This is a transcript from our podcast episode with Paul Hurcomb about meditation and stillness.

Axel Wennhall
Hi and welcome to the interactive podcast, Meditera Mera, with myself, Axel Wennhall, who asks the questions, and producer Gustav Nord. This is our second episode in English, with hopefully more to come, and we’re currently sitting in Gustav and mine’s office space here at Södermalm in Stockholm, waiting for our next guest, the spiritual teacher Paul Hurcomb, to speak about meditation, stillness, and self-enquiry. Paul Hurcomb is from the UK, where he grew up in London and then moved to Eastbourne. He now spends most of his time traveling between the UK, Spain, and Sweden, where he holds his meetings and retreats. From his early 20s, he spent 12 years as a Buddhist. However, it wasn’t until his mid-30s, when he became critically ill, that, in his own words, the truth beyond his condition, individual identity, was recognized. He understood that this experience had revealed something within him that no book, belief, or technique ever could. Since 2010, Paul has been holding meetings in his stillness with individuals and small groups of people who have this authentic calling to discover their own true nature and find inner peace. He has been deeply touched by the teachings of the Buddha, Ramana Maharshi, Eckhart Tolle, and his own teacher, Mooji. And meditation, stillness, and self-enquiry is exactly what we will talk to Paul about. What is meditation to him? Why is stillness so important? Who are our true selves? And how can meditation help us discover this? Hi, Paul. Hi, Paul.

Paul Hurcomb
Hello.

Axel Wennhall
Glad to have you here at Gustav and mine’s shared office space here at Södermalm in Stockholm. Before we get started with the interview and our conversation about meditation and stillness and self-enquiry, let’s start with a landing meditation that we can do here. You sit in our sofa, Gustav and I sit here next to you in our chairs. But you can do this meditation wherever you are if you’re listening to this. I have the possibility to close my eyes, I will do that. But if you’re walking or even if you’re driving your car, whatever you’re doing, just start by bringing your attention to your body. Just see what you can sense here. Perhaps you can feel your weight if you’re standing or sitting. Perhaps you can feel the breeze. And perhaps you can feel the sensations inside your body. Just become aware of whatever you’re experiencing right now. Whatever sensations you’re feeling. And if your mind wanders, just gently bring back your attention to your body. Okay. That was a short landing meditation. I’m really glad that you’re here today, Paul. And we have spent five days together at your retreat up in Stjärnsund in the southern part of Dalarna. But we haven’t really spoken because this was a silent retreat and there were a few satsang, but I never went up. So I’m really glad that we have this opportunity to speak here today. And I have been privileged to have some fantastic teachers who has shown me the way into this spiritual path. Bengt Renander, that I know that you met and know. And also Anna Wikfalk, who has taught me a lot about mindfulness. And now you. And what I’m so privileged about and happy about is that all the free of you is just showing the way for oneself to discover. It’s never about you. And I am glad that I have met you and I have learned a great a lot. And perhaps one of the most important teachings that I have ever learned in my life was at your retreat. About my true self and about presence and the natural state of being. So I’m happy that you’re here and that we can share this wisdom with our listeners. And also I have this personal agenda today to sort of to ask the questions perhaps I didn’t ask during the retreat. But first, how come you started to meditate and how did this journey start for you?

Paul Hurcomb
Okay, I started getting interested in spirituality when I was in my early 20s. And before that I didn’t have very much interest in spirituality. I was very much into sport. I was very much just a kind of just a regular ordinary sort of a guy. I never really had that deep calling to look for anything deeper. But, you know, some things happened in my life, you know, when I was around about 19 or 20, which completely changed everything for me. And kind of the life that I knew kind of got turned upside down. And I found myself very, I don’t know, on one level I found myself very alone. And I found myself very much looking for some kind of guidance and some kind of inner peace. Because I was definitely not at peace. I was very, you know, I was going down the wrong road at that point in my life. And I remember looking into various different types of spiritual practice. And I looked into Christianity and I went to many churches. I was actually living in Denmark at this point. And I remember going to quite a few Christian science type places. But I didn’t really find anything that resonated very strongly for me. And I ended up moving back to England. And when I got back to England, I started looking there. And I came across Buddhism. I found Buddhism. And something in the Buddhist approach really touched me. There was something about, it just felt, it just felt down to earth. And it wasn’t so much speaking about beliefs. But there was something in it that I could understand. And I started attending meditation classes. And pretty much straight away, I had a feeling that this was really something that was going to help me. And I actually ended up living in a Buddhist community for many years. And I did a lot of studying of Buddhist scripture. I did very many meditation retreats. And I was even actually asked to be a teacher in the Buddhist tradition. But I never did that. I didn’t feel to do that. Because I was actually a school teacher at that time. So I was just continuing with my school teaching during the day. And then in the evenings, I was at the Buddhist center and kind of helping out there. But that was how it began. Really through the Buddhism was the thing that really opened something up for me. Yeah.

Axel Wennhall
And then something happened in your mid 30s, right?

