One of my LinkedIn contacts, a coach who works with new coaches, sent me a video asking me if she could share her seven steps to being present.

The idea, which is in my experience correct, is that when we are present, transformation, both of ourselves and others, is a lot easier.

But the idea that presence can be reduced to steps is silly, and maybe even dangerous.

There are times when I am present and there are times when I am not. And there is a whole range in between.

When I am present, there is little or sometimes even nothing on my mind. I am simply here, with the person or people in front of me.

I am fully responsive to what is happening. I can be completely confident that my full creative capacity (which of course isn’t really “mine”) is online.

But if I’m thinking, “Do I have good eye contact? Am I acknowledging what the person is saying? Am I mirroring their posture?” and other things that books tell me are the ingredients that comprise presence, I am the exact opposite of present. I’m focused on me, not what is happening in front of me.

This is why I say you can’t “do” presence.

Presence is what happens when you stop doing, or trying to do, anything.

Presence is what happens when you even stop trying to “do” being.

Presence is our natural state, what is left when the doing and trying stop.

It can be hard to understand this until you notice when you are in it.

But once you see that, once you see the effortlessness, the utter simplicity, you will find yourself, catch yourself even, in presence more and more of the time.

When have you caught yourself? What’s different, for you and those you are with, when you fall into presence?

More and more, I see that people already know what to do. They just don’t know that they know. And even if they know, they don’t trust that they do.

Why?

Most of us in the corporate world have been taught, have been trained even, that decisions are made with data. That important things like strategy and innovation are best accomplished with analysis and spreadsheets and PowerPoint decks, often prepared by expensive management consultants.

But this is exactly backwards from what actually happens.

Scientists have concluded, over and over, that we make decisions first and then justify them with information and analysis.

In other words, we use the data to justify, to literally rationalize, what we already know but cannot explain.

We believe that it is the rational, the quantifiable, that is real. That our feelings can’t be trusted.

And yet everyone I talk to has had a “knowing” at some point that they can’t explain, and that they acted on anyway. Often in an important area of their lives. (For example, we don’t typically decide who to date based on a spreadsheet.)

My experience is that this knowing, when you recognize it and learn to trust it, is the most powerful decision making tool that we have.

It is a felt sense. It isn’t eager or anxious or impulsive. It doesn’t feel frantic.

It is deep. It is calm. It will quietly remind you and wait.

It’s not offended if you ignore it. But it can be persistent.

Do you know what I’m talking about? That job you knew you should take even though it paid less? That career shift that has been beckoning, but that you just can’t justify yet?

That idea for a new product or service that could change everything?

That’s your innate wisdom. And it can be cultivated.

Here’s an experiment for you–for the next week, make your decisions, at least the small ones, based on your sense of knowing. Your immediate response, yes or no, to what you should do.

This doesn’t have to be a big decision like where to work or whom to marry.

But it could be where to eat. It could be picking up the phone to call that person who just came to mind. Or taking an action based on a song lyric that comes to mind.

See what happens. See what surprises you.

Begin to see that this sense can be trusted.

And let me know what you learn along the way.

Not perfect as in, without flaws, but perfect as in, “exactly who you are supposed to be right now.”

Despite all the time we spend thinking that we could be different, that we could have done things differently, that anything could (or should) be different than the way things are, I see no evidence that this is true.

The only evidence that I see is that, no matter what we might think about the matter, things, and you, and I, are exactly the way they are because that is the only way they can be.

Otherwise they would be different. Right?

Does that mean we are done learning and growing? Does that mean that we should somehow stop trying to improve ourselves and the planet?

Of course not.

But think of the trillions of events that conspired to bring you right here, right now. From the conditions that had to be just right to create our universe to the conditions that had to be just right to create you.

You are almost infinitely improbable.

Exactly as you are.

Sounds pretty damn perfect to me.

A shout out to my teacher, the late Doug Silsbee, for inspiring this post.

I’ve been reading a great book, “Parenting in the Age of Attention Snatchers,” by Lucy Jo Palladino, PhD.

But it’s not just about kids, or parenting.

It’s about brains. Everyone’s brains.

According to experts, we have two kinds of attention—voluntary and involuntary.

Involuntary (or bottom up) attention is where we find ourselves a lot of the time. It’s the pull of social media (maybe even this post), the pull of video games or Netflix or any of the distractions that suddenly, seemingly without warning, grab us.

Voluntary (or top down) attention is the act of CHOOSING where to devote our attention. Voluntary attention is required for things like writing, or learning an instrument, or doing the actual work of our work (rather than distracting ourselves with YouTube videos to “learn” something).

Voluntary attention uses technology as a tool rather than as a toy.

There’s nothing wrong with getting lost in a video game or a new series. As long as we know we are doing it.

But it becomes a problem when it pulls us from what we really want to do. From the thing that might feel hard, but necessary.

And the more you are able to strengthen your voluntary attention, the more you can use it to create what you are called to create.

What practice are you using to increase your voluntary attention? One of my favorites is mindfulness. My son’s is martial arts.

What’s yours?