The Point Of No Return
How Many Times Can You Go Past It?
‘WHAT. IS. THE. POINT?’ is a short story I wrote and had published on BizCatalyst a couple of months ago.1 It’s a fiction and like a lot of fiction, based on truth. The story connects the ideas of dreaming and dying and wonders if maybe there is no difference. (Not exactly a new thought - I grant.)
I hadn’t given it much more thought until a few weeks ago as this short ‘Substack series’ came to mind.
My ‘getting better’ regime started a couple of years ago, which included a number of disciplines that I had previously never considered - much less practiced - like hypnotherapy (thank-you Dipti). When I was with Dipti it worked, but my failure when alone was very apparent. By myself, I just couldn’t get into ‘Trance’2 ‘on-demand’.
Not to dive too far down this particular rabbit hole (many people are far more qualified than ‘yours truly’ to talk to you about that), my problem it seems, is not unusual. Moreover, even when I did, I wasn’t sure I had and it wasn’t consistent and it was definitely not ‘on-demand’.
Then It Changed.
Somehow I had what I can only describe as a ‘breakthrough’, with no idea how I achieved it. And if I did achieve what I thought I had, I thought ‘flow’ was a more appropriate word, reaffirmed by these wise words that ‘flowed’ into my purview that very day!
The flow I experienced was as if my body vibrated with ripples and waves of warmth rolling across my skin like a river.
In parallel with the flow I felt my mind disappear into another world. A dream world. A world that I understood and recognized, but knew wasn’t my normal state, in turn begging the question - which one is normal?
Then It Changed. Again.
It was gone. Lost once more with no idea as to how or why it escaped me.
I Know Now.
"You never get it down. I don't know how to do this. You'd think I do, but it's not one of these things you ever really know how to do."
💬 Paul McCartney
… on how he writes the music he does. He is also famed for not wanting to explore too deeply ‘how’ he does ‘it’, for fear that the very examination will cause his talent to just disappear. Much like by ability to get into ‘on-demand trance’ disappeared when I tried to work out what was going on.
I think McCartney’s underlying point is to essentially ‘be at one’ with ‘your creative flow’, which channels a recurring creative truth … the importance of ‘letting go’. To let it ‘flow’. To avoid ‘control’.
It takes very little effort to unearth hundreds of quotes from creative luminaries across time and geographies who say versions of the same thing.
Is ‘the flow’ of creativity connected to the ‘flow of hypnotherapy’? Does one flow from the other? Or is it the other way round? Or both?
Or maybe it’s the same? … because everything is connected. Everything.
If you are interested in trying hypnotherapy, there’s a button for that
For a short time, her app is available as a free trial.
Or just connect with her directly to book an appointment.
That’s all for this one. My next ‘stack will give you more context around where I am going with all of this.
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At the time I hadn’t connected ‘trance’ to ‘flow’ which many people use interchangeably in this context. For me ‘flow’ is the right word. It reflects my experience, feeling and
Whether you call it flow, an opening, a clearing, space of possibilities or present to now, it won't last, or you won't find it, if you bring in upsets and issues from the past or concerns for the future.
Flow begins by taking the first step