Paul Hurcomb
Yeah. Again, I had a second, what I would say a big challenge or major kind of situation whereby from one day to the next, everything changes. And I think we’ve all had this kind of experience where just something happens out of the blue. And whole life really gets turned upside down again. And that happened to me in my mid 30s. And I’d been practicing Buddhism by that time for about, I think about 12 or 13 years by then. So I was very much established in the Buddhist teachings. But when this thing came up in me, it was so strong. It was overpowering. And my mind, you know, my mind kind of took over. And I found myself, you know, deeply, I felt suicidal. I felt very depressed, very anxious. I was in bed for, I think, a couple of months. And I would just have a friend who would just come and sit with me every day. And she’d just hold my hand. And literally, I didn’t feel like I could find a way out of that. And I was kind of, yeah, I was really wondering, you know, how am I going to end my life? Because I couldn’t see a future. You know, I was so, yeah, I was kind of tortured. My own mind was torturing me. And right in the middle of that, I’ll never forget what happened to me, because right in the middle of that, inside all of the torturous mind and everything that was going on, I was just lying in bed one day, and I felt this physical crack right in the middle of my chest. And I felt it was almost like a rib broke, that’s what it felt like. And I heard the crack, and it was almost like something of peace came through me. And it was not, I’d experienced many, I had many experiences of peace, you know, in meditation or in nature and things like that, but this was something very different. This literally had come from a very deep place from within. And for the first time in my life, I remember kind of realizing that I had a choice whether to follow this deeper sense of peace which was revealing itself in me, or whether I could listen to the mind which was kind of continuously trying to, you know, torture me. So for me, that was the birth of what I call the being’. It was a revelation of something else inside me, which had nothing to do with my personal mind, personal conditioning. There was nothing I did to make that happen, that just happened by itself. And I remember during this time that somebody at this point, they gave me a copy of The Power of Now’, the book The Power of Now’. From Eckhart Tolle. From Eckhart Tolle, yeah. Yeah. And I remember reading this book and listening to this book, you know, whenever I had any time, I was just reading and listening to The Power of Now’. And I felt so touched by that book, because that book was somehow giving me an explanation of what was happening inside me, because I couldn’t meet anybody else who understood that. Even if I went to the Buddhist Center, nobody really understood that. So yeah, I realized that something inside me had kind of burst through, it had come through something much deeper than the ego itself. And I just began to fully give myself to that. That was how this kind of second phase of my spiritual life began. Hmm. Yeah.

Axel Wennhall
And how did your life change after this?

Paul Hurcomb
Well, something in me felt very much called to honor what was happening for me. So I spent about, probably about two years I spent where I was able to just kind of rest in being and bring that sense of presence through me. And I would just spend a lot of time in nature. I’d spend a lot of time, you know, just walking on the seafront where I live in in Eastbourne in England. And just I spent a lot of time being very quiet and very still. And I was still working a little bit. I was still doing some teaching. And then actually an opportunity came up to start a golf, a golf college. And golf had always been my love. You know, I’d been a big sports person in my life. I played a lot of soccer, I played a lot of tennis, a lot of cricket, all these things. But golf would always been the thing that I loved. And in fact, there was a time where I wanted to become a professional golfer. But I trained to become a sports teacher. And then this opportunity came to start this golf college. So I started this golf college up in the UK. And I was trying to bring in the things that I’d sort of discovered in myself. So we’d do yoga every day, we’d do Tai Chi every day, we’d do meditation, and we’d have that alongside the golf and alongside the study. So it was kind of a holistic golf college. And I spent, I think, probably about five years at that golf college. And even now, which is 15 years later or something, I still go in there a couple of times a year and talk about mindfulness for golfers and stuff like that. So I still have a connection with the college. But yeah, I was there for around five years. And that was a fantastic project for me. I really enjoyed that. But there came a time where I also then felt that something in me wanted to be freer, wanted to be freer. And I decided to take a sabbatical from my job for a year in the golf college. And I went to New Zealand, I went to Australia, and I went to India. And it was in India that I met Mooji. And Mooji, I just kind of chanced upon one of his satsangs, and I sat in there, and he was speaking about something that was beyond presence. He was speaking about presence. And just for those who are listening, presence is the intuitive feeling of beingness in the body, the feeling I am. Just the natural intuition I am. And for me, I’d come to a place of rest in that sense of presence, in that I amness. I was resting in that I amness. But he was speaking about something beyond that. So I was kind of, at first I was pretty confused, actually. Didn’t really understand what he was talking about. But something in me felt a draw and an interest to stay there. So I spent that winter going to all the satsangs, and then I spent the next four winters going to all the satsangs. And that was in a place called Tiruvanamalai in Southern India. And it was there where one day, kind of out of the blue really, I kind of recognized what he was speaking about. And that became clear for me. So that was the kind of progression from being identified as a person who was meditating, to knowing oneself as the sense of presence, to knowing oneself as the self in whose presence all of these other things arise. It’s a kind of, it’s a kind of, it’s kind of like a letting go of all the things that we’re not, and just a coming back to resting in what is completely original for us. Yeah. And then I began, a few people started asking me, you know, what am I doing? What have I been doing in India? And, you know, could we start having a few little meetings? And, sorry, I skipped over, some years ago I held groups based on the power of now. So I already had a bit of a network of people who knew that I taught some meditation and I was interested in spirituality. And then I began to hold these kind of what I call meetings in stillness, or satsang, some people call it satsang. And that started off just very, you know, very casually. Literally, we’d just be three or four people would come to my house on a Wednesday evening, and we’d just sit down and we’d have some tea together, we’d sit in stillness together, and we’d just, you know, we’d have some sharings, and we’d just openly look at some of the things that people wanted to look at. And it started like that. And I have meetings at my home for about, probably about five years. And I occasionally, even now, I have meetings at my home if I’m there. But the groups have got much bigger now. But I still see a lot of the people who began and who used to come to my home every Wednesday, I still see a lot of those people. And we still, we still speak and we’re in touch. Yeah.

