In mid-September, as Tribe members know, I started a 100-day challenge to encourage us to work on some big-rock goals (or to establish new and beneficial habits) as we round out a crazy 2020.

My biggest goal for the challenge was to write nine short books as a series on creative blocks for Rock Your Genius (my main work and project). In researching for the series, I'm uncovering insights and tools for helping overcome (or, really, dance with) fear, which I believe to be the main reason for our not pursuing those creative callings that little voice inside us nags us to create.

It seems in the recent decade or so, we have even more fighting against us though—not just our fears, but also the constant distractions and "busy-ness" that's come with the advent of social media, devices, YouTube, Netflix, and about a million other things vying for our attention.

How do we create anything that contributes something to the world (or to our own lives, even), if we have deeply-rooted fears holding us back that, even if we could or wanted to try to overcome them, there'd be a never-ending list of outside forces working against that effort?

One of the books I've used for research is The Sacred Enneagram by Christopher L. Heuertz. He talks about the use of contemplation as a way of doing the inner work required for growth, specifically the practices of solitude, silence, and stillness. In the recent days, I've considered the personalities of myself and a few closer people I know and how that might apply.

My type, for example, is one that values connection. I've spent the better part of my lifetime chasing relationships that didn't seem nearly as interested in chasing me back. In fact, in many cases, I felt way more like a bother than a relationship they actually valued.

Still, my wiring kept me fixated on the possibility of figuring those people and relationships out. If I could only hang in there long enough, if I could only be present enough, if I could only do something interesting, worthy, or valuable enough, maybe they'd value me and our relationship, too.

That never happened—it was never going to happen, but that didn't make the fixation and void any less pronounced.

My tendency has been to try harder, keep trying, but through all that trying, I only felt less worthy.

Instead, using the contemplation practice of solitude, what I'm looking to realize and establish is the "enoughness" that already exists within myself (it's within everyone). Instead of fixating on anything outside myself and compulsively working for relationships with others, I should've been valuing myself, and by forcing myself to become comfortable with the solitude, I could learn to value what I had within me the whole time.

Or, take someone else I know, whose tendency is to constantly take on new activities and projects. Every day is something new. No one project is ever enough. All options must remain open, and there's probably something better to consider at any moment of the day.

For this person, the contemplation practice of silence is important. The mind is constantly filled with chatter. It never rests. It constructs and destructs projects and possibilities every minute it's awake.

The silence teaches the mind to listen.

Then there's the third type, someone who's constantly doing, who thinks there's always something that needs done or fixing—except it's never good enough. Nothing is ever good enough. The manic "busy-ness" only leads to frustration, frustration over the fact that it will never be done and frustration over the fact that no one cares as much as you or is doing as much as you (or is doing things as well as you).

Stillness teaches serenity.

In all three cases, you'd look to what the busiest part of yourself is.

Is it your heart?

Is it your mind?

Is it your body?

If it's your heart, then you long for connection, so you have to learn to not compulsively need that connection. Solitude builds an appreciation for a relationship with yourself and, likely, something bigger than you, something spiritual.

If it's your mind, then maybe you long for competence, so you compulsively think and evaluate and re-evaluate and learn and explore, but all that compulsive exploration won't give you the knowledge (or maybe knowing) you seek. That won't come from the information as much as it will come from within. Silence requires you to learn to quiet the mind, stop looking for information and distractions, and just listen. There's a chance, if you would get quiet enough, then you might hear something from another part of yourself, other than your restless and insatiable mind.

If it's your body, then maybe you long for control, so compulsively do things, stay in action, fix things. Stillness requires you to stop with all the "busy-ness" and lean into the calm and centered knowing that everything is already done, everything is already good. Your manic fixing and doing is never enough and never will be; there will always be something to be done.

In all cases, you learn to rest—rest into who you are, rest into what you know, and rest into the perfectly imperfect (never-gonna-be-perfect)"groundedness" over manic fixation that usually leads to nowhere.

Intuitively, we often know what we need. You might be drawn to certain things, even the topics of solitude, silence, and stillness—or contemplation. The activities that you're drawn to might also hint at what you know you need, if you'd ever slow down long enough, get quiet enough, or be willing to be by yourself enough to allow it.

In The Complete Enneagram by Beatrice Chestnut, there were a couple of quotes that summed up the aim of a contemplative practice:

• "The faculty of voluntarily bringing back a wandering attention, over and over again, is the very root of judgment, character, and will. No one is "master of himself" if he have it not." — William James

And ...

• "Between stimulus and response, there is a space. In the space there is the power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom." — Victor Frankl

I've wondered many times during this pandemic if we're not going through a collective forced rest (not always happily or willingly, I might add), now that we've been required to sit in spaces of stillness and silence and solitude. It's like our very own Walden, and as Thoreau himself said, "the incessant anxiety and strain of some is a well-nigh incurable form of disease," and as I'm sure you've already heard, "the mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation."

Yet, I agree with Thoreau when he says, "I do not mean to prescribe rules to strong and valiant natures, who will mind their own affairs whether in heaven or hell; nor those who find their encouragement and inspiration in precisely the present condition of things and cherish it; but mainly to the mass of men who are discontented and idly complaining of the hardness of their lot or of the times, when they might improve them."

Perhaps a trip to Walden is necessary.