This time with with awareness

I am on the footy field. I am 15 years old and I play for Research, the perennial strugglers who never seem to win a game. 

It is the last quarter and we are are close as we have ever been to a top team - 24 points down. Something comes over me. I start firing-up my teammates. Calling them by name. Telling them that we can do this. To believe. To find that extra bit of effort that hides behind their fear.

The ball is launched into the air by the umpire, our ruckman taps it in my direction. I gather, arch my back as I evade the lunging hand of the opposition, sprint away and launch a massive kick into our forward line. I feel elated and expressive and that I am being who I am, totally unencumbered, living in the moment.

I am in a meeting room. I am 22 years old, and I work at PWC, the consulting firm who only employ the best of the best and who win at everything.

The project is not going well, but the client doesn't know it. I know there is something to be said. I know that it will not be popular. It will be better for the client, and in the end better for PWC. And certainly better for myself. I know we can work together to make it happen. But I don't talk. I sit and nod. I comply with my manager.

I return to my desk slowly. I have a strange sad feeling about me. I feel constrained, repressed and like I am living within myself. I look around at my team mates. They look drained. Unhealthy. Well-paid and unhappy.

I am in my home. I am 38. I sit at my desk to type of blog post about what is going on for me in this moment. It is not always pretty or coherent. It is not earning me the big bucks. I feel energised and awake and liberated.

It has taken me 16 years; I am now doing with consciousness what I was, as a 15 year old, doing spontaneously.