Axel Wennhall
Because I remember at your retreat that I participated in, one of the insights I got was when you described those three kind of layers or how you want to describe it of your true self, the aware presence, but also the natural state of being that is always here. Yeah. And that we don’t need to, we don’t need to add or do anything to be present. And also the human as part of this. Could you elaborate a little bit on how those three work together?

Paul Hurcomb
Well, most people, they’re identified, let’s say, with the personal self. And the personal self is really our conditioning, our education, our background, all the ideas that we’ve got about ourself. And most people, they believe they are that and only that. They identify with that part of themselves. But through, through self inquiry, through meditation, through just kind of meeting or speaking with someone who’s kind of been on that journey, they can show you that there is a deeper self than just that. And it’s not that we have to get rid of that. There’s nothing wrong with our surface humanness. And we all need that on some level, we need that in order to function and survive and, you know, do what we have to do. But through spirituality, we come to see that there is a deeper self. And that deeper self, let’s start with the state of presence. The state of presence is that part of ourself, which hasn’t been conditioned. And it is completely pure and completely, it’s at peace in and of itself. So the more we are able to discern the difference between our mind and what I call heart presence, or the more we’re able to discern the difference between our kind of head and our heart, then the more we will be just kind of naturally at peace. And, you know, for most people, spirituality is just coming to the state of presence. That is what all spiritual practices are about. And, you know, presence becomes that very ground where we sort of, we face our trauma, we face our, you know, strong feelings and emotions in ourselves, we face and overcome the egoic mind, we face all these patterns which begin to reveal themselves when we do come into presence. So that becomes the kind of the ground to meet and face ourselves. And in fact, in the Bible, even Jesus said that. He said, I am the way, the truth and the life. Nobody comes to the Father except through me. Meaning the I am, the sense of presence, I am, is the way, the truth and the life. And that nobody comes to the Father, meaning nobody comes to the pure self, the pure consciousness self, except through the I am. So the movement is from the kind of personal self into the beingness self, into that which is witnessing and perceiving both of those parts of our self. There is something here which is simply here by itself. It never changes. It is not subject to any conditions. But it’s almost like we’re overlooking that most of the time because the mind labels that as kind of, you know, not useful. What are you going to do with that? You know, what value does that have in the world? So the first thing is as we overcome the egoic mind and come more to rest in the beingness, then as we come into the recognition of the self, then the influence of the mind is no longer there. And then we come to rest in what I call natural state. A natural state is just this underlying state. It’s the state which is here by itself. And it’s a letting go of the person who thinks they’ve got to keep a state and do something in order to be in that kind of awake state. What I have seen in spirituality is that ultimately it is a letting go of everything that we are not. It’s just a letting go of the mind, a letting go of everything else until what we are simply reveals itself by itself. And then it’s up to us to fully honor that and to fully to give ourselves to that as much as we are able. So that is the journey as far as I see it, from person to presence and from presence to the self. And to dispel one of the myths of spirituality, to recognize and realize the self doesn’t mean you won’t have stuff going on on the surface level. You know, for me, there’ll still be things going on and I’m very open about that in meetings and in retreats. I’m still on one level, on the surface level, I look at the highly sensitive trait, the traits of a highly sensitive person and I can tick all of those. I look at the traits of somebody who maybe has had trauma and sometimes I can fully understand these things. But I have come to the point in myself where I’m absolutely clear about what I am. It doesn’t mean other things won’t arise, but it’s learning to allow these things to arise without becoming identified and lost inside them and then creating a separate sense of self out of that. It’s kind of just resting in your true position and just allowing your humaneness to be there without trying to kind of get that into any particular shape. Ultimately, it’s a letting go of control. It’s a very deep letting go of control.

Axel Wennhall
And that’s a hard job because the controlling part is so conditioned within at least myself. And when I hear you express this, another thing that comes to my mind is that this is something you have to experience. And that is the meditation, right? Where you just do this self-inquiry and see, okay, well, if this kind of object asked the mind or thoughts or feelings, if I can be aware of it, how can I be it? And then what, what is meditation for you and how do you teach meditation to your groups?

