are going to say anything 

Silence 

What do we do? 

Silence 

Do we just sit here in silence? 

We were talking and now we aren’t, is that okay? 

Silence 

Say something I’m giving up on you 

Maybe just smile? 

Look like you’re thinking of something to say? 

Or have found something reeeaaally interesting in the far distance that has your full attention 

Silence 

Is it weird now? 

Is it too late to talk? 

Silence 

Well this is kinda what you wanted… you would probably prefer to not talk 

Silence 

Okay, relax then 

But this isn’t relaxing, its uncomfortable 

Silence 

You wanted silence 

This is what you asked for 

Enjoy it 

Silence 

I mean they aren’t talking either  

Its not your responsibility to hold the conversation they can speak if they want to  

This is what you actually wanted so honor it 

Don’t do something you don’t want to do 

Commoonnnnn you got this 

Silence 

Yeeeeaa look at me go 

I’m a badass at Silence 

Silence 

Silence 

“Oh look a frog!” 

Its funny how we can want something so much and then when opportunity comes to have it we don’t know how to take it. The paradoxical condition of the human mind to want the opposite upon which it holds onto. 

What do we do when we get what we want? When we achieve what we set out to do?  

What happens when what we wanted doesn’t meet our expectations or the change feels too uncomfortable to get used to? How much do you really want what you want? 

I want to feel relaxed in the silence with others. I want to actively listen and allow the natural flow of conversation and silence. I want to honour what’s worth saying and what’s best left unsaid. I want to honour myself and others by speaking truth, love, understanding. I want to enjoy the beautiful connection of the energetic conversation without words that beautiful silence can bring. 

I am going to show you a little exercise here in conscious creating and the power of words here.. I will reframe the above statement and write it as it is already done. A gentle reminder that it all already exists and through my words I can bring it into my reality. Read both out loud and experience how they feel differently in your body. 

I am so happy and grateful to be able to honour and enjoy noble silence with others. I love actively listening and allowing the natural flow of conversation and silence. I am divinely guided in my ability to communicate truth, love and appreciation. I am blessed with the experience of energetic connection, of conversations without words and the bliss that silence brings. 

So let me tell you about the life changing journey I had in the silence last week 🙂 

Inner Walk 

I am letting go and allowing myself to flow through life increasingly. I trust that I am being divinely guided and am excited to see how my life unfolds for me. Less planning, more living.  

When I decided to set off to Koh Phangan and take a week off and I had a few intentions:

• Explore the retreats, workshops and offerings in the spiritual community 

• Take time out for myself, digital detox, integration 

• Decide if I want to move there 

Now back on Koh Tao, I am still taking in what an incredible, life changing week I have had. All I was looking for and more than I ever envisioned flowed my way. 

There are some experiences you know you were meant to have in life. Where everything lines up, makes sense and feels right. You follow, without question, without needing an explanation, knowing you are where you are supposed to be. Trusting with faith that this is part of your journey. 

For me, Inner Walk was one of those experiences. I had heard about it, briefly looked at it before heading out to Koh Phangan, as I had with many other workshops, trainings and retreats. I had heard good things but didn’t really know much about it other than it was a form of walking vipassana meditation. 

In a state of clarity and alignment I believe that everyone that comes into my reality is part of me, there to teach me something, show me something or pass on a message or guidance.  

When I went to Wonderland for my retreat, the first person who sat down to eat with me told me about how she would soon leave to go to do the inner walk. Two nights later, at a bonfire, a man started talking about living in flow and how he wanted to facilitate Inner Walk. He mentioned that it starting the following day and that we just had to ask reception to take us if we wanted to join. The next morning I woke up and knew I was going to go on the Inner Walk, I could miss the afternoon of my retreat as I was sure I would get something out of the one day. At the sharing circle after the first day of Inner walk I knew I was missing the rest of my retreat and completing the four-day Inner walk. 

Inner Walk is a silent four day, four hour vipassana walking meditation created by a Buddhist monk with the intention of carving out space for people to learn to be with themselves and their thoughts. In a world where we are addicted to stimulation, the practice allows time to go inwards and experience listening, observing and connecting with ourselves without distraction. Through the experience we are to learn how to “be here now”, understand suffering and how to release it. 

Rest in natural great peace 
This exhausted mind 
Beaten helplessly by karma and neurotic thoughts 
Like the relentless fury 
Of the pounding waves 
In the infinite ocean of samsara

… finding that rest, the comfort and ease to just—to let go, and just—to just naturally be

Then you see the mind just quietly settle, just like a glass of muddy water” 

 Nyoshül Khenpo Rinpoche

Like a glass of muddy water, if you don’t stir it and let it settle, the dirt will naturally fall to rest at the bottom. Such like the mind that if you just let it be and surrender, eventually the chaos falls away leaving a state I can only describe, from the experience, as gentle bliss. It can not be forced or encouraged, desired nor even thought about. It is a state that comes from experience, of acceptance and allowing. A practice of learning to listen to yourself, letting yourself be as you are and living in healthy harmony with your true nature. Being alone with your thoughts for four hours free to think whatever thoughts arise is an extremely enlightening quick fire way to become aware of yourself! 

