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So you find it easier to be at peace in your free time.
But then you go back to work, and it seems like everything there pushes you into stress or pulls you into anxiety.
- Your boss makes unreasonable demands, you feel obligated to comply.
- Your colleagues invite you to drinks, you feel pressure to fit in.
- Your clients overstep boundaries, you feel afraid to be firm.
And inwardly, all of this feels very different to when you’re sitting at home in meditation.
But it doesn’t have to…
This difference you experience is a problem because you’re not meditating so you can be at peace only while meditating. If that were the game then victory would be divorcing your family, exiling yourself from society and sitting full lotus in a cave 24/7.
There, you’re no good to anyone but yourself.
But in 2025, society needs peaceful, balanced, wise individuals more than ever.
The real reason to meditate is for mutual benefit.
First, you ditch your own mental/emotional baggage.
Then you have hands free to help others.
Now your ability to help is enormous.
From here, your worldly goals take care of themselves. What is good work or business if not helping people in some way?
But again, if that freedom is only known to you while you’re sat at home or on retreat, it’s of no value.
You may have found that after meditating enough, the benefits have “leaked” into daily life.
This is good.
But you can do better.
What if you stopped waiting for the benefits of your practice to show up in your life by accident…
And instead made your whole life your practice?
What if instead of striving to develop virtuous qualities in effortful meditation, you instead recognized that these virtuous qualities are your default mode?
I know, I know: add this to the list of things I say that sound too good to be true. When I first heard it, I certainly didn’t believe it. But neither could I ignore it. Eventually, I considered that I had two choices:
- Keep trying to whip myself into shape with various spiritual techniques, one after another, potentially for the rest of my life, hoping one would finally “enlighten me”
- Drop techniques altogether, as recommended by a small group of sophisticated teachers, and see if it led to the freedom they promised
Reasoning this out, it became clear that option 2 would be quicker to confirm or deny. Because option 1 involved more teachings and practices than I could possibly explore in one lifetime.
Option 2 was enticingly simple:
Stop.
Let go.
Relax, in the deepest sense of the word.
Abandon all ideas about Awakening and rest as the space in which ideas occur.
As I explored this, I fell in love with two things about it:
- It was delightfully easy compared with the dozens of other practices I’d worked with.
- It was truly unconditional: I could practice it anytime, anywhere—whether I was stressed or calm; dull or alert; sad or happy.
See, this isn’t really a “practice”. It isn’t about changing anything but, rather, recognizing everything as it is. In that recognition, we see that nothing has the ability to affect who we really are: that “always-on” awareness that has never been harmed by anything that occurs within it.
In being stressed, we’re aware of stress.
In the passing of stress, we’re aware of the passing.
In the absence of stress, we’re aware of the absence.
That said, most people in 2025 don’t experience much of that absence. There’s always something new to replace what came before: an endless stream of stresses and gratifications. We come to think that something is wrong if we’re without those two; we’re addicted to stimulation.
But behind, beneath, within and throughout all of it is awareness.
We would not experience stress if not for awareness; we would not experience gratification if not for awareness. This is what I and other teachers of nonduality mean when we say everyone is already enlightened. There is no way to not be aware! And this awareness perceives everything with perfect clarity. It is only due to lack of recognition that people suffer.
Without this recognition, we interpret things rather than seeing them as they are.
Without this recognition, we reify things and take them to be able to harm us.
Without this recognition, we reject things and wish they were different—including ourselves.
But in a moment of deep recognition, we stop running the mental/emotional processes that make all of this possible—for a moment. And that truly is all they are! Ancient teachers of nonduality knew this, and now we’ve confirmed it with scientific measurement.
Stress is optional; anxiety is optional; suffering is optional.
This doesn’t mean that if you have trauma you should be able to hit some magical “delete” button and erase it from your memory forever in a single flourish. I’m just explaining the mechanics. This is intended to be empowering, not dismissive.
It means that, for a brief moment, you can stop the narratives around what is occurring and simply allow it to come and go—as is its nature.
Then you can stop for another brief moment.
Then another.
The narrative will start up again.
You can let it go again.
This is an invitation, not a standard.
Perhaps all you can do the next time stress arises is hold it just one percent less tightly.
Excellent!
Now, again.
And again.
Do this a thousand times, and perhaps you’ll be able to hold two percent less tightly.
Look right at your stress, recognize the aware space in which it occurs, and watch it come and go without your needing to do anything to it directly.
If you really need convincing, just try keeping it exactly the same for 30 seconds.
It can’t be done.
It’s constantly vibrating, shifting, morphing.
You might lump together a constellation of sensations and call them “stress”, but this is an example of the pitfall of attributing labels to things.
Look closely and appreciate the ever-shifting, high-resolution nature of experience.
Then appreciate the stable awareness that is the essence of it all.
If you need to do this at home without distraction at first, that’s okay. Just don’t make the mistake of trying to change anything by applying effort.
Once you’re comfortable, bring this practice of non-meditation out on a walk, then out in public, then into conversation.
And finally, into everything you do without exception.
Be at rest in the presence of all experience.
When labels, stress or trauma arise, look right at these the same as you would a painting, a bird, a cloud formation.
Awareness is the basis of them all.
That is what you are.
How could you be that which comes and goes?
Who are you in its absence?
The more you explore my recommendation, the more familiar you become with your true nature; the more evidence you gain for this being the resolution of your suffering.
I made a full guide to non-meditation—and a guided practice—that you can use as support.
And if you want to know where you stand in this whole picture, take my 1-minute quiz.
I’ll be back with another reminder soon.
With love from my sofa,
Dan 💙
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