Paul Hurcomb
Well, I’m very clear that in my meetings, it’s not about becoming a better meditator. So I’m not trying to sort of create better meditators because there can be subtle ego in that, you know, now I’m, you know, last week I was meditating for 20 minutes, now I’m meditating for 25 and, you know, by the end of the month I’ll try to get to 30. You know, I mean nothing wrong with that, but that isn’t really what I’m sharing. I’m sharing something different to that. But one of the things that I try to do is I try to meet whoever comes to the retreats where they’re at. So I’m not trying to kind of pull everyone into a certain place, but whenever I meet somebody I’m kind of sensing, okay, you know, What is this person want and and is there a kind of space in them where they can explore deeper inside themselves? Because you know, I’m not on sort of like a a mission to, You know, get everybody into the self or something like that. I just feel that my My only job in in exclamation brackets, Yeah, my only job is just to simply be as I am and just sit in the meetings in my right place and then just kind of let go of it from there. I don’t feel I have to make something happen or everyone has got to kind of be enlightened by the end of a five-day retreat. I don’t think of anything like that. I just feel okay, just be, be in your right place and just allow what is going to happen to take place by itself. So actually, at the beginning of a retreat, I will always ask the group- I love to do this and I’ll just- we’ll have a circle to begin with and I’ll just ask people, you know what, what brings you here, what, what is it in your heart that you’re seeking? You know what do you want? And you know, people may say, you know, some people are looking for self realization and some people are looking for, you know, just to find a little bit of peace in themselves or something like that. So people come for a whole load of different reasons. But to come back to your question now, what is meditation? For me, meditation is a complete letting go of control. It’s a simple invitation to simply be still in yourself and just become aware of what is taking place inside you, but without grasping at any of that, without trying to make that any particular, trying to get that into any particular shape. As everything kind of comes more into the place of stillness, as you’re not grasping at it, things come into a field of stillness. Then for those who are open and for those who are willing, then meditation can be mixed with inquiry. And inquiry is to begin to ask, you know, who or what am I? Who am I that sees the mind moving? Who am I that sees the emotions arising? What is here before everything else is taking place? What remains completely stable in me, even if everything else is moving? And the moment we catch hold of that, then something shifts from being kind of interested just in objects to now we become interested in the subject. So the objects may still be there, but what is the subject? Who am I that is perceiving all of these objects? And then we really begin to look into that. And beyond all assumptions, beyond all ideas about ourself, can we truly look into the nature of ourselves? And as we look, what do we find? And, you know, this isn’t about me giving any answers, because intellectual understanding is not enough. It’s about coming to the realization in ourselves that we begin to see that what I am, I thought I was this other thing, I thought I was this person, but I can see that this person is a perceivable object in front of something else. What that is, I cannot say, but I know I must be that. I cannot find that as an object of. It is not another object for the mind to understand. It’s beyond the mind. There is something that is here completely by itself. And I must be that. I cannot be other than that. And when I know myself to be that, then I leave aside everything I’m not. And what do I find in that recognition? Pure peace. Pure silence. Pure unchanging grace. I just as, as I am. There is something here that cannot be improved upon. It cannot be bettered. It cannot be practiced. It is here before any of that. And what I love about this particular approach is that this is not something new that I’m speaking about. This is Jnana Yoga, wisdom yoga, the yoga of self-realization. And beings have looked into their nature since the beginning of time and they have come to this conclusion. Not as theory, not as idea, but as actual living proof, living recognition. Once you come to this realization, then you may decide to carry on to study if you wish and all these things, but none of that will be as significant. It’s beyond study. It cannot be learned in that way. It can only be discovered. It can only be known. Not as an object, but as yourself. And for me, that is the most, that is the highest potential of the meetings I hold, for people to find that and confirm that and realize that. Then I’m very happy if that happens.

Axel Wennhall
Is this another word for enlightenment?

Paul Hurcomb
I try not to use that word.

Axel Wennhall
Okay. How come?

Paul Hurcomb
Because people have so many ideas about that, you know? You know, if you use the word enlightenment, people have so many ideas. And in fact, many years ago, I was invited to hold some meetings at Ängsbacka. And I love Ängsbacka. I’ve been going there many years. And for those people who are listening now, Ängsbacka is a spiritual course center which offers retreats and festivals throughout the year. And I remember the first time I was going there, one of the guys there, he said, We’re going to put you in a room with another equally enlightened person. And I said, Oh no, no, don’t put me in a room with an enlightened person. I said, I just want to be at the, you know, just put me in with the regular people. Don’t put me with an enlightened person. I just want to be, I don’t want to be treated in a special way. And because ultimately, you know what? Awakening is the greatest disappointment for the ego possible. The ego has got so many ideas about what awakening is, what enlightenment is, you know, what I’m going to get. And the thing is, a lot of people play into that as well. So there’s a whole kind of thing going on where people are selling that dream of enlightenment. But if I look at Ramana Maharshi, if I look at any of these great sages who have had profound impact on the world, were they special? Did they need kind of special treatment? Did they expect others to kind of, you know, treat them differently? No, they were completely, completely just down to earth. They were completely, in one way, completely ordinary because they didn’t have a separate sense of self to keep up. And I remember reading, maybe I told this story on the retreat, actually. I remember reading about a French royalist who went to visit Ramana Maharshi. And she brought, she sailed from France, which I’m guessing would have taken at least a few weeks in those days. And she brought lots of presents for him. And she arrived at the ashram and they brought all the presents in and everything. And Ramana was just sitting there, you know, completely still, just in silence. And they stayed at the ashram, I think, for three or four days. And he hardly noticed her. Or he didn’t really speak with her very much. And then on the last day when they were leaving, one of the servants said to the French, I think she was a queen or some kind of royal princess or something. They said, Aren’t you upset? You know, you came all this way and you brought all of these things for Ramana. And he’s hardly, you know, acknowledged you. And she said, I’m so happy to be here. She said, He has been the first person who hasn’t treated me like I’m something special. And I could just sit on the floor in the ashram like everybody else. And, you know, this is beautiful because it is a taking away of all egoic masks. It’s a stripping away, you know, one is a royal, one is a beggar. But if you take away both of those roles, we’re the same. We are the same at the core of ourself. We’re just playing different roles for a period of time. And I kind of love that expression. For me, spirituality is kind of down to earth, grounded and real. And I know many people meet me and they’re very disappointed. They’ve got so many ideas about it. And I show up in a pair of jeans and a t-shirt and you know, people have a lot of judgments about that, a lot of ideas about that. But I say, well, you know, this is, this is myself and I’m in my right place in myself.

Axel Wennhall
Yeah, I remember also at the retreat that you said that the practice is not about becoming happy, it’s about becoming yourself.

Paul Hurcomb
Did I say that?

Axel Wennhall
I think you did. And let’s see. Yeah, at least I took a note on it. In the retreat. I think you said something. It’s not about being being happy and cheerful all the time. Yeah. And you gave the story about the Indian sage that they were sort of, they were just themselves. Yeah, they weren’t smiling or super happy all the time.

