How do you find any peace at Christmas when everybody expects you to be upbeat?

There is the noise, the money, the debates round the table, and underneath all of it the fear of losing people. You cannot control the dinner, the presents or your relatives. It is like getting in the sea and expecting the sea to move around you. What changed things for me was sitting back and saying, go on then, let me have it. Then I did not have to do anything with what turned up, my thoughts included. Lower the expectation and there is suddenly room for other people in it.

One thing to try: Listen more and talk less for one gathering. When somebody finishes, wait before you fill the gap.

• (1:17) How do you do joy on demand
• (3:59) Too busy, too loud, and the fear of losing people
• (6:16) The pressure to deliver the perfect day
• (9:00) Getting in the sea and expecting it to move for you
• (10:20) My mum's food, and she is still here
• (11:39) The moment I sat back and said, let me have it
• (15:05) What the Zen teachers do that nobody else does
• (19:07) Listen more, talk less, come back to the breath

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Steven

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Is being vulnerable the same as being weak? Asking for help is the most vulnerable thing most of us ever do.

I recorded this twice. The first time I talked about everybody else's vulnerability and it was not honest, so I binned it. I need people. When my body goes into dysreflexia I need somebody there, and there is nothing optional about it. But there is a difference between being vulnerable and feeling vulnerable. When you ask, you can ask from fear, or you can ask from courage and wisdom at the same time. Same words. Completely different person saying them.

One thing to try: Next time you ask for help, notice which voice is asking. Then let a braver one ask instead.

• (1:17) The most vulnerable thing you can do is ask
• (3:04) I recorded this once already and it was not honest
• (4:13) What my body does, and who I need there
• (5:15) Judging is not always unhealthy
• (6:23) Get old enough and vulnerability finds you
• (8:02) Being vulnerable is not the same as feeling it
• (10:13) Asking from courage, not only from fear
• (12:30) The mask, and who decided they were strong

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Steven

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What comes after mindfulness? Noticing the leaves is the start, not the finish.

I was coming down the hill in my electric wheelchair looking at the leaves, and it struck me that plain awareness is only the doorway. It is simple and it is hard, and it is nearly impossible to explain to somebody who has not felt it. Awareness is not only outward either. What can the body teach me right now. And gratitude goes the same way: thank you kettle is the surface, and underneath it runs all the way out to caring about the whole world.

One thing to try: Turn the attention inward once today. Ask what the body is telling you and then just listen.

• (2:58) Without awareness we snap and snarl
• (3:59) So simple, and so hard to hold on to
• (5:05) Awareness is not only about the outside world
• (6:16) What can the body teach me
• (8:02) Deeper gratitude, past the kettle
• (9:12) Universal care, and a world centric view
• (10:21) We do not know other people. We barely know ourselves
• (11:40) Your hips hurting is teaching you something

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Steven

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Who are you without your story? Take away the job, the labels and the roles, and what is left?

You were born a blank canvas and other people handed you the colours. Parents, teachers, the lot. Everything you do today comes out of that. I put a photo of myself in an odd hat on Facebook and watched how quickly a label arrives. You have a thousand voices in there and some are braver, wiser or kinder than the one that usually speaks. Drop the story and you are not becoming somebody new. You are just allowed to pick different colours today.

One thing to try: Go somewhere ordinary today and look at it as somebody with no history of it. See what you notice.

• (1:52) Doctor, carer, dad, councillor. Which one is you
• (3:09) The blank canvas and who hands you the colours
• (4:11) The wake of the ship, as Alan Watts put it
• (5:33) The hat, and how fast a label arrives
• (8:51) A thousand voices, and you choose which speaks
• (12:49) What if I bring a new role to this moment
• (13:51) Become friends with the ego and play with it
• (16:51) Dropping the story is not becoming a new person

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Steven

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Why is letting go so hard? Because your mind evolved to hold on. This is about what comes after forgiveness, when there is nothing left to do but put it down.

I say things in council meetings and then spend the evening asking myself why I said them. A tree lets a leaf die and fall and puts no weight on it whatsoever. For years we have lived as though a thought demands an action. It does not. If somebody throws a name at you, do not catch it. Start with the small stuff and work up.

One thing to try: Next time somebody throws something at you, do not catch it. That is the whole exercise.

• (0:01) Why letting go is so difficult in the first place
• (1:50) A review from somebody who has not been themselves lately
• (3:29) Saying something in a council meeting and regretting it all evening
• (5:00) Expectations, and living in a world with other people in it
• (7:11) The tree that lets the leaf fall without any weight on it
• (8:50) Believing a thought means you have to do something
• (10:25) After forgiveness, there is just putting it down
• (13:55) If they throw it, do not catch it

Eleanor, Josie, Senga and Beth.

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Steven

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Is there really such a thing as a negative thought? By the end of this I do not think you will say yes.

