Unlike the first month of my sabbatical, month two ended up being the epitome of what I wanted from my time off. I sought the human BEing side of myself, while trying to let go of the human DOing for a bit.
Disclaimer: I’m a left-brained, science and productivity-focused engineer, who dove into trying to get closer to my feelings and the present moment. A few months ago me would have been uncomfortable with what you’re about to read.
This month was the most progress I feel I’ve ever made towards the cliché of “finding myself”. It’s not that I found anything new, it’s that I felt I was able to more clearly see what was going on in my mind. I could see many of my fears with a clarity that made me feel they couldn’t control me. I was able to see the root of some negative behavioral patterns I have, which is helping me prevent them. It’s not that I fully cracked the meaning of life, my heart’s desires, and all that (the next couple of months of sabbatical proved that!), but I finished the month feeling like I had taken a big step deeper on the “journey inwards”.
What was I doing?
Eva (my partner) and I were in Spain for a month, mostly spending time near where she grew up at a place on the coast. She was working during the week, so I had a lot of time to myself. I stuck to the morning routine that I had built up in month one–journal on gratitude, exercise (sometimes including an end-of-run dive in the sea!), meditate, then eat breakfast without distractions. Well…unless you count this beautiful view as a distraction:
The fundamental intention I had was to be present with everything I did. I have a tendency to spend too much time unintentionally drifting off to the future, rather than giving “now” my full attention. Now is all there ever really is, so it’s crazy to spend so much of my time planning and thinking about the future, if when I finally arrive to that future I’m not even showing up for it!
What this looked like was basically bringing meditation techniques to life, something that I’m rarely aware or focused enough to do. For me, the point of meditation isn’t actually to be present. It is to gently try to be present, fail, realize you drifted, gently come back to the present, then repeat. There is immense value in learning to realize you’ve drifted because you’re training yourself to return to the present. There is also immense value in the moment you realize you’ve drifted because that is the moment you can clearly see the thought that pulled you out of the present moment–you’ve just witnessed how your mind works and gotten to know it better.
I basically turned a lot of my time alone into meditation, but rather than coming back to the breath every time I drifted, I came back to the world around me. When I was running, I sought to be aware of my body, my movement, and my surroundings. When I swam, I lightly focused on imitating the fish and feeling the cold water with curiosity. When you are able to fully bring yourself into the present moment, the world around you is already amazing. I didn’t need to chase something interesting enough to jerk myself into the present because I was already interested enough to do it myself. Alright…I’ll chill with the philosophy and tell you some of the random things I did.
When hiking, after a little pre-research, I put away AllTrails (for the most part) and tried to feel which way I wanted to go at each fork. Tuning into those feelings was interesting, but the most valuable and surprising thing that came out of it was that by accepting I wouldn’t end up at any particular target, I lost a focus on “destination” that I hadn’t realized how tightly I held onto. Because there was no specific goal, I saw the world around me with a different lens. I saw colorful butterflies and playful birds that I had always missed as I was intently following the correct trail to get to the spectacular gorge that would be worthy of my attention. Instead, I felt like the whole forest was filled with these incredible and intricate beings called trees, which I couldn’t believe were the same trees I had been seeing all of my life. I looked closely at them and felt spontaneous curiosity about the complex shapes they had grown into in their search for sun. I looked closer and saw the patterns of their bark and the lines of ants crawling on them. I even had moments where I felt the desire to hug them — something I had always made fun of Eva for doing. I have never been someone that felt connected to nature, but my month in Spain brought me so many moments of awe that I now feel deeply reverent. If you’ve never felt like hugging a tree, then you need a sabbatical!
