At 11:00 am, just four hours before I was supposed to give a TEDx talk, I couldn’t remember my lines.
I was rehearsing, ready to give the most important talk of my life, and after the third line into the talk, my mind would go blank. The words, drowned deep down inside me, just couldn’t make their way to my mouth. I tried three times and failed each time. I heard myself thinking, Maybe I should gracefully bow out and give this talk when I am better prepared.
The irony wasn’t lost on me. What I was experiencing was exactly what my talk was about: “Returning to the Field Within: How to Be Mindful When It Matters Most.” Before acting on my impulse to back out from this opportunity, I decided to pause and follow my own advice to practice three mindful steps to return to my field of non-judging awareness.
Has this ever happened to you—right before you’re about to give a presentation or go for an important meeting, and your mind goes blank? What did you do in that situation?
When we’re mindful, we return to a spacious mind that is open to a sense of awe and endless possibilities.
Hundreds of clients’ experiences (and my personal experience) confirm that it’s challenging to be mindful outside of our meditation practice, especially in situations that push us out of our comfort zone like a contentious conversation, solving a complex problem, or giving a TEDx talk. By “mindful,” I am referring to our innate capacity to be present, open-minded, and intentional about our actions. Sometimes, it’s hard to know what mindfulness feels like, and the metaphor of a wide-open field can remind us: When we’re mindful, we return to a spacious mind that is open to a sense of awe and endless possibilities. Rumi’s famous quote from the poem, “The Great Wagon,” speaks to this field within:
Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing,
there’s a field. I’ll meet you there.
In critical moments, especially when we lack the resources to deal with challenging situations, we revert to default ways of reacting—like getting defensive, aggressive, or shutting down—that don’t offer the best outcomes. How can we return to our field within in the middle of challenges? There are three steps in a mindfulness practice that can empower us to show up intentionally and lovingly, even when we’re feeling terrible.
How I Returned to My Field Within
When we think of a mindfulness practice, the first thing that probably comes to mind is meditation. That is an essential step in any mindfulness practice, but there are two other steps that are easy to miss—contemplation and skillful actions.
In my mindfulness practice, especially when I am feeling stuck, I’ve noticed that after calming my mind and body with meditation, my mind wants to jump back to action. This tendency is common with participants in my mindfulness classes as well. It’s easy to skip the essential middle step of contemplation. Why is it so important? The space in between our awareness (of present moment experience) and our impulse to act is where limitless possibilities exist. When we gloss over this step, we lose the opportunity to skillfully bridge the gap between what’s happening right now and our deepest aspirations for what we want to see happen.
Here’s how I used the three mindful steps on the day of my TEDx:
Meditate: Once I became aware that I was feeling stuck, I took a few moments to meditate to calm my anxious mind, which was ready to believe my critical self that I am not ready to give the talk.
Contemplate: Once I had created a little more space in my mind and body, I examined my experience with an open and loving mind. Realizing that I was giving a TEDx talk after just four weeks of preparation, when it typically takes three to six months to prepare for a talk like this, my critical self could look at the situation with renewed confidence and gratitude for the opportunity to share work that I love and that could benefit people.
I realigned with my intentions for the talk by recalling the TEDx audience. As I started to engage with my experience in an intentional way, I realized that giving a perfect talk wasn’t the most important thing, although the perfectionist in me would argue otherwise. What was most important was that I show up fully and joyfully to share the work I love, in service of others. I knew first-hand, through my role as a town councilor, that this work can benefit everyone, especially in this time of divisiveness, pandemic, and inequities in our communities—when we need new ways to problem solve, communicate, and work with each other despite our differences.
This work can benefit everyone, especially in this time of divisiveness, pandemic, and inequities in our communities—when we need new ways to problem solve, communicate, and work with each other despite our differences.
When I connected with the ways in which leaders and changemakers can benefit from returning to the field within to respond intentionally to the challenges they’re encountering, I saw the TEDx talk as an opportunity to share this gift of mindfulness with others. Of course, I wasn’t going