So let me talk you through my inner walk.  

Without questions and safe in my knowing I had been guided to this experience, I arrived ready to walk. I love walking and have got through some of the toughest times in my life by putting one foot in front of the other, so I was intrigued as to what the practice would bring up for me. After a short talk we started to walk. You walk barefoot across a shala about 15m wide with an array of about 25 other human beings. Back and forth, back and forth for four straight hours. There is no clock, you are told when to start and when to stop. You walk in meditation, eyes to the ground in noble silence. You can take breaks when necessary and unlike other meditations you can let your mind flow freely.  

I loved my first day. It just felt like a nice way to take some time out for myself. On my personal journey learning to be at ease in the silence with others, I was so grateful to be sharing the space, walking in noble silence with twenty-something other humans, all also showing up for themselves. It is truly amazing how much you can feel others energy and grow bonds in the silence of the shared experience.  

Every day we had a sharing circle after the walk. As I shared, I mentioned jokily that I had noticed where the sun was going down enough that I knew it would be over soon and had been watching for the leaders to stand up and strike the gong ending the session. 

This was highlighted to me as control. Control is something I have an awareness of not having the healthiest relationship with, in the past. It’s something I thought I had mostly let go of, living my life increasingly in authentic flow. Little was I aware of just how deeply I was still clinging onto control in my life and how much harm it was causing me and my relationships with others. This then began my journey inwards uncovering the depth and design of my roots of control. 

We are told that we need to be cautious about how and with whom we spend out time outside of the walk as we are very open. When I arrive back to my retreat centre in the evening there is a last minute change to the schedule and we are offered a special session of ‘Energetic Cord Cutting of Relationships’. Believing in divine timing and figuring it would be a talk of some sort and interested to learn more, I went along.  

It was not a talk. It was a practical session where we going to release unresolved relationship dynamics in our life that caused us the most pain. We were told to pick a person, dead or alive, whom we had an unresolved relationship with. It didn’t have to be that we didn’t want to have a relationship with that person anymore, just that you didn’t want it to be as it was. It was recommended that if you weren’t clear to pick a parent, as these are source of most relationship dynamics anyway! 

In partners we were to take it in turns to sit energetically opposite the person in our chosen relationship and say all you had ever wanted to say completely unfiltered whilst your partner supported you with your emotions. We were guided through releasing all that had been unsaid in the relationship to facing your last words with them being on their deathbeds, from both yours and their sides. 

I ended up being the one person in the room without a partner and able to work through the process twice, so it was an easy choice to do both my parents. I say easy, this was not easy! It was the hardest option but one I knew would release the biggest weight from me and what I needed to do. 

There is no hiding from the fact that, for a lot of my life, I was enmeshed and intertwined in my parent’s relationship. Nor is there any hiding from the fact that I have chosen to physically remove myself from feeling obligated to be part of their unravelling over the past few years. For a while, I would have been the first to say that their separation was a good idea. The reality of it though is actually extremely painful; emotional and chaotic. In a very close family, where everyone was going through things in their own way, I have taken myself away to tiny paradise islands in the middle of nowhere to create physical space to get emotional space. And whilst I may dress running away up very beautifully, I cannot hide from the fact that the unknown of it all has been an uncomfortable space to sit in. 

So here I was, emotionally open, willing, able and being given a safe space to face the current states of our relationships. If not now, when? 

Heavy tears plopped down continuously as I balled my eyes out for the entire hour and a half session. I gave myself the space to truly grieve and honour that I was, and it was okay to be, upset about the situation. The most unexpected and upsetting realisation that I had however, I came to when facing the idea of both my parents dying. Living out the reality of my greatest fear in life, I felt peace. Peace that the chaos was over, peace that I didn’t have to worry about how I would deal with it anymore, peace that the exhausting dance of divorce was done. And I realised this was all about control. The situation is painful, I have not known how to deal with it or sit with it and I wanted it to end. That being out of control was worse for me than living out my greatest fear.  

This felt very dark and was a lot to get my head round. I walked heavily on the second day thinking about control, fear and eventually love. That love was truly at the centre of it all and the fear that true love, the unconditional one, leaves me so open to hurt that it feels easier to keep away from it though. But its not easier, it’s a weight of waiting for a greater pain and not living in the process. Carrying the weight of the future and the past in preparation for the future weightlifting that may come my way. 

