TRANSCRIPT: Notes From Dunfanaghy 16 – Your Work is Inevitable
Hi, it’s Megan. This is today’s Notes from Dunfanaghy, which is a voice note series — these voice notes are for myself as I prepare for the Dunfanaghy retreat at the end of September, but I’m also sharing them with you so you can hear the messy musings that go into it.
I woke up this morning with a quote in my head, which is an Annie Rogers quote, and it says — I might butcher it slightly, but you get the gist — the unconscious insists, repeats, and practically breaks down the door to be heard. The unconscious insists, repeats, and practically breaks down the door to be heard.
I’m thinking about this. I’m thinking about inevitability. I spent the day yesterday with a couple of clients. I spent the afternoon with a client who happened to be in London, we’ve been working very closely together for the last few months, so we spent the afternoon together, and then we had dinner with another client who was in town, and they just both happened to be in town at the same time, so we had dinner. They’re also both coming to the retreat in Dunfanaghy, and we’re talking about all kinds of stuff.
I actually thought that, whatever today’s note would be, I thought that it would come out of that time with them yesterday, and I almost got too much from yesterday to be able to put it succinctly into one note — which, hopefully, that’s what happens for people at the retreat as well, you go expecting one thing, you get something a bit different.
But we were talking about the retreat, and I was talking about, like, obviously I have a structure for the retreat, and there’s places we’re going to go, but then there are also places within the landscape that are very alive for me right now, and that I feel like I’m kind of in conversation with, and I haven’t yet decided — will we go to those places at the retreat, will we not, will we go to some of them. Like, the whole thing is still a little bit in flux. And I said, you know, I’ll make a call at some point in the next eight weeks and figure out exactly which places I want to take people to.
And one of my clients who was there, she said — it’s funny that you think that it’s your decision, it’s funny that you think that it’s your choice, any of this stuff. And that is very true.
So I talked before in one of these notes — I think it was the third one — we talked about the black hole perspective, and the inevitability about our work — like, our work is coming for us, if we’re paying attention. And I’ve been thinking about that a lot the last few days, like the idea that once you make a commitment to do your work, or to do this next chapter of your work, whatever it is, you really don’t have much choice in it.
Like, so I’m working on a book at the minute, and I started last summer, and I went to the writing mentor that I’m working with, and I went with, like, an idea for a business book — kind of, obviously not a straight-up business book, but I thought it would be mostly about business and it might contain some of my story. But that’s the idea that I went with, and the whole thing has just morphed to be not that at all. It’s become a much more personal project, and it’s also taken me to places that I don’t know that I really wanted to go, but also did really want to go.
Like, I think this is a paradox at the heart of our work. I almost think that we make a commitment to do our work, and that’s like entering a tunnel. And usually you have no idea what tunnel you’re entering. You think you’re entering one short, simple, bright tunnel, and you get halfway in, and you realise — oh shit, this is not the tunnel I thought I was entering, this is dark and deep, and is taking me to the places that my unconscious knows that I need to go.
And I want to do that on some level, and on another level I absolutely do not want to do it, and I think it was a terrible idea, and I don’t know how I got myself into this position. And then you turn back and you realise you can’t get back out the way you came in. The only way out is to continue through the tunnel. And it’s both this exhilarating feeling and this just sick, terrifying feeling.
And that is our work. And I think that the choice that we have is: are we going to commit to the work, or to this next phase of the work? Like, that’s kind of our only choice. And once we have committed, once we’re in the tunnel, we don’t really have a choice.
You know, we can engage in this fantasy of, oh, I’ll decide exactly where we’re going to go, and, you know, I’ll decide exactly how we’re doing this. But that’s not really how it works. Like, you’re in the tunnel, and then your job is just to pay attention and to go with it, and to be in collaboration with the universe, your ancestors across geological time, the people who show up in your life. Everything about your life then becomes a work in some way.
And so I guess I don’t really know where I’m going with this, other than — I think if that is your experience of work, I think that means you’re doing the work.
And I think that, certainly in my life, I’ve been through other tunnels before, but I’ve also sat outside the front of tunnels for a long time. Like, I’ve sat at the entrance of the tunnel for a long time before deciding to enter the tunnel. And sometimes sitting in front of the tunnel feels okay for a while, and that’s fine, and you’re just taking a pause, and it’s bright and sunny at the entrance of the tunnel, and you can stay there.
And then sometimes getting stuck at the entrance of a tunnel can be a torturous place to be, because our unconscious insists and repeats, and it’s trying to break down the door. It knows you’re supposed to go in that tunnel. And I often have those moments in my work of realising something, like, oh, that’s what I’m supposed to do. And my stomach will immediately flip, because the thought of doing it makes me feel sick. And my stomach flips because I know I’m going to do it anyway, even though part of me doesn’t want to do it and part of me is terrified.
So sometimes it’s fine to sit out the front of the tunnel, but I think my guess is, if you’re listening to this, if you’ve persisted with this long enough, there’s probably some tunnels that maybe you’re in the middle of, or maybe you’re about to head down another tunnel. And as painful a process as it can be, I find the inevitability deeply, deeply soothing.
And I try to remember this idea of the geological present, which I talked about, I think, in the first voice note. You know, like, we’re thinking about the geological present, we’re thinking on a timescale of at least thousands of years, if not more. And in the geological present, our work is already done, we’ve already gone through the tunnel. Like, the moment that our work exists in is way bigger than us, it’s way bigger than our lifetime. And so the work’s already done. I find that reassuring as well, if that makes any sense to you whatsoever.
So, yeah, this is my motivational talk today — go down the tunnel, it’s terrifying and it’s awful, but also it’s kind of great. And if you would like to join me in Dunfanaghy to have more uplifting existential discussions like this, and to figure out — where are you? Are you in the tunnel? Are you towards the end of a tunnel? Are you right at the beginning of a tunnel? Are you sitting outside a tunnel, afraid to go inside? Are you sitting outside a tunnel so afraid to go inside that you are in denial of the fact that there’s even a tunnel there at all?
This is all of the kind of stuff that we will tease out at Dunfanaghy. And I would love for you to join us, if it feels like that’s the thing that you’re supposed to do this year.
Thanks for listening.