Life is a phenomenal experience and there are many facets to it. Some of us will prefer to create art, dance, read and write, do business, hike mountains and travel, and so on. The list is pretty endless!

In the search for the worthwhile, only turning to the inner-self can give an answer. It is where life brings us presence and joy, that it is most well lived. One can experience the oft-discussed flow state, a state of presence and absorption in an activity, in any of the examples above.

This tell us something — that life is lived at its fullest in a state of presence. One can passively take in, or actively channel, the full-spectrum of their experience; bodily energy and movements, thoughts, the outer environment, intuitions, and more.

To be in the thinking habit will tend to filter out and numb other impressions and senses that are available. One need not totally stop thinking, as that ability is not something we lose. We can just see that there is also a greater repertoire of experiencing tools that are on offer.

It will be the mind that gets in the way of this: for it has accumulated a great many emotionally-tinted impressions that shape the thought-scape within each of us. This scape is highly charged and repetitive in nature.

It may tell us that something cannot be done, that certain efforts are futile, whilst also offering protective thoughts that shield us from our own vulnerability. A vulnerability that is implicitly seen by it, as unacceptable.

In being present and experiencing greater gaps in-between thoughts, the question becomes ‘what am I when I am not the mind?’. It is up to each person to navigate this, but it certainly is not something lesser-than.

The soul and spirit are deliverers of peace, where the mind can only bring turbulence. This peace, this holistic flow, is experienced differently by each person, and it is at play regardless of whether one is absorbed in the mind or not.

The mind is a compartmentalized product of spirit, and yet a shield from it. One may take comfort in their house walls, but this house still came from, and is within, a wider beyond. This shielding function of mind is one to both cherish and be aware of.

Step out from this house, and know you can return to it. In doing so, the wider world of experiences will feel more and more like your home, and in doing this, the house too is expanded and transformed along the way.