A little over a year ago, I released out a limited-run podcast entitled, “Present.” The first of what would be eleven episodes released on March 29, about two weeks after so much of our normal routines and expectations were disrupted by the onset of the quickly spreading coronavirus. At the time, I described the episodes as “an impromptu podcast with the aim of helping us all slow down, reflect and choose each moment as we navigate life during a global pandemic.” A year later, I still find myself in need of habits and practices that help me to live intentionally in the present moment.
I recently picked up a book, one I’d heard about over the years but most recently heard it referenced on two podcasts, one of those during a conversation with NBA coach Steve Kerr and NFL coach Pete Carroll.
The book is called The Inner Game of Tennis by Timothy Gallwey.
Written in the 70s, it’s something of a cult classic, not only among professional athletes but for anyone looking to maximize performance and focus in any field. Really, any field. It’s simultaneously about tennis and not about tennis at all. I’m very intentionally working my way through it right now.
Gallwey, years after the book was published, began to take The Inner Game philosophy to a wide variety of industries and organizations. Gallway, someone with zero musical ability or training, once coached a trained tuba player in a top-tier symphony to overcome a performance issue he had been struggling with for some time. The coaching session took two minutes, was in front of the full, skeptical symphony, and astonished every single person in the room with almost instantaneous results.
Just a few pages in, I’ve been underlining and taking notes, soaking up what feels like deep insight and common sense all at the same time.
"For most of us, quieting the mind is a gradual process involving the learning of several inner skills. These inner skills are really arts of forgetting mental habits acquired since we were children.
The first skill to learn is the art of letting go the human inclination to judge ourselves and our performance as either good or bad. Letting go of the judging process is a basic key to the Inner Game....When we unlearn how to be judgmental, it is possible to achieve spontaneous, focused play."
Does that sound like a tennis lesson to you? Yeah, me either. Even though the examples largely center on tennis (so far, at least), the transferability of the Inner Game mindset is almost effortless.
Judgment results in tightness, and tightness interferes with the fluidity required for accurate and quick movement. Relaxation producs smooth strokes and results from accepting your strokes as they are, even if erratic.”
Here in 2021, as the vaccine reaches more and more people, you can almost feel the anticipatory leaning in of the masses, eager to ramp back up to full-speed “normal” life. There is undoubtedly a growing relief in places where the vaccine is reaching significant numbers, like here in Indiana here an estimated 70% of people over the age of 65 have already received it.
Yet it also feels uneven, precarious, halting at times. The relaxing of public health mandates, churches opening back up, public gatherings growing in size and frequency—it can feel for some like a constant evaluation of “what’s the right thing to do?” What’s practical? What’s wise? How have things really changed? Even within friendship circles, let alone all of society, there is uneven progress of vaccination and social comfort. I’ve heard many people, personally and professionally, admit that opening back up feels so much hard than in some ways than shutting things down and sheltering at home did in the beginning.
Contradictions abound.
In my own life, I find myself seriously considering big summer vacations in heavily-visited places while also timidly wondering if our family should attend coffee and donuts before Easter church services next Sunday morning. I can’t always explain my rationale, nor is my measuring of what is safe and good consistent.
And so I come back to the wisdom of staying present to this moment, imperfectly and in fits-and-starts. “What’s the right thing to do?” isn’t a very helpful question for me. It implies a perfect plan, an ideal flow of information, unassailable logic. Even if those things existed, I have little in my own personal experience to convince me that I’d be able to find them.
And so I come back to the idea of moving past judgment, past the dualistic “right and wrong” mindset that creates the tightness The Inner Game describes. There are times when right and wrong apply, to be sure. But it’s probably less often that we have grown to think.
Richard Rohr also describes this tension of contradictions and guides me toward letting go of the need for certainty, conformity, and judgment.
The source of spiritual wisdom is to hold questions and contradictions patiently, much more than to find quick certitudes, to rush to closure or judgment, as the ego and dualistic mind want to do. The ego wants to know it is right. It wants to stand on its own self-created solid ground—not the mysterious solid ground of the abyss. This is why so much religion remains immature and is a hiding place for many “control freaks” instead of people trained in giving up control to a Loving Presence.
[Nondualistic] consciousness will teach us how to actually experience our experiences, whether good, bad, or ugly, and how to let them transform us.
Being transformed by the present moment is what I’m learning to trust. As I’ve written before, perhaps gratitude is about remaining open and letting all of life transform us—not just the good and easy and obvious things. I believe we can most readily do that, not by replaying the past or perfectly anticipating the future, but by staying mindful and awake in this moment, where we can find a smoothness, an easiness, a lightness of being.
Links to Check Out
The Empty Religions of Instagram. “…our purpose is not to optimize our one wild and precious life.”
Deb Haaland confirmed as the first Native American Cabinet Member. “…[she] brings an entirely new approach to her role, one with deep knowledge and connection to issues concerning Indigenous affairs and environmental protection.”
What Helps, Not Hinders. “…feedback is a crucial mechanism, because our relational dynamics matter.”
A Twitter thread detailing the racist art hanging on the wall behind Georgia’s Governor while he signed into law their 21st century Jim Crow laws aimed at suppressing voters by making it a crime to give food or water to people in line, limits early voting, limits dropboxes, and gives that state more control over local election offices.
Families of victims in Atlanta spa shootings trying to make sense of tragedy. It’s important to honor the lives of those killed in recent Atlanta shootings.
Podcasts
Work Life: Taken for Granted: Daniel Kahneman Doesn’t Trust Your Intuition
Kahneman is a seminal thinker about, well, thinking and decision-making. So many quotable and insightful parts of this conversation.
Work Life: Taken for Granted: Malcolm Gladwell Questions Everything
I would listen to these two talk about anything together. Fun, thought-provoking, insightful, challenging.
Dare to Lead: Emily and Amelia Nagoksi on Burnout and How to Complete the Stress Cycle
If you feel fatigued, tired, up against a wall, or burnt out, this is a must-listen. Plenty of nerdy details about stress and burnout, but practical and action-oriented, too.
How to Save a Planet: Recycling! Is it BS?
This was an eye-opening episode, especially on what is ACTUALLY recyclable versus what we are told is recyclable. Great information to learn and share with others.