Paul Hurcomb
Exactly. Exactly. You know, what I’ve seen in the last 20 years or so is this idea that to be spiritually awake means that you’re happy all the time and you’re always walking around with this big smile and this big love and this big openness. And that may be the case for some people. But what I’m challenging is the idea that that is how it has to look like for everybody else in order for them to be in the awake state. Because the danger of presenting that as some kind of hallmark of awakening is that people start to feel, well, you know, I’m not, I don’t feel like that today. Does that mean I’m not awake anymore? Well, no, you, if you’ve recognized who you are, if you know who you are, then your expression will come out of you however that is meant to be. And for some people that their expression is a kind of joyful, loving openness. And for another one, it could be just a complete silence. For another one, it could be a very fiery. And for another one, it could be kind of very reclusive. So it doesn’t kind of look like anything outwardly, but it looks like something inwardly. And what I’ve often said is that peace is more important than happiness. Maybe I said something like that, that would. Because for me, peace is a hallmark of awakening. Like I feel in myself, I always feel this undercurrent of peace in me. That is always here. But I wouldn’t say I’m always feeling blissfully happy. So again, I’m speaking about myself now, but I have seen this tendency for new age spirituality to kind of be, you’ve got to be in bliss all the time, this kind of idea. And I very much challenge that. I don’t see that to be true in my own experience. And also I have to say, there was a time where I was in a lot of bliss. I was waking up, if I could go to sleep, sometimes I couldn’t even sleep, because I had so much bliss in my body. But I would wake up and I would kind of, you know, have this kind of chi running through me so strongly. And I was praying for it to calm down because I actually didn’t want it. I wanted to just calm down and just, you know, just come back into natural state. Because, you know, you’re on this kind of, you know, the postman knocks at the door at 7.30 in the morning and you kind of open the door and you’ve got this huge smile and you want to hug the postman or something. No, you kind of have to, that may happen for a stage, but no one can really keep that up and nor should they need to. I feel you only need to keep something up if you haven’t recognized what you don’t need to keep up. There’s something here you don’t need to keep up. It simply is as it is. And when you know yourself as that, then what comes out of that is really not much of your business anymore. I remember giving the example of Jesus and I remember traveling around Spain and I was looking in a lot of the churches in Spain and I remember looking at the pictures of Jesus and the disciples. And before I had my own awakening, I would look at them and I would think, you know, Jesus doesn’t look very happy. And you know, some of the disciples, they don’t look happy. But what I came to see at a later stage was, that is often just how the face is when you’ve realized who you are. You don’t have to keep something up. The face just rests as it is. And it’s so funny because sometimes on retreats I look at people and they could look absolutely blissful in meditation. They could look like they’re having the best time. And I could look at somebody else in the corner just sitting quietly, no expression on their face at all. And it could come to the end of the retreat and I could ask them, how was the retreat for you? And the one who looked so blissful, they may say, it was hell. I didn’t find any peace at all. And the one who’s just sitting there quietly in the corner said, so beautiful. I was just resting in myself. So we never know what’s going on for people just by what they look like.

Axel Wennhall
I remember coming back from the retreats and I had this kind of insight that it’s so easy and an obstacle for myself in this realization is the striving and all the expectations. Because when I’ve been feeling present, that is a joyful state to be at. Yeah. It’s a wonderful state to be at. So that kind of, that has led to kind of expectations and striving to get back there. And there’s also this kind of fear to lose it. Yeah. But I also remember I read, I think it was in a book from Sam Harris, Waking Up, where he had a, he had a saying from Ramana where he said that when you realize who you are, you will laugh at all your efforts.

Paul Hurcomb
Yeah.

Axel Wennhall
And I remember I just laughed out high when I read it because it was so easy. So, but then also what I see in myself, I don’t know if it’s because the realization isn’t strong enough, but it feels like, it feels that it’s easy to lose, to lose this connection. What would you say about that?

Paul Hurcomb
Yeah. You know, this is why this resting as presence is so important. Because when you’re speaking about it, you know, sometimes I got it and sometimes I have it. And you know, it’s easy to lose. What you’re speaking about is whether the attention is in the mind or it’s in the being. You’re speaking about that. And unless we are, I’ve learned this Swedish word, unless we are vaksam, vigilant, vaksam, did I say it right? Yeah. Unless we are vaksam, then the attention is just going to go to where it’s been kind of conditioned to go. And for most people that means it’s going to go into the mind, it’s going to go into the sense of personhood. So it takes tremendous effort in the beginning and to get stabilized in presence. So that is a kind of constant checking in and a constant, you know, just keep coming back to yourself. You know, am I lost in thought now? Am I lost in my personal sense of self? And can I again just come back and find the stillness? Can I find my own presence? And, you know, I’m very much encouraging people, you know, take short breaks throughout the day. Take five minutes here and there. Just put your hands on your heart. And again, just feel the feeling I am inside yourself. Feel the sense of being inside yourself. Get used to just, you know, just being still. Just stopping. Even if it’s just for 10 seconds, you’re just bringing space into your day somehow. As that kind of strengthens in you and you do come to the point where presence becomes your default state, so then you’re habitually going to the state of presence. As you come to that point inside you, then something settles down and your whole inner environment becomes much more one of stillness and silence. At that point, you may begin to see that what is noticing this environment of stillness and silence, that has been here all along. But if someone would have told you that when you’re in your mind, it wouldn’t have made the blind bit of difference. And this is where, for me, some invited teachers that sometimes they can be too quick to overlook presence, because presence is the ground. It’s almost like the bridge between the personal eye and the pure self. And presence should be our kind of our diet, our spiritual diet. It’s the thing that we go to, food all the time. Am I in presence right now? But as you said, at a certain point you will laugh at it because you come to a certain point where you see that whether I’m in presence or I’m in the mind, what I truly am is here before both of those. And that has become so clear now that the power of both presence and the mind have weakened anyway. They don’t become so important anymore. Presence still remains important if strong emotions are coming up or if you’re going into difficult situations or, you know, some kind of something’s activated in you. But most of the time, and I speak about myself, most of the time, I’m not trying to hold on to the state of presence. I’m just resting in natural state. A natural state is that state of emptiness. For many people, if they ask me, what is your highest teaching? I would just say, be empty of I. Don’t pick up I. Because if you pick up I, then you will need a practice. Then you will need something to kind of, you know, lessen the effects of the feeling of I. Because the feeling of I, for most people, is restless and agitated and unsettled. But if you don’t pick up I and you just remain empty, then what do you need? And who are you in that state? And can you lose that state? You cannot really lose that state. You can only, you can only leave it. That state is always here, but we experientially leave it when we go out shopping and identify with something else. But like I said earlier, you know, people, no one really values emptiness. You know, no kids in school say, you know, when I’m older, you know, what are you going to be? I’m going to be resting in emptiness. Nobody does. And it’s only, it’s only really a few people who really are going to really value that. Most people, they value presence because presence feels good. And as you say, it feels joyful and blissful and we want that. But who are you when presence is gone, you see? And is there something else here which doesn’t go? And is it possible to know ourself to be that? Because if presence can come and go, and if the mind can come and go, then what perceives all of that? Must that not be who we are? If presence was who we are, then when presence went, we would go. But if presence is gone and we’re still here, then who are we? What are we? And these questions, when I put these questions out, they’re not questions to be answered, you know, I am the self. They’re open contemplations. You know, you could teach somebody Advaita in five minutes. It’s not difficult to learn, but to embody is something different.

