Day 201: You Don’t Need to Force the Answer
I sat down this morning and for the first time, I didn't know what to write about.
That doesn't happen very often.
Usually something from my spiritual practice, something that happened the day before, or some small moment in my life starts tugging at me.
A sentence. A feeling. A realization.
Something that wants to be explored.
Today, there was nothing obvious.
Just me sitting here, wondering what wanted to come through.
The things I thought of were thoughts that I could have written a paragraph on, but not an email, or they were big philosophical things that were too much for an email.
I was feeling a little bit like Goldilocks, but not landing on that 'just right' topic.
And because we are starting to talk more about living a self-led life, I'll go with that.
Self-leadership doesn't always look like making a bold decision or setting a clear boundary.
Sometimes it's about small decisions and choices.
And sometimes it looks like not forcing the answer before it's ready. Just sitting in the middle of something.
Waiting for a new perspective, waiting for an answer, waiting for the best way to tell people about a major decision you're making.
That is not always easy for me.
I've spent a lot of my life focused on being able to figure things out. To find the angle. To solve the problem. To sense what someone needed and offer it before they even asked.
That can be a gift.
It can also become a habit of pushing past the quiet.
There is a difference between being guided and trying to produce something because you think you should already know.
That's what I noticed this morning.
The old part of me wanted to look for something useful and meaningful. Something that could become an email.
But another part of me, the part I trust more now, said to just sit here for a minute.
I'd already been sitting for about 5 minutes, which is a long time for me. Things to write about usually start to come forward before I even finish what brought it up.
So, I'm telling myself to sit. One more minute.
Don't rush it or reach for something that isn't there.
Don't turn this into a problem.
That feels like self-leadership too.
Learning to notice when the ego wants to perform and when the soul wants to wait.
The ego gets uncomfortable with blank space.
It wants certainty, productivity, usefulness, and proof that we're doing enough.
The soul isn't in a hurry. It knows that quiet is not empty.
Stillness has its own intelligence.
Not knowing is sometimes the place where the next true thing begins to form.
Eastern philosophies call it beginner's mind or empty mind.
I've had enough experiences now to know that when I try to force clarity, I usually get a version of the answer that sounds reasonable but doesn't feel fully aligned.
And when I wait, even briefly, something more honest rises.
Not always something dramatic or profound.
Sometimes it's just the next sentence.
Or the simple recognition that I don't need to make something happen in order to trust that something is happening.
That's a big shift.
For so long, many of us were trained to override the quiet.
Keep moving.
Keep producing.
Keep explaining.
Keep proving.
Keep being useful.
And that is so completely exhausting. And yet that's the hamster wheel so many of us are on.
Friday, something was wrong with the video editor I use. And because I had the A/C on, I had to clean it up with studio sound before I could post it.
I uploaded it 4 different times and it kept messing up my video.
I had a choice of rerecording it, and at the end of the day, I just didn't have the energy to do that, or not post at all.
I felt so much guilt about not posting, breaking my word to myself, knowing that my views would go down to zero, and I'd be starting over and have to build views again because the algorithm is so fickle.
So my ego mind said, "you know, you've been working so much and numbers are down anyway, why don't you take a break from short form for a few days."
So, I didn't post all weekend.
What your soul wants and what your ego mind wants can be very different.
But sometimes, once the drama settles, they are pointing to the same thing from different directions. I had been working too hard. Taking one small thing off my plate for a few days was a good idea and I was willing to live with the algorithm drop.
Living from the soul instead of the ego asks something different of us.
It asks us to listen before we act.
To pause before we answer.
To feel before we decide.
To trust the inner guidance that doesn't always arrive as a loud instruction.
It arrives as a soft no or a quiet yes, without the urgency.
And sometimes as a blank page that says, "Stay with me. Don't abandon yourself just because you don't have an answer yet."
That is what I'm practicing today.
Not forcing, pushing through, or trying to turn the quiet into something more impressive than it is.
Just noticing that I can sit here without knowing and still be led.
That feels like a different kind of strength.
The strength of staying present and not letting discomfort make the decision.
The strength of trusting that when the next step is ready, I'll know.
Today's Gentle Practice
Think about one place in your life where you are trying to force an answer.
Ask yourself:
What would happen if I stopped making this a problem for just one breath?
You don't have to solve it today.
You don't have to know the whole path.
Just give yourself a moment to sit with the quiet and see what rises when you stop pushing.
With you,
Lynn
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