EPISODE #163
How Much Life Are You Willing to Let In?
with Barbara Patterson
About This Episode
There are times when life looks fine on the outside – work is flowing, relationships are steady – yet something inside feels muted. A quiet flatness.
That subtle hum of “blah.”
In this solo episode, Barb explores how that feeling can often be a sign that we’ve drifted into our minds, narrating, managing, and interpreting life instead of living it directly.
Drawing on a James Joyce quote, “Mr. Duffy lived a short distance from his body,” she reflects on how our mental protectors, once useful, can begin to constrict the very aliveness we long for.
Through story and reflection, Barb invites you to notice where you might be living one step removed and to rediscover what happens when you let life in, not as something to fix or improve, but as an opening to more connection, richness, and felt presence.
“Maybe the question isn’t how do I live more fully,
but how much life am I willing to let in – even when it stirs me?”
Show Notes
- [00:00] – Letting Life In: An Introduction
- [01:41] – The Distance from Our Bodies
- [04:23] – The Protection of Observation
- [06:02] – The Impact of Internal Guards
- [09:21] – The Call to Aliveness
- [12:34] – Exploring Direct Experience
HAVE QUESTIONS FOR BARB?
Meet Your Host
Barbara Patterson is the owner of a global coaching and consulting company helping entrepreneurs, leaders, and those who serve them access more clarity and creativity, have greater impact, build powerful relationships, and experience higher levels of fulfillment in work and life. She is the founder of Innerverse Academy, a global platform and community designed to point people to the source of human potential and the relationship between their inner world and their work in the world.
You can follow Barb on Linkedin and Instagram. You can also learn more about Barb and her decades of work here.