Axel Wennhall
You know, I’ve been using this advice a few times when I’ve been facing issues or problems since coming home. And from that experience, whatever it is, a strong emotion or a worrying thought or whatever, I just removed the I in that situation. And it sort of removes problems at the same time. Because it sort of brings one back to the actual experience and what you experience right now. And in there, there might be something you have to deal with, but the problem seems to vanish when you can do that kind of own inquiry and method for yourself. So that has also been very useful that I’ve been using.

Paul Hurcomb
Wonderful. Yeah.

Axel Wennhall
But then two minutes later, back, new problems, new identification.

Paul Hurcomb
But, you know, when nothing’s going on and when you’re just, you know, there’s no problem, there’s nothing happening, are you able to just kind of rest in that underlying sense of being? Are you able to just give yourself the time and the space to just really be as you are? Because what I see with a lot of people is they’re actually kind of creating problems and situations and looking for things. Because to be empty and to have nothing going on, I mean, that for many people is like, it’s like their idea of hell. But if you’re not identified with the mind, and if you can just enjoy your own emptiness, your own beingness, just become very beautiful just to be without I. To just to just be empty.

Axel Wennhall
It’s quite easy to spot when the mind is activated. Yeah. Because then the sense of restlessness and the sense of I need to do something.

Paul Hurcomb
Yeah.

Axel Wennhall
Productive or whatever it is comes comes in mind. And I think that’s where meditation comes in hands, at least for myself, because that is a place to rest. And to sort of try to be more in that kind of state. And hopefully that can last, at least have some glimpses during the day.

Paul Hurcomb
Yeah. Yeah. It’s definitely very helpful. But I wouldn’t put it as the ultimate goal. I would more say that allow the meditation to reveal something inside you and let that which is being revealed come to know that to be what you are rather than the one going into meditation and out of meditation. See if what meditation reveals, which is stillness and silence, if you can begin to know that to be yourself. Because what is at the very core of our struggle is this strong identity with the person who then believes that they are meditating or that they are keeping the stillness or that they are keeping some kind of spiritual state. Because what we come to see is that without this person, those states of stillness and silence, they’re here by themselves. In fact, one of the great masters, Papaji, he used to give a beautiful example. He said if you look up on a bright day at the sun and you close one eye and you put your finger up, just close one eye and put your index finger up, so you can block the whole sun just by just with one finger. He said in the same way, the egoic eye can block the whole realization of the self. And it’s almost like we have got into a position where we are fully focused on that finger. And we’re trying to improve the finger, make the finger better, dress the finger up, get the finger into a certain spot. But I say no, just drop the finger and something is here by itself. And then you don’t have to keep anything up. You don’t have to maintain anything. Your job is over. And it’s almost like you’ve surrendered to something much greater than yourself. And we come to this point either through self-inquiry or through surrender. Both of these paths are kind of looking into the separate eye and kind of dissolving that into the whole. Let’s put it like that. That’s one way of putting it. So there is no such thing as an enlightened person. There is nobody who still believes they are the person who is awake. They’re there. Those two can’t live in the same room. You see? For you to wake up, your sense of I has to disappear. Now, if there’s still interest from the mind, the mind is going to say, how’s my sense of self going to disappear? And how can I get the I to disappear? And the mind is going to kind of wonder so many things. I say, okay, still a lot of mind there. Okay, now just come back to presence then and come to the point where the mind is no longer influencing your higher choice. Now, ultimately, the mind is going to come into the realization of the self as well. But the mind will only come into that realization when you’re absolutely clear about what you are. When you’re clear about what you are, then the mind also, everything is also coming into that. Everything is kind of lining up itself.

