The Courage to Stop Rowing
What Eastern wisdom teaches us about returning to ourselves...
In our culture we are trained to row harder, hustle, control, manage, and optimize. And yet, most of us are quietly drowning in the process. What if the answer isn’t in rowing faster…but in putting down the oars altogether?
During our Inner Compass Academy class, The Watcher and the Way, Daniel shared something that hasn’t left me since:
“Lift the oars from the water. Let your arms rest. Let your heart’s little intelligence listen.”
It was from a Mary Oliver poem, but the invitation felt like a direct call from the Self.
In Western culture, we glorify the ego’s drive. We name it ambition, discipline, or responsibility. But when we are only rowing with no awareness of what drives us, we risk severing the most essential connection of all: the one between our ego and the Self.
In Eastern psychospiritual practice, suffering arises when we mistake the wave for the ocean. We think we are the wave, our personality, our identity, our roles, when in truth, we are the vast ocean from which the wave arises.
So, what would it mean to remember that you are not your doing? That you are not the anxiety spinning in your head…but the witness underneath it? The one who watches. The one who is still here.
This is why we began our class not with a lecture, but with a breath. With a drop into sensation, into now. Because from the East/West integration lens, there is no consciousness without relationship. And there is no relationship without presence.
And here’s what I’ve learned: sometimes the ego doesn’t surrender with grace…it collapses. I remember a moment, years ago, standing in my kitchen, completely emptied. I had done everything “right.” Checked every box. Carried every load. But somehow, I felt like a stranger in my own life. My body was exhausted. My joy was gone. I wasn’t rowing anymore, I was sinking.
That collapse was a turning point. Not because I fixed it, but because I finally stopped trying to fix it. I sat. I breathed. I cried. I let myself feel the unbearable truth that I had been rowing out of fear, not love, for most of my life.
And that was a moment I remembered I had choice.
Because the Self doesn’t shout. It waits. And when you’re ready to put down the oars, it’s right there beneath the surface, steady and alive.
Want to go deeper into these teachings? The next cohort for the Inner Compass Academy starts soon and I’d love to see you there.
Practice: The Stillness Reset
This is not a meditation. It’s a moment to stop rowing.
Lie down. Somewhere comfortable. No goal. No posture. Just let your body melt.
Place one hand on your chest, one on your belly. No need to change your breath. Just feel it.
Let your body answer this, not your mind:
What part of me is trying the hardest right now?Say softly (in your mind or out loud):
“You don’t have to do this alone.”Let yourself rest here. Don’t fix. Don’t analyze. Just be. Even for a minute.
Repeat whenever you feel yourself bracing, pushing, or striving.
I know how hard it is to stop performing for the world long enough to be with what’s true. I know the internal chaos that can arise when we stop numbing and start feeling. But that’s the path. And no one else can walk it for us.
You’re either rowing unconsciously, or you’re surrendering to the current of something deeper. The world won’t teach you to listen for it, but your body remembers, your breath remembers, and somewhere beneath the noise and the doing and the striving, you remember.
And maybe that’s the work, not to become someone new, but to return to what’s already there. To sit beside your own stillness long enough to hear it speak. Because when you finally put down the oars, you might realize…you were never lost. You were just rowing too loud to hear yourself call.
I’d love to hear from you: What part of you is most ready to put the oars down?
Share in the comments—I’ll be reading.