The Path of No Path

Overcoming the peddling of perpetual discontent

This week brought a despondent lament from a brave new writer in one of my online writing groups: how do I know I'm on the right path?

It is a sensible question. A disorienting question. A pilgrim's question. A lost question. And it's a question I've heard a thousand times from a thousand brave new writers.

Here's the short answer: there is no path.

And here’s what’s interesting: in this instance she wasn’t talking about writing. She was speaking of her life ‘path’.

And I experienced the most remarkable insight: mine was the last generation in the west to have grown up in a world free from the languaging of the new age industry.

In the world I grew up in, the only ideas, information, career possibilities were those that were directly spoken to us or existed visibly around us.

There was no ‘path’. There was no ‘true purpose’. There was nowhere you were supposed to be that wasn’t reliant on precisely where you were.

I’m going out on a limb here to suggest two generations of the imposition of ‘achieving your potential’ and ‘living your authentic life’ and ‘finding your true purpose’ have disrupted the souls and corrupted the actual life potential of phenomenal numbers of people in the west and elsewhere. It is the snake oil messaging of our times: the peddling of perpetual discontent.

This is not to idealise the world I grew up in. There is no doubt it was limiting. That is not the point. The point is the thousands of women who have sat in circles with me who are longing - longing - for something beyond the snake oil ‘truth’ of them to find their self-aligned expression in the world.

And there we have it, our purpose: the path of no path.

Writers are walking the mystery.

It's what we do.

Whether you are a writer, or you want to be a writer, or you just have something you know you need to write, our words lay out a path on which to travel. Sometimes the path lights up and we can see all the way to the horizon. Then the page closes in and we can barely make sense of the words we've just written, let alone know where we're going.

The fact of the matter is that for most of us, with the best planning in the world, we won't know what words are ahead of us until we write the ones that want to be written today.

That's the reality. And that’s our task: write the words that want to be written today. That, and make peace with not-knowing what words are making ready to show up tomorrow.

That lamenting discomfort about the ‘right’ path? It's a sign you're on the paradoxical path of no-path.

This is why writing is the bravest thing most of us will ever do.

You know you are on the 'right’ path because ultreia! you keep going.

You know you are on the right path because you are uncomfortable. Ultreia! you keep going.

It's the nature of the process. It comes with the territory.

The image above of the tightrope to the moon, it's where we start our programs and retreats. It's why people sign up. They are at the edge of their known world. Writing is that rope, the path on which to travel.

This is the gift of pilgrimage, that is, peace-making with the reality there is no 'there'.

I learned this on Day 25 of the first time I walked the Camino, from St Jean-Pied-du-Port to Santiago de Compostela.

By Day 25 the novelty had worn off. There was no good reason to be doing this. There was nothing particularly wrong. There was nothing serious going on. There was nothing at all … but - the endless agony of keeping going because … because why? What for?

I lay down on the road many times that day, not a single cell in my body remotely interested in going on.

And then I understood. There was no ‘there’.

Santiago de Compostela was utterly irrelevant to the day I was actually living. I understood that if I didn't pick up one foot and put it down in front of the other, there was no arriving at my destination. The moment wasn't asking me to magically appear in Santiago de Compostela. The moment was asking me for one step, literally, that’s all that was required from me: one step. I can do one step!

And the next moment? One step! I can do one step.

For writers struggling with their own Day 25, all the moment is asking from you is one word. That's it. The moment is not demanding the entire book. It wants a word. Just one word. You can give the moment what it is asking for: one word. You can do one word.

As for the path of no path, if there is no ‘there’ then there is no need for a path, let alone the ‘right’ path. There is, for some or many or a few of us, a destination of sorts out there on the horizon, it is the light calling us home.

The longing is the path. We can only get there from here. Therefore, by definition, we are on the right path.

Ultreia, we keep going,

Steph

Your life, your sanctuary.

If you’d like to lay out a path on which to travel, bookings are now open for the Bali Women's Wellbeing Writing Retreat. Over five days in Bali, we find our words and we find our way.

You do not have to ‘be’ a writer to participate in this beautiful retreat.

Bali's gentle landscape and rich spiritual traditions offer stillness and sanctuary.

We have booked an entire retreat for just us, a small group of women eating deliciousness we don't have to cook on dishes we don't have to wash up.

Our task is to rest on the fringe of a living rice paddy, where the duck herders and rice planters go about their business, and the sun comes up and the sun goes down and the moon rises and sets from our wide open windows, while we keep gentle company and take time to ourselves, finding our words, our voices, our ways.

It is not an overstatement to say this retreat is life-changing. Here are a few thoughts from women who have walked this path before you:

“This retreat has been a journey I have never been on before. It has taught me to ... stand strong and ... trust my decisions."

“There are not enough superlatives to describe my journey. Stephanie’s skill to draw ability, confidence and courage out of me, even whilst I was resisting, is awe inspiring."

Bookings for Bali 2025 are now open
Dates: Monday 13 October - Saturday 18 October.
There are 8 places only. Your booking is confirmed with a $550AUD deposit.