Axel Wennhall
We’ve been talking a lot about self-enquiry, but I also know for myself and for people I meet in meditation and teach meditation to that a lot of the humanness that you describe and a lot of strong emotions comes up. Yeah. And something you talked about a lot on the retreat was the inner child. Could you please describe what the inner child is and how you sort of work with this in meditation or in life?

Paul Hurcomb
Very good, thank you. So from the highest perspective, from the realization of the self, then the inner child and all these things are not significant. But, and this is a huge but, a really big, big but, if we have got stuff from our childhood, if we’ve got trauma, if we’ve got some part of our self which we abandoned in order to survive and in order to function and in order to just survive the circumstances in which we lived, then at a certain point that is going to come back up. All of that stuff which we’ve buried and we’ve pushed down and we’ve tried to forget about is all going to come back up. And for many people that comes up as a very afraid, very wounded, traumatized inner child. And the energy of that can be so strong and so overpowering that it can kind of sabotage our spiritual growth. So you cannot just keep saying, well, I’m the witness of that inner child, I’m the witness of that inner child and that cannot be me, because it doesn’t really work on that level. It didn’t work for me anyway. So what I encourage people to do, if they’re open to doing that, is to begin to see if they can open to embrace and hold the inner child. But can they do that from and as the sense of presence? So then the inner child with its trauma, with its fear, with its anxiety, with its terror, can all of those feelings which can be very overwhelming, can they be allowed to arise that we don’t identify with that part of our self, but we hold that lovingly and compassionately and gently within the light of our own heart presence. And for me that has been a hugely big part of my own journey about learning how to re-parent the inner child and hold the inner child so that the inner child feels safe enough to be able to kind of let go a little bit. And you don’t feel then that there’s something inside you that when it comes up, it is going to kind of create havoc. Because I’ve seen it in myself and I’ve been around spirituality for 30 years now and I’ve lived in spiritual communities and what I’ve seen so often is people can have very direct and clear recognitions of who they are. But if they haven’t done the trauma work, if they need trauma work, if they haven’t done the inner child work, then that is when that comes up, that kind of takes over. So I’m very much encouraging people to do that work if they need to do that. And that may not even be the place for that. I encourage people, some people I encourage them, you know, to go and work with trauma experts or to go and have some therapy and things like that. For some people that’s very, very healthy and very important. So that they’ve got a stable ground through which to go further. But what is really important in all of this is that if they find a therapist or a trauma healer or whatever it is, that that person also has recognized their higher power. Because if you’re just working on the level of personhood, it doesn’t have enough power. And this is what I believe and what I feel is true, is that authentic healing, it comes when we are in touch with the spirit. That is what gives us the greatest healing. Other things are helpful. I myself had some EMDR for my own trauma, and that was helpful. I think that’s what they call it, EMDR. But nothing has been more helpful for me than being in my right place and holding that wounded in the child within the light of presence. So I do a lot of work with people on that. I feel that’s important. And that’s kind of a little bit unusual for an inviter, spiritual teacher, because often that part is not really not always acknowledged. But I feel I feel open to working on that level with people.

Axel Wennhall
Yeah, I can see in myself I I don’t use the word in a child, but working with strong emotions is this kind of. sometimes I believe I’m working with strong emotions, but really I’m just disconnecting from it. But when I know that I’m actually being present with the strong emotions is if there’s this interest into it, there is this kind of leaning into the emotion to fully fill them. And that isn’t always so pleasant at all. But as you say, when you can be that present and also be the witness of that, that gives the possibility to actually be with the feelings.

Paul Hurcomb
Very beautiful. For me, the willingness to fully feel and fully embrace our humanness is very much an integral part of authentic spirituality. And I feel that inside most of us there is trauma. Inside most of us there’s buried patterns of conditioning. Even if we’ve had a beautiful life, just in the human condition that we’ve been born into, we’ve all picked up a bit of that. And this is one part of the spiritual journey that a lot of sort of new age type spirituality doesn’t seem to acknowledge. But for me, ultimately, spirituality is about self-honesty and authenticity. And that means that if there are strong emotions coming up inside us, can we open to them? Can we feel them? Can we allow ourselves to face them without becoming lost inside them? Without becoming identified and creating a kind of story and a victim around them? Can we just fully face ourselves? And that can be both terrifying and also, you know, I will use the word enlightening, because we begin to see that there is something inside us that can face everything. There is nothing stronger than our own heart presence. And when we know that experientially, then that brings a tremendous freedom, because we’re no longer afraid of ourselves. We’re no longer afraid of what might be kind of lurking inside, because we know that whatever it is, we can be with it. And maybe even we come to the point where we want things to arise. So rather than them being hidden, they come up into the light of the self and we can look at them. But now we can look at them consciously. I mean, Jesus spoke about that, didn’t he? Of the going into the wilderness and facing himself. And there have been many books written about, you know, the dark night of the soul and all this kind of stuff where we truly have to face ourselves. And, you know, only we can do that. No spiritual teacher can do that for us. No belief can do that. Only we can do that. And we’ll only really have the courage and the strength to do that if we can find this sacred presence inside us.

Axel Wennhall
We’re soon going to meditate together under guidance from you. But before that, do you have any advice or any, perhaps any warnings for people who might listen to this and are interested in spirituality and meditation, but are about to start their journey?