I had always believed in journey over destination, but removing the destination in my hikes opened up such a different world to me, that it exposed how little the intellectual believing translated to my lived experience. It makes me feel that there’s something there for me to learn about approaching life. By learn, I don’t mean “intellectually believe in a phrase like journey over destination”, but to actually feel it in the life I’m living. I recently heard a quote from Alan Watts (on this Slo Mo episode) that I think might capture what I’m trying to feel:
We thought of life by analogy with a journey, a pilgrimage, which had a serious purpose at the end, and the thing was to get to that end, success or whatever it is, maybe heaven after you’re dead. But we missed the point the whole way along. It was a musical thing and you were supposed to sing or to dance while the music was being played. — Alan Watts
You don’t rush through a song just to get to the end, because the end isn’t a destination, it’s not the goal. Life doesn’t have a destination. We must play. (ok, I lied about stopping with the philosophy)
I felt like I had personal “break-throughs” in a few other areas, but this post will never end (or get published) if I go into the same level of detail. Here is the quick(er) hitting list of the things I did that led to insights that felt “profound”. Keep in mind that a big part of why they helped me was the state of mind I was in at the time (your mileage will vary and be unique to you).
- I went on a self-guided silent retreat weekend in the mountains. No talking, no phone, no reading. Just focusing on trying to be present. This time in “silence” must have been the loudest my mind has ever seemed. During the latter part of my five hours of meditation on Saturday evening, I felt a few “realizations” that have stuck with me, in particular, realizing that the “connecting with nature” and “letting go of destination” concepts that were blowing my mind were actually things Eva had in many ways been living in front of me for years. It was humbling to see that rather than seek to understand her approaches and learn, I had mostly dismissed them as childish and even often found them annoying. I felt sad that despite thinking of myself as open-minded, I wasn’t being open to the lessons the person closest to me could share. Just because someone isn’t the Dalai Lama or a best-selling author, doesn’t mean they don’t have a lot they can teach you. On a more positive note, my time spent at a waterfall at the end of the retreat was the most intense connection with nature I’ve ever felt.
- A few days later, I did this weird “undress your ego” exercise from Chapter 4 of Solve for Happy. I’m not sure there was anything about it that I hadn’t heard before, but as I sat on the bed of a hot, tiny, Barcelona hostel room, I felt like I caught a glimpse of the “me” under many layers of ego/identity. It felt like a “me” that has been there for as long as I can remember. It was more of a feeling than anything else, but the feeling was what I imagine a small, silent baby looking around at the world with wide, curious eyes feels. It’s possible I just imagined an experience that I had been reading and hearing about from others, but that glimpse felt very “true” to me and since then I’ve felt able to access a similar place in particularly still moments. A big part of me wants to leave this part out because I’ve already had several people semi-sarcastically asking me if I “found myself”. I’m pretty sure that’s my ego though, so I’m trying to let it go! I don’t want to over glorify what happened because I’m not suddenly free of my ego and awakened to my heart’s desire, but did I find myself? I think I caught a glimpse, you bastards 😜
I walked into month two with the intent to “go deeply” into myself. The unintended side-effect was that Eva and I connected more deeply than perhaps we ever have — despite the fact that we mostly spoke in my broken Spanish as she helped me in a self-guided “immersion”. After she was done working, “how was your day” on our walks or during our meals turned into deep discussions about the ideas I was pondering and how they might fit into our lives. Given that the topics were deeply personal in nature, I felt like I was shining a light for her on a vulnerable part of myself and being completely accepted without judgment. In the Who are You? chapter of Solve for Happy, Mo says:
…the reason trying to get others’ approval will always fail is because they won’t be approving of you. They’ll be approving of your persona…And you’ll feel it. You’ll feel, deep down inside, that your effort was spent to gain praise for someone else. It’ll make the victory feel empty and make you feel that the real you isn’t worthy…Find those who like the real you and invite them closer.
Spending time pondering the “real me” gave me the awareness to invite Eva closer. Writing this post is an invitation to you, the reader, to come closer. Let’s humbly talk about our search for meaning and happiness, our struggle with fears and frustrations, and our dreams for the future. We might not find THE answers, but we will have shared a deeper connection, which in itself must be a step in the right direction. Thank you for reading and taking a step closer. ❤
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