On the third day I thought a lot about love. What love truly is, what it looks like as the true essence of the word without condition. Not as we know it that “I love you if…” or “..as long as you” but “I love you always and no matter what, in every context as love, pure love with a wide open heart. Full.” I realise and accept that love is probably my biggest fear, where I feel least safe and trust myself to see clearly the least. I emulate love and love sharing my love with others, I love watching other people’s love however, I’ve had far bigger walls than I even realised up around receiving it than I realised.  

Not wanting to withhold myself from receiving the one thing that I truly and most deeply want, out of fear, I started thinking about what I needed to move past it. 

Forgiveness came up. I drew a card from my deck that third night and it literally told me that forgiveness would set me free from my ancestral karma and that I needed to learn to work with my darkness. These are things again that I know, or thought I knew and thought I was done with. Released, moved on, next mission please! No.. here I am sitting with the lesson that I thought I learnt. The lesson that is here again asking me to truly, maybe one last time, maybe just a few more rounds to go, learn it. 

I find forgiveness a difficult concept because I feel out of control of how I pragmatically forgive things? How do you forgive yourself or others? It sits with me like the process of digesting my food. My body digests the food like my mind and heart forgive. I feel like it’s something I can aid by creating conditions, but can’t control the execution of. It’s never as simple as someone saying sorry and you saying I forgive you. At least not with the big stuff. It takes time, space and an intention to alleviate the weight that it bares.  

I’ve tried self hypnosis, listened to ho’oponopono every night whilst I sleep for months and there here I am, faced again with forgiveness. I journalled a lot in between days three and four. Allowing what was inside of me to come out and unravel on the page.  

“Why are you trying to be anything other than yourself? 

I arrive for my fourth and final day to the leader playing “I am, as I am” before he starts discussing the concept of forgiveness. Raw and open, the connection of my thoughts and dreams with the words he then spoke was very overwhelming for me. I believe very deeply that human beings can transmute thoughts between each other. I had thought about asking him what he thought about the concept of forgiveness before I arrived and thought I would let the day flow as it would. He then proceeded to directly address, all my thoughts and without prompt two of the biggest areas of pain needing forgiveness in my life. He had heard me in the silence.  

On this the final day as I went to walk, I couldn’t. I could feel the need for release of all the emotions and so I took myself to the side and let them all out. Part of the whole process is learning to listen to yourself, recognise when you are looking for distraction and honour when you truly need something. Eventually I made my way back to the walking space and began to walk. Our leader had talked about how forgiveness suggests there is something to forgive when in reality most people just aren’t aware and are simply misunderstandings. Everyone has their own story. We all have many stories to justify our ways of being or reasons for doing what we do. And so from this awareness that everyone has a story, we don’t really need to know what that story is. Everyone has their own unique “why”. If we understand that we don’t understand, and that others don’t understand, it helps to let go when misunderstandings will have lead to hurt. When you understand that someone didn’t understand then there is a lot more acceptance. I always remind myself that everyone is just doing the best they can with the tools they have available to them at any time. I am grateful for any experience in helping me to gain perspective and awareness. You can even go one step further and be grateful and appreciate the misunderstandings, their reasons why or what the learnings are for you on your journey. 

That’s why my key take away for the four days was  “Free the future from what the past didn’t understand” 

Because once you do understand then you can break the cycle, change the course for the future, free yourself and therefore by proxy the collective from weight and chaos of the past. If you don’t change, nothing changes. If I change my reaction to something from how I would have done in the past, then I am able to change the future. If I respond with Love rather than hurt, I can free myself from that hurt and move forward with Love. 

On my final walk, I walked without stopping. As I was, without judgement or control, in a gentle blissful trance, back and forth, back and forth allowing and in the flow. Not wanting it to end nor wishing it would last for ever. Enjoying the experience of this compassionate freedom and peace I had been taken to. A place that cant be described and can only be experienced.  

At the centre of any storm or cylone there is calm. Chaos flying all around and yet right in between it all, at the eye, is a place of stability and peace. At the centre of who you are, everything is easier. Ironic that so many of us spend so much effort trying to be things that we are not. Thinking what we are isn’t good enough or what we want to be. Thinking we will be “better if… or “when…”. The greatest gift I believe we can give the world is to be ourselves. In the great puzzle that is the universal common collective you can only find your place as the unique puzzle piece that you are, not as a duplicate.  

So if I want you to take anything away from this week, its this.

You are the best and only version of you in the whole entire universe. Your unique nature and perspective is a gift. Serve by being and sharing you authentically. 

Just as we are all unique, we all see the world differently and therefore that means sometimes we will misunderstand each other. Accept this and free the future from carrying the what the past didn’t understand. 

Experience. Experience is our greatest teacher. To learn and grow we must experience and that means we have to do hard things that scare us. But do it scared, and even terrified. But do it knowing that the only reason you feel so much fear is because of how much you want it. Love, freedom, magic only happen from outside of your comfort zone.