Inner Rhythm

6 hours ago
6 min read

Inner Rhythm

14:33

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To live in rhythm with life is to live from the heart.

In heart-centred living, we move with the way of things.

Not striving.

Not resisting.

Aligned with the rhythm that carries us.

The heart centre is the gateway to a deeper, more connected way of being —

a place where we feel held by the rhythm of life.

There is an old Zen teaching that says:

“The Great Way has no gate; there are a thousand paths to it.”

This teaching reminds us that rhythm — not certainty — is what holds us.

Golden filaments of light weaving through darkness and gathering at a radiant centre, symbolising many paths returning to one source.

Old wisdom tells us that while our paths are many,

they arise from the same source.

They lead to the same place.

This speaks to an essential rhythm — that diversity springs from unity.

The rhythm of life links the past, present, and future.

It is a living force within us all — breath, heartbeat, aliveness.

It connects us to earth, to our ancestors, to our inner truth.

It moves through cycles of birth, growth, loss, death, and regeneration

And it moves us.

Sometimes gently.

Sometimes across oceans.

Land, Time, and Belonging

I came to this wild and strange land, Australia, when I was five.

We often drove down the southwest coast and camped out beside the ocean.

I’d lay on the sand under the stars and tell them,

“When I grow up, I’m going to live beside this mighty ocean.”

After a turbulent decade of early adult life, that’s exactly what I did. And it is this land that fuels my dreams, my imagination, my inspiration. The work I do.

I choose to live simply. To be guided by the sun, moon and stars - the cycles of life. To listen to the voice of my heart, to walk out with the elements, to listen to what my body needs, to see the beauty all around me and within me. To pay attention to, and act on, my dreams and desires. To take at least a moment each day to rejoice in the wonder of my life.

This year brings a new rhythm.

Attuning to a new rhythm begins with tuning into our own rhythm — which our current lunar practice is all about. When we cultivate trust in our own rhythm, we find simple ways to stay connected to the greater rhythm of life.

In recent weeks, my region has experienced flash heatwaves, wildfires, and sudden floods that carried cars and caravans out to sea. These are the times we are living in. What steadies us now is not about having answers or certainty, but learning how to keep our footing.

How to be comfortable with the unknown —The Unexpected

One of the most reliable ways we do this is by tending our inner life — by strengthening our sense of belonging and trust in ourselves. What matters is that we trust how and what we receive — no one else can validate our inner knowing or authorise our imagination for us. These are mystical aspects of our inner being and they are part of how we perceive the world accurately.

Imagination helps us feel our place in the larger field of life. It allows us to become wayfinders — adjusting our sails to catch the winds of life and find our way.

This kind of knowing is felt. As Joy Harjo writes, “The voice of inner truth, or the knowing, has access to the wisdom of eternal knowledge. The perspective of that voice is timeless.” Our knowing is the deep sense of something being true or not true. The body recognises this first. If we pause and ask — ‘does this bring me peace?’ — we have our answer. If it doesn’t bring peace it is not the right course to take.

We find our rhythm most easily in stillness — in moments where we pay attention to our inner voice. When we listen to, and act on, that voice — our inner knowing — we come into flow, in rhythm with our life.

Each of us carries an internal rhythm — the cadence of breath, the beat of the heart, the felt sense of yes, no, or not yet.

When we attend to this rhythm, the body settles and perception becomes clearer.

Our inner rhythm comes into relationship with the rhythm of life around us.

Our inner rhythm does not exist in isolation. It is always attuning with life around us — responding to light and dark, to season and temperature, to rest and movement, to closeness and space. In times of grief or loss, rhythm can feel disrupted or fragile, yet it is often rhythm — breath, presence, simple repetition — that gently carries us through.

Modern life can pull us away from rhythm by rewarding urgency and constant engagement. When rhythm is lost, regulation is lost too, and we can become fatigued, vigilant, or disconnected.

Returning to rhythm is a practical act of care. It happens through simple, daily practices — paying attention to the breath, honouring rest and spaciousness, and spending time outside, present to the ecosystem around us. When we move at a pace that is sustainable for our wellbeing, rhythm becomes a reference point — steadiness grounded in knowing where you are, and trusting your inner guidance.

Time has its own rhythm. It is one of Mother Earth’s gifts.

We come to know it through cycles and seasons —through the first flowers of spring, through the turning of light and dark, where the moon is rising — through nature’s signs that life is shifting.

When we take time — as a practice — to walk, to sit, to breathe, to be present — we come back into our own rhythm. Then our perception of time changes — how it moves, and how we can choose to move with it: the way light shifts, tides change, a new day dawns.

This is how rhythm becomes orientation, and how time becomes something we can trust — not as a schedule to keep, but as a living field we are already part of.

Reading Rhythm in Sky, Moon, and Season

Across Australia, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples have read time through the night sky for more than 65,000 years. The sky has long been a living guide — orienting people to season, movement, and right timing. Not only through the bright points of light, but through the dark spaces too — the shapes formed in the Milky Way itself.

One of these is known as the Emu in the Sky.

The Milky Way stretches across a dark night sky above a quiet shoreline and silhouetted trees, with the dark dust lanes forming the shape known as the Emu in the Sky.

Formed by the dark dust lanes of the Milky Way, the orientation of the Emu marks where one is in time. As the Emu changes position, life on the land is changing too. Its appearance signals seasonal transitions — including when emu eggs may be gathered, and when waterholes are full.

The Emu in the Sky demonstrates a profound yet simple understanding of how rhythm orients us. By observing these celestial movements people know where they are and how to live in right relationship with the moment they are in.

One of the simplest ways many of us can stay connected to rhythm is through the cycles of the Moon. The Moon has shaped life on Earth for billions of years. Its steady phases — waxing, full, waning, dark — offer a shared rhythm of return. No matter where we are in the world, the same moon rises. It is the same moon our ancestors watched, and the same moon that will shine on those yet to be born.

The Moon informs tides, sleep cycles, and biological rhythms across countless species. Science journalist Rebecca Boyle calls the Moon “the captain of life’s rhythms,” noting its influence on reproduction, behaviour, and rest. Like the stars, the moon guides us through real time.

Across the natural world, beings orient themselves by rhythm rather than instruction. Newly hatched sea turtles, for example, find their way to the ocean by responding to subtle cues — light on water, the slope of sand, the pull of tide.

In Kakadu, in northern Australia, the Traditional Owners recognise six seasons, not defined by dates, but by signs — changes in weather, the look of the sky, rainfall, plants, animals, and water. This knowledge, refined over tens of thousands of years, guides how people live, gather food, and care for Country.

Seasons arrive when nature is ready.

Stars tell us where we are. The Moon keeps us in step. The seasons show us how to live accordingly.

When we learn to read rhythm in this way — in our bodies, in the sky, on the land and sea — life becomes more navigable. Not because we control it, but because we are in relationship with it.

Our rhythm is our steadiness and we tend and harmonise it through presence.

As we move through 2026 a new rhythm is emerging. It’s a threshold time where we have the opportunity begin new ways of being.