What Is Left When You Stop Trying?

We try so hard to hold it together.

To be wise. To be calm. To be whole. To be together.

But sometimes, the trying becomes the very thing, the very obstacle in the way.

What if clarity doesn’t come from effort?

What if peace isn’t earned but revealed when we stop chasing it?

There is a silence beneath all striving. A peace, a presence that doesn’t need you to be anything but here, unconditionally. It doesn't measure you. It simply meets you.

In the Ashtavakra Gita, it is said:

"You are not the doer. You are the witness."

And what a relief it is. To stop fixing, stop explaining, stop proving. And to let things be unfigured for a while.

what if the stillness you seek is hiding in the space where effort ends?

what if the clarity you crave only arrives once you stop reaching for it?

let the pieces fall,

let the roles fade,

what remains when there’s nothing left to carry,

that is the beginning.

If you are tired of trying, try nothing.

Let what’s underneath rise. Let what’s already whole greet you.

You are not failing. You are finally resting.

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© 2025 Beyond Silence. Written by 'the one listening'

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