So is your inner voice shooting off at the mouth again too? You know the voice Im talking about right? Its the one in your head right now saying “what inner voice… I dont have an ‘inner voice’… he’s crazy!”.

I wish I was back in the ‘inner voice’ sales room… in hindsight I would have chosen that quiet, content and humble one in the corner. How this loud mouthed, easily distracted and self obsessed one got in my head I will never know.

So anyway, my 1 year old son was on my lap eating avocado.

My inner voice (lets call it ‘IV’ for short)… goes off.

You’d think I could click into the moment and sit with this beautiful little man as he munched on a bit of avocado, wiped a little in his ear, stared at it intensely, put some in my mouth (and nose) and so on. He was simply living in that moment… his world was the avocado, the taste, the sensation, the experience. Who could have thought an avocado could bring so much joy and wonderment?

Meanwhile my IV was chattering noisily, “should have worn my green shorts, wish i’d had more sleep, this is taking forever, I should have got my breakfast first… etc etc.” And being multi talented, IV was also in the future, “I’ve got to check email, when’s Anne going to take him, what are we going to have for dinner tonight”…

(Ok i lie. I did not think about dinner at all, I just wanted to show that a male could plan dinner more than 20 minutes before it happens… but yes, I was bluffing… I can’t.)

Our 5 yr old daughter does not seem to be inflicted with the same chattering, loud mouthed inner voice. The other day after some good news we decided to have a family celebration. We started to get ready to go out and at that moment Anne got an important call from a family member and spent the next hour and a half on the phone.

My IV was NOT HAPPY! Every two minutes it was getting me to check on Anne, display ridiculous body language and pained expressions to get her off the phone… or at least express my ongoing annoyance at the sudden change of plans.

I was just getting in my stride… you know, building up a momentum to my silent whinging and impatience, when I was rudely interrupted by my daughter.

In between bothering Anne I had been playing with my daughter and son on the sofa. I was barely aware of what we were doing until about an hour into it and my daughter turned to me with a massive smile and said, “I love this celebration!”

“Oh”, went IV for once slightly embarassed, “I guess life is still happening now isn’t it?”

So how do I deal with my loud mouthed IV?

Well for starters, I’ve learnt to simply acknowledge what it says rather than yelling back to tell it to shut up… that’s halved the noise in my head already.

But the real key has been hanging out with an amazing peer group of present, mindful, wise people. No… not the local Budhist society, or the Dalai Lama and his crew even…

The peer group that I aspire to learn from and emulate in their ability to be in the moment and engage with life?

Well quite simply… It’s my kids!!!

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