Wait for your next thought. You cannot make one. You do not know what it will be. So whose thought is it. Your subconscious has no idea what is positive or negative. A good haul is a positive thought to a burglar. It has no timeline either, no tomorrow, no last week. It hands you what it thinks you need right now. My mind is a twenty four hour committee meeting of about ten thousand voices arguing, and I have stopped trying to chair it.

One thing to try: Sit three minutes and just wait for thoughts. Be the one who notices them arriving, not the one arguing.

• (3:06) Everything in your body has a job, including the mind
• (4:12) Wait for your next thought. You cannot make one
• (6:18) You have thoughts. You are not the thoughts
• (7:54) To a burglar, a good haul is a positive thought
• (9:01) Your subconscious has no tomorrow and no last week
• (12:59) Ten thousand voices, arguing, all day
• (14:10) You cannot look at your own eyes
• (15:24) Three minutes, if you are somewhere safe
• (16:15) Become the watcher of thoughts

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Steven

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What do you take away from 500 miles in a wheelchair? A hundred and forty parishes, three hundred places, thousands of conversations, and one question that stopped me years ago.

Four or five hours a day on the road at a snail's pace, and it never once rained where I was. The brain stores the day at the front and moves it to the back overnight, filing emotions with emotions, and it cannot tell whether it was a film or your life. This one also goes back to the day I left home heading for a river, and the question that arrived before I got there.

One thing to try: Find one thing in this moment that gives you a genuine thank you. Only one.

• (0:00) Five hundred miles round Cornwall, done
• (1:51) A hundred and forty parishes and over three hundred places
• (3:39) It never once rained where I was
• (5:25) How the brain stores the day, then moves it overnight
• (6:59) Filing emotions with emotions, film or real life
• (8:44) Heading for the river, and the question that arrived first

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Steven

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What do you do when a friend dies while you are out raising money in their honour? I was on the road doing 500 miles for the air ambulance when I got the message.

He broke his neck a couple of years before I broke mine. Same level, same everything. He wrote a book. He flew planes. An hour after I heard, my ego said carry on and my body said no, and I had that argument the whole way. If you are listening to this you are alive, and that is the celebration. Do not go hunting one life purpose. Ask what your purpose is right now.

One thing to try: If you feel like you love somebody, pick up the phone and say it. That is a purpose.

• (0:06) I have not gone anywhere, and where I have actually been
• (3:05) If you are listening to this, you are alive
• (5:02) Which voice wins? The one you allow
• (6:56) How the air ambulance helped them, story after story
• (9:30) It is not me changing your life. It is you
• (11:33) Ego with a little wisdom, and it being enough already
• (13:49) Always helping others and never yourself will drain you

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Steven

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Is letting go of everything actually good advice? No. Hold it too tightly and it is a hot mess. Drop it entirely and nothing happens. The answer sits in the middle.

Everybody quotes the song and nobody means it. I am doing 500 miles round Cornwall. Hold that loosely and I will enjoy it. Hold it tightly, with twenty thousand pounds to raise and a set number of miles a day, and I will not. I am not in control of the traffic or the potholes. Other people bring something to the table too, and that is the part we keep forgetting.

One thing to try: Take the thing you are gripping and loosen your hand by ten percent. Not let go. Loosen.

• (0:05) The philosophy of holding things lightly
• (1:46) The balance between attachment and detachment
• (3:30) Trying to control the narrative, everybody else, the government
• (5:16) Let it go, that song, and why nobody actually means it
• (6:51) Holding loosely, and starting to see the beauty in it
• (8:25) Twenty thousand pounds and a daily target would ruin it
• (15:14) Neither clinging to everything nor dropping everything
• (20:12) Not in control of the traffic, or the potholes

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Steven

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What is the difference between something that makes you happy and something that nourishes you? Fireworks are wonderful. They do not feed you for the week.

Even a sip of water is more entertaining than meditation. But meditation gives you wisdom and calm and the ability to see things as they actually are, which the firework does not. Your favourite track is gone twenty minutes later. Enjoy it, but do not ask it to carry the day. I have been taking more time alone lately, by choice, and it is doing more for me than most things.

One thing to try: Pick one thing today that nourishes rather than entertains, and do that one instead.

• (0:02) Seeking happiness, or seeking something that lasts
• (1:50) Not needing to be fulfilled, and why that helps
• (4:06) Choosing time alone, and going out in the chair
• (5:10) The firework display, and what it does and does not do
• (6:40) Nourishment is not about feeding better than we are
• (10:08) A sip of water is more entertaining than meditation
• (13:45) Your favourite track is gone twenty minutes later
• (17:02) Tapping into wisdom built up over millions of years

Kelly Blackwell, Pat, Mark Kananda, Caroline, and the anonymous donors.

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Steven

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