Photo by Sami Matias Breilin on Unsplash
“I have arrived, I am home.”
~~ Thich Nhat Hanh
Greetings to all my precious people!!
We have cleared physical space. We have released ancestral patterns.
Now we arrive at the most persistent layer of homecoming: the mental clutter.
The planning. The strategizing. The constant need to figure it out, know what’s next, have all the answers. The 3am thought loops. The voice that says you’re not doing enough, being enough, achieving enough.
The noise.
We live in a culture designed to keep you mentally occupied. Distracted. Scrolling. Consuming information. Comparing. Planning. Optimizing.
But your soul is trying to speak. And it can’t be heard over the noise.
This week, as we approach Thanksgiving in the US – a time traditionally about gratitude and gathering – I want to invite you into something countercultural:
The practice of sacred not-knowing. Of creating mental space. Of coming home to the quiet.
The Tyranny of Constant Knowing
Somewhere along the way – perhaps through education, perhaps through capitalism’s demands for productivity – we learned that not knowing is weakness. That uncertainty is failure. That we should ALWAYS have a plan, a strategy, an answer.
This is exhausting. And it’s a lie.
Thich Nhat Hanh, the Vietnamese Buddhist monk and peace activist, spent his life teaching one essential truth: “I have arrived, I am home.”
Not “I will arrive when I figure it all out.”
Not “I will be home once I achieve my goals.”
But “I have ALREADY arrived. I am ALREADY home. Right here. Right now. In this present moment.”
The only thing standing between you and this homecoming is the mental noise that tells you otherwise.
The voice that says:
- “You should know what’s next by now”
- “Other people have it figured out”
- “If you just plan better, work harder, strategize more…”
- “There’s something wrong with you for not knowing”
This voice is not your wisdom. It’s your conditioning.
What Chinese Medicine Teaches About the Mind
In Classical Chinese Medicine, we understand the mind (Shen) as residing in the Heart, not the head.
When your Heart-Mind is clear and settled, you experience:
- Presence (here now, not lost in past or future)
- Clarity (able to see what’s true)
- Peace (even amidst uncertainty)
- Connection (to yourself, others, the sacred)
When your Heart-Mind is scattered or disturbed, you experience:
- Anxiety (constant worry, racing thoughts)
- Confusion (unable to access your deeper knowing)
- Insomnia (the mind won’t quiet)
- Disconnection (from your body, your intuition, what matters)
Mental clutter scatters Shen. It fragments your spirit. It makes it impossible to hear the quiet voice of wisdom that lives beneath the noise.
And our culture? Our culture PROFITS from scattered Shen. From your distraction. From your constant consumption of information, products, solutions to problems you didn’t know you had until someone told you.
Coming home to the quiet is an act of rebellion.
The Season of Incubation Requires Silence
We are transitioning from Metal season into Water season – from autumn’s letting go into winter’s deep rest. Water is the element of:
- Stillness (frozen lakes, slow underground rivers)
- Darkness (the longest nights of the year)
- Mystery (what germinates in soil we cannot see)
- Trust (that life continues even when we can’t perceive it)
Water season demands that we STOP KNOWING and START TRUSTING.
Seeds don’t germinate because you dig them up to check on them. They germinate because you leave them in the dark, quiet soil and TRUST the process.
Your life is the same.
The answers you’re seeking? They won’t come through more thinking, more planning, more mental effort.
They will come through the quiet. Through the not-knowing. Through creating space for deeper wisdom to rise.
This Week’s Practice: The Pilgrimage to Silence
This is not a quick fix. This is a practice of returning – again and again – to the quiet beneath the noise.
Daily Micro-Practice (5 minutes):
Choose one time each day – morning, midday, or evening. Set a timer for 5 minutes.
Sit. Be still. Do nothing.
No meditation app. No guided visualization. No music. Just YOU and SILENCE.
When thoughts arise (and they will – incessantly at first):
- Don’t fight them
- Don’t engage with them
- Simply notice: “Ah, thinking.”
- Return your attention to your breath, to sounds around you, to the sensation of your body
That’s it. Five minutes of practicing not-knowing. Not-doing. Just BEING.
