What is a Good Life? #61
Befriending What Is Here with Duncan Moss
On the 61st episode of the What is a Good Life? podcast, I am delighted to introduce our guest, Duncan Moss. Duncan is a Clinical Psychologist, and Honorary Research Fellow at Plymouth University, whose approach draws from long-standing psychological perspectives and also from the methods of meditation and the traditions of contemplation and awareness. He has been a student in the Tibetan Tradition for many years.
Simply put, this was the exact type of conversation I was hoping to capture when starting this podcast project. Duncan has a wonderful mix of wisdom, experience, and humility to explore what is here now for him while sharing valuable insights from his own research and personal inquiries.
This entire conversation is a beautiful exploration of the disturbances we can feel in life, accepting their inevitable appearances, befriending what is here right now, and a nod to the correlation between slowing down and experiencing kindness and compassion towards ourselves.
We discuss Duncan’s present explorations into the work of Eckhart Tolle and our resistance to suffering, letting go, and surrendering. We also explore themes like our ‘monkey minds,’ suffering as a teacher, and the timelessness of the present moment.
If you are presently suffering from any discontent in your life, this episode will be highly illuminating and soothing to listen along to. It won’t magically fix whatever you are perceiving, but perhaps it will give you space to observe and accept it and befriend whatever experience you are presently going through.
The weekly clip from the podcast (4 mins), my weekly reflection (3 mins), the full podcast (55 mins), and the weekly questions all follow below.
1. Weekly Clip from the Podcast
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2. My weekly reflection
In this interview, Duncan, at one point, observes that the compassion we may be attempting to cultivate for ourselves already exists, but we simply haven’t made time or space for it, or for ourselves to notice its presence. It is silent, so we can’t hear it amidst our busy lives.
The moment I heard that, for some reason, my mind was cast back to the most recent dump of snow we had in Berlin a couple of months back. There was enough snow on the footpath, and conditions were icy enough that either your space to walk or speed was considerably restricted.
I remember observing and telling my wife one evening that there was a profound difference in the way people were communicating when they were taken out of their autopilot ways of walking the streets. We automatically had to pay far more attention and slow down due to the possibility of slipping (hence we were present). When spaces emerged where snow or ice didn’t affect parts of the path, people were far more likely to let others go first, wait on each other, exchange glances, and even smiles.
A week later, when I was having a coffee next to a junction where I had observed such shifts in behaviour, I heard a loud beeping of a horn and an exchange of swear words between a driver and a cyclist. I laughed to myself with the thought that normal service had resumed.
When I reflect on my own behaviour, I see a huge correlation between compassion (whether to myself or others) and time. If I give myself plenty of time to make it to the airport or train station, I am a completely different person with other people on the road. Depending on how much time I have, I can smile or laugh at the behaviour of other motorists, or I can see myself in conflict or competition with them.
Other people go from something I can almost impartially observe to a threat; it’s kind of trippy if you think about it, the same scene with a completely different interpretation.
The self-checkout line in the supermarket also comes to mind. If I am in a rush or not, my observations of other people take on a completely different energy.
It makes me think of what is typical of a modern-day schedule and how we seem to want to pack as much into our schedules as possible. Where is the time for connecting with compassion if you are already watching the clock as one engagement winds down, only to be plotting your path to the next engagement?
For something (time) that is a human construct (at least in the linear way we follow it), it is amazing how our relationship with it exerts so much pressure on our lives and potentially deprives us of compassion. At what cost to our states of being are we willing to live such busy lives?
Without really thinking about it before writing this out this morning, over the last 8 years, I plan so little. It would not be uncommon for my evenings to be completely free of plans (for months) beyond the present day or week. It was the same before I had a baby.
Now I still end up seeing and connecting with lots of people spontaneously, whether in my neighbourhood, city, or online, but there is far more space in my life than before and much more time.
During that period, my relationship with myself and the level of compassion I experience in my life have changed quite substantially, which has also really altered my relationship with time and the pressure it brings. Or allowed me to let go of measuring my life through the timing of external milestones.
I would be surprised if I would have given myself as long to handle a transition period in my career from finance into realms of coaching, facilitation, writing, and hosting a podcast, had the same levels of busyness maintained from other periods of my life.
Which really makes me wonder what this busyness we are pursuing is costing us in terms of not just time, energy, and compassion but consequently living a life that we want to live. What opportunities or potential is it restricting us from or pushing out of our lives?
Instead of a conclusion, I’d just invite you to consider, in what ways might your busyness be costing you that you previously have not considered?
📣 My weekly conversation group takes place every Wednesday at 7pm (CET) on Zoom. It incorporates silence and authentic communication. It is free for now as it’s for a course I’m designing and I’m experimenting with different themes. Message me here to find out more or sign up.
3. Full Episode - Befriending What Is Here with Duncan Moss - What is a Good Life? #61
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4. This week’s Questions
What might serve you to let go of / surrender to in your life?
If the presence of suffering were to be a teacher, what is it presently trying to teach you?
About Me
I am a Coach based in Berlin, via Dublin, Ireland. I left behind a 15-year career in Capital Markets after I became extremely curious around answering some of the bigger questions in life. I started this project in 2021, for which I’ve now interviewed around 200 people, to provide people with the space to reflect on their own lives and to create content that would spark people’s own inquiry into this question. I am also trying to share more genuine expressions of the human experience, beyond the facades we typically project.
If you would like to work with me, or you simply want to get in touch, here’s my email and LinkedIn.