Change Your Stance

There are periods in life when everything appears fine from the outside, but inside there’s a resistance. The job is stable. The people are kind. Nothing is obviously wrong. And still, getting up to work is a grind. I’ve been living in that space.

For a long time, I tried to make sense of it intellectually. I looked for practical explanations. But eventually I had to admit that the discomfort was tied to years of sincere effort that didn’t unfold the way I hoped. Businesses that failed, projects I cared deeply about that never became financially sustainable. Experiences like that not only disappoint you, but they also slowly chip away at your confidence. They make you question your own inner compass.

The yogi teachings speak directly to this kind of conflict. Yogi Ramacharaka writes: “Much of the suffering of men arises not from pain, but from the sense of futility, from work done without inner assent.”