What is a Good Life? #111
Sensing The Undercurrents Of Life with Dr. Senem Donatan Mohan
On the 111th episode of the What is a Good Life? podcast, I am delighted to introduce our guest, Dr. Senem Donatan Mohan. Senem is a storyteller, story practitioner, and author based in Dublin, who is originally from Turkey. She holds a PhD degree in natural sciences and blends creative arts with science. Through her concepts Stories Cure and Aliveness Within she focuses on cultural and individual vitality. Over the past two decades, Senem has touched the lives of thousands of children and adults through her performances and books.
In this wonderful conversation, we explore the undercurrents and rhythms of life, balancing masculine and feminine energies, the visible and invisible, the guiding capacities of our inner child, moments of being lost in time, and the transformative powers of storytelling.
The whole conversation embodies this rhythm and noticing.
The weekly clip from the podcast (2 mins), my weekly reflection (2 mins), the full podcast (55 mins), and the weekly questions all follow below.
1. Weekly Clip from the Podcast
2. My weekly reflection
I often think we are missing something in this life.
The sheer complexity of systems involving human behaviour makes them virtually impossible to predict.
Meanwhile, the sheer complexity of our internal world, allied with our emotions and our experiences with others—over which we have no control—makes our ideas of mastery or certainty seem a little misguided. Not necessarily in specific areas, but in our totality.
At the same time, I sense a growing disillusionment with the idea that simply consuming information is transformative—especially after reading your tenth self-help book, nodding along vociferously, only to find yourself in need of reading the next one while things remain largely the same as do the lessons shared.
One perspective that has shifted greatly for me is the belief that I need to solve everything—myself, you, us, the world.
Perhaps I merely need to sit with it and not look away.
"Sitting" isn’t meant literally or passively—action of some sort will always follow, just as I keep breathing, eating, and shitting.
What I sense is often overlooked in life is the sheer range of what we experience.
I spoke to someone last week whose partner is terminally ill, and after yet another hospital visit, they found themselves having to consider what they’d have for dinner that evening.
The range—the mundane and the important, the elating or crushing moments of joy and sorrow.
I suspect that the more we become aware of the vast canyon of experiences we encounter, the more we soften toward ourselves and each other. The more compassion I can have for these little sacks of meat with beating hearts and souls tasked with navigating this life.
No matter where a moment, choice, or exchange falls in our perceived hierarchy of experiences, it matters. They all have an effect or a consequence.
Whatever you are experiencing is not trivial, not irrelevant. While it is all relative, whatever it is, the hardest thing you have ever had to deal with is simply that, regardless of anyone else’s experience.
For me, right now, it may be finding balance between artistic expression, integrity, values, and earning a living.
For someone else in my circle, it is acclimatising to becoming a parent. Another is facing their mortality.
At any moment, for anyone, it can be the wonderful mess we entangle ourselves in—simply trying to relate to each other and pushing buttons we cannot even see, with no intention of doing so.
I sense that it is really important to hold all of this in our awareness—not to solve the riddle of life or reach some state of certainty in its great uncertainty. Simply to acknowledge this isn’t an easy task.
More simply, so we can contribute fully to whatever our part or role is in this great unfolding, this collective drumbeat or rhythm. Being ourselves rather than mastering ourselves or life.
To sing our own note, to align with the undercurrents and rhythms of life—just as Senem beautifully references throughout our conversation.
Not adding any more distortion, complexity, or suffering than is already an inevitable part of it all.
And incredibly, for me, that often feels enough—acknowledging its vastness, sitting with whatever is, and moving with these rhythms and currents.
The unknowing and lack of control no longer feel like burdens to carry or problems to solve, but something shared—something that connects me, that allows me to know I am part of it all.
3. Full Episode - Sensing The Undercurrents Of Life with Dr. Senem Donatan Mohan - What is a Good Life? #111
4. This week’s Questions
Do you sense a deeper rhythm to this life? Do you feel like you are in or out of alignment with that rhythm?
If the moments when you lost all sense of time were trying to guide you, what might they be guiding you to?
About Me
I am a coach, podcast host, and writer, based in Berlin, via Dublin, Ireland. I started this project in 2021, for which I’ve now interviewed over 250 people. I’m not looking to prescribe universal answers, more that the guests’ lines of inquiry, musings, experiences, and curiosities spark your own inquiry into what the question means to you. I am also trying to share more genuine expressions of the human experience and more meaningful conversations.
If you’re interested in exploring your own self-inquiry through one-on-one coaching, joining my 5-week Silent Conversations group courses, or fostering greater trust, communication, and connection within your leadership teams, or simply reaching out, feel free to contact me via email or LinkedIn.