Do this every day this week. Notice what shifts.
Weekly Deeper Practice (1-2 hours):
Once this week, create an intentional “pilgrimage to silence.” This is time set apart, made sacred by your attention.
Options:
Silent Nature Walk
Walk in nature for an hour with NO phone, NO earbuds, NO agenda. Just walk. Notice. Breathe. Let the natural world teach you about presence.
Contemplative Sitting
Find a comfortable spot. Light a candle. Sit for 30-60 minutes in silence. You might journal. You might just sit. You might weep or laugh or feel nothing. All of it is valid. The point is: you’re not DOING anything. You’re BEING.
Sacred Nap
Rest. Not scrolling-in-bed rest. ACTUAL rest. Lie down in the middle of the day. Close your eyes. Let go. Trust that the world will continue without your mental effort for 30 minutes.
Digital Sabbath
Choose 24 hours this week (or even 12) where you turn OFF all devices. No phone. No computer. No TV. Just you, your body, the present moment. Read. Cook. Walk. Sit. Be bored. Let the quiet come.
Thanksgiving Practice (if you celebrate):
Thanksgiving offers a perfect opportunity for sacred silence amidst the chaos.
Before the meal, suggest this:
- Everyone sits in silence for 2 minutes
- Place hands on heart
- Each person silently acknowledges what they’re grateful for (not sharing aloud – this is internal)
- End with a simple “Thank you” spoken together
Watch what happens when you invite silence into a typically noisy gathering.
What Arises in the Quiet
Here’s what many women discover when they finally create mental space:
At first: Discomfort. Restlessness. The urge to DO something, CHECK something, FIX something.
Then: Deeper feelings that have been buried beneath the noise. Grief. Anger. Loneliness. These need to be felt, not thought about.
Eventually: Clarity. Not loud clarity – but quiet knowing. A sense of what’s true. A recognition of what matters. A remembering of who you are beneath the mental chatter.
This is your wisdom.
It was there all along. You just couldn’t hear it over the noise.
Kaira Jewel Lingo, a Dharma teacher in Thich Nhat Hanh’s tradition, writes about “coming home to ourselves” through mindfulness. She teaches that when we’re lost in mental noise, it’s as if we’ve left our house. We’re not present in our own lives.
But we can always return. The house – your true home – is always waiting.
Your breath is the doorway home.
Your body is the doorway home.
The present moment is the doorway home.
You don’t need to figure anything out. You just need to come back.
“I have arrived. I am home.”
The Deeper Truth About Not-Knowing
Our culture tells us that not-knowing is weakness. That uncertainty is failure.
But wisdom traditions tell us the opposite: Not-knowing is the ground of true wisdom.
The mystics call it “beginner’s mind.”
The Daoists call it “Wu Wei” – effortless action that arises from emptiness, not force.
The Buddhists call it “don’t-know mind” – the place before concepts, before grasping.
When you practice not-knowing, you create space for something deeper to emerge.
Not answers from your conditioned mind. But knowing from your unconditioned wisdom.
This is the homecoming: returning to the part of you that already knows. The part that doesn’t need to figure it all out because it trusts the unfolding.
Walking This Path of Quiet
If this practice calls to you – if you recognize that your mind has been running you, if you’re exhausted by the constant noise, if you’re ready to come home to the quiet – know that this is learnable.
This is what I help women practice through the C.O.A.C.H. Method:
Curiosity instead of judgment
Optimism (trusting the process, even when you can’t see it)
Awareness (presence in the body, the moment)
Courage (to feel what’s been buried beneath the noise)
Healing (integration of body-mind-spirit)
I have space for 1:1 work beginning in December. If you feel called, let’s talk. Email me directly.
For now: practice the quiet. Five minutes a day. One longer practice this week.
Come home to yourself. You’ve already arrived.
P.S. Next week, our final November newsletter: Spiritual Homecoming – returning to the soul that arrived here, before all the conditioning. This is where everything we’ve cleared makes space for what wants to emerge in December.
“Close your eyes and follow your breath
to the still place that leads to the
invisible path that leads you Home.”
~~ St. Theresa of Avila