Paul Hurcomb
Yeah, I would. I would say to anybody listening to this, that if they have found some parts of it helpful, and some parts of it they haven’t been able to understand or they found confusing, I would say just stay with that which they found helpful. And see if they can just, just honor that and leave the bits that, you know, when I’ve maybe been speaking about the self, you know, some people they can’t understand that. So leave that. And just kind of, yeah, just take what is helpful and leave the rest, I think is the best advice. But what I would also say is that if someone is touched by anything that’s been shared, then that which is touched inside them, that is grace itself. That is the spirit of truth itself. Because nothing I’ve said during this hour we’ve been speaking is for the mind. Not one word I’ve said is for the mind. It’s all for the being. So if something is felt there, then that is felt within them as the being. It is only the being that recognizes itself. And what I encourage people to do is when they come to meetings is more like, can they listen energetically? So they’re not kind of focused on all the words, but can they just listen energetically to where the words are coming from? And can that begin to open up something inside them and does something resonate inside just by energetically hearing what is being shared? Last thing I would like to say to people, if they have got a calling for truth and inner peace, I very much encourage them to follow it. Because nothing else will take that itch away. We all have resistance to it and we all deny it and we all try to get away from it at various different times. But if that is in your heart, then It will always be there until it’s fully embraced. Thank you so much for the questions and interview. Thank you very much.

Axel Wennhall
Yeah, and would you like to perhaps introduce the meditation for the listeners?

Paul Hurcomb
Yeah, yeah, I can do that. Okay, so I just invite whoever’s listening to this recording to join us for a short meditation now to finish this interview. And you can just begin by closing your eyes if you feel comfortable. And by turning the attention inwards. And if the mind is active. And to the best of your ability, just bringing the attention away from the thinking mind and coming into the body. And just seeing if you can feel what is present for you right now in the body. And if it helps you, you can just use the breath to deepen into the body. allowing the breath to come right down into the belly area. And as you feel what is present for you, just see if you can allow it to be as it is. Your feelings, emotions, sensations, just allow them to be as they are without trying to control them in any way. There’s something inside you simply aware of these movements, just observing these movements. If you bring this sense of awareness down into the heart center, to the feeling of presence, that place where you are unconditioned, that place where you are empty of personal identity, place of sacred stillness. allow yourself to come to rest there, a space of no mind, pure being, and just enjoy this deep sense of rest. The last couple of moments of the meditation. Be still and know I am God. Thank you.

Axel Wennhall
Thank you. I just have this feeling that I just want to stay quiet for a while. Yeah. But I do have a few last questions. So if someone listened to this would be interested in your work and your retreats, what’s coming up for you and how can they reach you?

Paul Hurcomb
Well, we have regular meetings, retreats and online meetings all the time, quite regularly. And we come to Scandinavia, Norway and Sweden a couple of times a year. We have things in England, we have things in Spain. And like I say, we have the online meetings so people can join from home. Sometimes I say we because I work with my partner, Ulrika, she’s Swedish, and she’s very much supporting the work I do. She’s very much a part of it and she’s a therapist and she does a lot of help with people as well during the meetings and also outside of the meetings. If people want to look at what I share, there’s a Facebook group called Meetings in Stillness where I write regularly on there, maybe three or four times a week, poems or insights or share videos. There’s also the website, www.meetingsinstillness.com. And then for those people who want to look at some of the older Satsang’s or the videos, there is the YouTube page also called meetingsinstillness.com. There’s a theme here, isn’t there? Meetings in stillness. And last place is there’s a SoundCloud meetings in stillness for audio meditations, which some people like. Yeah, there’s meetings in stillness everywhere.

Axel Wennhall
Last question.

Paul Hurcomb
Yeah.

Axel Wennhall
Do you have any guests that you would like to listen to in an episode of Meditera Mera?

Paul Hurcomb
Oh, that’s a great question that is. What I mean, you know, I’ve got my favorite spiritual teachers and that would be Eckhart and Mooji. But I don’t think they’re going to, I don’t think you’re going to get them here right now. You never know. But what I tell you, the thing that really I love as well is to see where people are bringing this into everyday life. And often I’m sometimes very inspired by watching programs about prisons and things like this where they’re doing mindfulness in prisons or teachers doing it in schools. That’s also very beautiful. And also for me, because I’ve been a big sports person all my life, when I hear about the link between sports and mindfulness. And I think golf really lends itself to it very, very well. And I do golf, mindfulness for golf courses as well, called Conscious Golf. So watch it on Facebook. But I would love you to interview somebody who is doing, you know, this all the time with the golf, maybe a golf pro who is very much into mindfulness work. That would be very, very good. I’d enjoy that very much. Perfect. Yeah.

Axel Wennhall
I actually just read this week that Rory McIlroy meditates.

Paul Hurcomb
Absolutely. Yeah, he’s a big meditator. Yeah.

Axel Wennhall
See if we can get him.

Paul Hurcomb
Yeah. Yeah. Good luck.

Axel Wennhall
Good luck. Thank you. Thank you for coming. Thank you for this conversation and the meditation.

Paul Hurcomb
Wonderful. Thank you for inviting me.

Axel Wennhall
Thank you for listening to this episode of the interactive podcast, Meditera Mera. We hope you have been inspired by our conversation and by Paul’s meditation. It was really great meeting Paul. And if you want to know more about him and his retreats, you’ll find their contact information on our website, breathein.se. This podcast is made by me, Axel Wennhall, who works as a meditation coach, and Gustav Nord, who runs the production company, Flip-Flop Interactive. Together, we also arrange meditation and adventure retreats. You can find more information about our retreats at breathein.se. This was our second episode in English, and we hope to bring in more international guests to the podcast. So if you have any suggestions on inspiring guests, please email us at hi@breathein.se. And if you like this episode, please share it to your English speaking friends, so we can inspire even more people to meditate and perhaps find their true self. And if there’s something that we will bring with us from our conversation with Paul, is it that don’t try to improve your finger, just bring it down.