Last week, I finished a long term project and milestone at the NGO I work. Our NGO had a week-long celebration of its 100th anniversary. A team effort that took more than a year to prepare with very few resources. The week was very successful and inspiring, and I was happy to be able to contribute to a huge team effort involving a global network. Nevertheless, it was not an easy week: I had to step out of my comfort zone, deal with small frustrations and afterwards digest many thoughts racing through my head. At the end of the week, I felt exhausted and a bit down, so I had to find myself again.
When I am at a loss, I turn to friends I can trust, and try to find comfort in meditation and spiritual podcasts and learning. This time I dived a bit deeper into Eckhart Tolle’s learnings.
Listening to Eckhart Tolle is not always easy as he uses many different terms to talk about ‘Our invisible essence’ such as form identity, fictitious identity, service identity, ego, life situation and deeper self. In a podcast with Tony Robbins on Finding Your Identity, Meaning & Purpose in Life, he spoke about a person’s horizontal and vertical dimension, and that was easier for me to grasp.
Your horizontal dimension refers to your story, or better, the story you are telling yourself and others. Your horizontal dimension is influenced by your life situation which is composed by your health, finances, home, personal situation, traumas you had and on top of that a stream of unconscious thinking and thoughts in relationship to your life situation, mainly negative. These negative thoughts, if not controlled, can have a negative impact on your emotions and ultimately your actions. Sometimes people become so consumed with their life situation that they lose themselves in it. Their life has been reduced to their horizontal dimension and nothing more.
To live fully, the challenge is to find your vertical dimension, in other words your deeper self.
Who are you behind the narrative in your mind?
Who are you when you let go of negative thoughts?
Who are you when you listen to yourself? When you sit with yourself?
You can only find yourself when you sit in the present as according to Eckhart Tolle, life is only now, not in the past nor in the future. Being mindful in your day-to-day life and fully present with your five senses are the first steps.
As a coach, I recognise these two dimensions very well. When clients open up to me during the first coaching sessions, they refer to their horizontal dimension; they talk about their life experiences and everything what is going on in their head, they tell their life story and what they are used to telling when people ask to introduce themselves. However, they have approached a coach because they go through transition, they struggle, and they are not fully satisfied. Maybe, they want to find a better life work balance or live life in line with their values and passion.
Coaching is a useful tool that can help you to recognise who you really are by taking a step back and looking at yourself from the outside. Coaching helps you to question your negative thoughts, fears and belief systems. Taking time for coaching means you are taking time for yourself, stepping out of your life situation to explore your deeper self and go beyond.
As for me, after the eventful week, I took time to sit with my self, I wrote down my thoughts, so I could let go. I calmed my mind by knitting while listening to music. Finally, I found myself again and more important, my values and power!
If you want to find out more about Eckhart Tolle’s insights and practices, I strongly suggest to check out his website, https://eckharttolle.com/.
Finally, if you are consumed by your daily life situation, and you want to step out of it to explore who you really are, do not hesitate to contact me at fanny@changewithme.org.
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