Last week I wrote a post called Life Is for Living, Not for Understanding.
At first glance, this might sound like a continuation of the same idea. In many ways it is. But after a conversation with a few fellow coaches this morning, I realized there is another layer worth exploring.
If we’re not careful, we can quietly turn understanding into another condition for living.
It sounds innocent enough.
“Once I understand this…”
“Once I heal…”
“Once I let go of the past…”
“Once I work through my trauma…”
“Once I finally get it…”
“…then I’ll be able to move on.”
Different words.
The same assumption.
Life is waiting.
It seems to be woven into so many approaches to change. We are encouraged to dig deeper, uncover more, solve more, understand more. There is certainly value in reflection, therapy, coaching, and honest conversations. They have all helped countless people.
But sometimes I wonder if we’ve unknowingly placed life on hold while waiting to become ready for it.
What if that assumption is worth questioning?
From the perspective of the Three Principles, our experience of life is continually created through Thought and brought to life through Consciousness within the intelligence of Mind.
That understanding is important.
But perhaps not in the way we often imagine.
When Sydney Banks spoke about understanding, I don’t believe he was referring to collecting more concepts or explanations. He wasn’t inviting us to become experts in psychology. He was pointing toward something much simpler.
Seeing.
There is a difference between understanding something intellectually and seeing it for yourself.
You can read every book ever written about riding a bicycle.
You can understand balance, momentum, and steering.
Yet none of that teaches you how to ride.
Then one day, something clicks.
Nothing new has been added.
You simply see it differently.
From that moment, riding becomes natural.
Life seems to work much the same way.
Some of the deepest insights I’ve ever experienced didn’t arrive because I was trying harder to understand.
They appeared while I was living.
During a walk.
While driving.
Laughing with friends.
Working with a client.
Sitting quietly after I had stopped trying to figure everything out.
Life was already unfolding.
Wisdom simply caught up.
Perhaps that’s why Syd so often encouraged people to get back into living.
Not because life distracts us from understanding.
Because life reveals it.
The question isn’t what you’re doing.
It’s whether you’re living under the assumption that life is on hold until you’ve finished doing it.
That assumption alone can create an entirely new Thinkiverse.
One where every insight becomes another prerequisite.
Every challenge becomes another project.
Every uncomfortable feeling becomes another problem to solve before life can begin.
Yet life never asked us to understand it first.
A child doesn’t understand childhood.
A bird doesn’t understand aerodynamics.
A tree doesn’t understand how it grows.
Life unfolds anyway.
Why do we assume we are the exception?
What if you didn’t have to solve everything before taking the next step?
What if you didn’t need complete clarity before saying yes to life?
What if understanding isn’t the doorway?
What if living is?
The beautiful irony is that genuine understanding often arrives after we’ve stopped demanding it.
Not because we earned it.
Not because we finally became worthy of it.
But because we relaxed enough for fresh thought to appear.
Maybe we’ve been looking in the wrong direction.
Perhaps we don’t understand our way into life.
Perhaps we live our way into understanding.
So today, instead of asking yourself what still needs to be solved…
Ask yourself a different question.
Am I waiting to live until I understand?
Or…
Am I willing to let life show me what I could never think my way toward?
Much Love,
This clip really resonates with the these last two posts that I have made. I share this video often and love to listen not only to the song, but what she talks about in the beginning.
Enjoy and Reflect: Nightbirde “It’s OK”
