We Are Movement Itself
Recognizing Life as Pure Becoming (Part 2 of 4)
A few weeks ago, a reader’s insight about “breath” in the comments of an essay (Embrace the Confusion) led to an unexpected revelation. Movement and stillness aren’t opposites; they are intimate dance partners in the ballroom of life.
To summarize how we got here, the dialogue was in response to a challenge I presented to readers that was at the heart of my original essay:
Move first, understand later.
“Perhaps breathe is a more appropriate verb,” the reader suggested. “Breathe first, understand later. To breathe is to both move and be still.”
I appreciated the comment, but this observation invited a deeper question:
If breathing embodies both motion and stillness, what does that tell us about how we should face uncertainty?
That question opened the door to a simple yet profound insight. We are not static beings who sometimes move. We are movement itself: life temporarily shaped into the embodied patterns that we call human identity and personality.
“If we are, at our essence, movement,” I found myself writing in the comments in response to the reader’s challenge, “then to ‘move’ is also to be, to exist, to become aligned with one’s essence. When I pause and say, ‘I am,’ I have moved.”
These words surprised me even as I was typing them. They arose from somewhere deeper than conscious thought, pointing toward a truth that I was only beginning to grasp and trying to decipher with words.
This is Part 2 of a four-part meditation on what it means to embrace confusion, building on the first essay’s exploration of how the quality of our movement matters (Breathing Room). In this essay, we ask a more fundamental question:
What does it mean to be movement itself? And how do we live in alignment with that deeper mystery, especially when we feel uncertain or confused?
To put it another way:
If we are always in motion, how do we find the stillness necessary to face uncertain outcomes?
The Illusion of Stillness
We speak of stillness as if it were the opposite of movement, but this is an illusion.
Even in our deepest meditation, we are breathing. Our heart is beating. Blood flows through our veins. Neural networks fire. Cells divide, renew, die, and are born. The earth spins. The solar system races through space.
We are never not moving.
What we call stillness is really a particular kind of awareness, a conscious participation in the movement that is always happening rather than an absence of movement itself.
In other words, stillness isn’t the absence of motion. It’s a conscious way of being with the motion that’s always present. It’s not the end of movement, but a different way of moving.
The reader suggested this nuance when they wrote, “to be moving is to be breathing.” They recognized that existence itself is a form of movement, that being alive means being in motion at levels both visible and invisible.
This recognition is important.
If we are essentially movement, then the question isn’t whether we move when confusion arises. The question is how we can move wisely, or how to align our conscious movement with the deeper movement of life itself.
I’ve experienced this shift in my own moments of deepest uncertainty.
Instead of asking “Should I act or wait?” I began asking “How is life asking me to move right now?” That one shift in language transformed how I approached decisions.
Sometimes the answer was bold action. Sometimes it was patient listening. But always, it was some form of movement aligned with what the moment was calling for.
The Living Spectrum
So far, we’ve seen that stillness is not the opposite of movement, but a particular form of it. Now let’s look more closely at the different kinds of movement available to us.
Once we recognize that we are always moving, a whole spectrum of movement becomes visible, each with its own function and timing:
Physical movement grounds us in space. The problem-solving walk, the dance that loosens stuck energy, the change of environment that sparks new perspective.
Emotional movement carries us through inner landscapes. Grief that softens into acceptance, anger that transforms into clarity, fear that shifts into excitement.
Mental movement shifts our thoughts and deepens our understanding. The mind never stops moving, and confusion often signals this movement in transition.
Social movement connects us to others. Conversations, reactions, silences. All of them move us and shape who we are becoming.
Spiritual movement realigns us with the sacred. This is the deepest current, guiding us toward meaning, purpose, and wholeness in our life.
The art of living wisely involves learning to recognize which type of movement each moment calls for.
When confusion arises, we can ask:
What type of movement wants to happen here?
I’m learning to trust these different invitations. Sometimes confusion calls for a long run to clear my head. Sometimes it calls for sitting with difficult emotions until they soften into deeper understanding of my inner demons. Sometimes it calls for reaching out to a friend.
And sometimes—more often than not—it calls for surrender, for letting go of the need to control or figure everything out in the moment.
The key is recognizing that confusion itself is information about movement already happening within us.
Movement as Becoming
Perhaps the most profound insight from this dialogue is that movement and becoming are the same thing.
Every time we move, we become more of who we are through the choices we make. Not just physically, but emotionally, mentally, socially, and spiritually. Each type of movement shapes us, changes us, reveals new dimensions of who we are becoming.
The reader recognized this when they described confusion as “an invitation to look within ourselves, to take those first steps towards discerning what is causing discomfort or dissonance.”
This is movement toward self-knowledge. Movement toward wholeness. Movement that aligns with our deepest truth.
What this understanding offers is a completely different relationship to confusion and uncertainty. Instead of seeing them as obstacles, we can begin to recognize them as invitations. Invitations to explore the full spectrum of movement available to us and already unfolding within us.
Not all movement needs to be efficient or goal-directed.
Sometimes the most important movement is the one that looks like stillness: the movement of deep listening, of being present, of allowing space for something new to emerge.
Sometimes confusion calls for what looks like wasting time: sitting by a river, taking a long bath, staring out the window. These aren’t non-movements. They’re movements toward mindfulness, toward the kind of awareness that allows new possibilities to become visible.
The reader’s insight about breath honors this slower, subtler kind of movement. It reminds us that sometimes the most profound action is the one that creates space for deeper wisdom to emerge.
The Dance Continues
As I reflect on this entire dialogue, I’m struck by how it demonstrates the very principle it explores. Life calls for different types of movement working together.
The reader offered intellectual movement by challenging assumptions and asking new questions. I responded with emotional movement, allowing defensiveness to soften into curiosity. Together, we created social movement through dialogue, an organic exchange that generated new insights for both of us.
And beneath it all, there was spiritual movement, a quiet alignment with something greater than either of us, a willingness to be changed by the encounter.
None of us was static.
We were all moving, all becoming, all participating in the larger dance of consciousness exploring itself.
Perhaps the deepest truth that emerged is the revelation that the conversation itself was a form of movement. It was the movement of understanding evolving through encounter, the movement of relationship deepening through exchange.
We are all always moving, always becoming, always participating in the infinite dance of life. Confusion is not a place to get stuck. It’s a place where the dance becomes more interesting, more alive, more free.
The reader who challenged my phrase—Move first, understand later—gave me a gift. They helped me see that movement is not just something we do, but something we are. They revealed that we exist as expressions of the same creative movement that animates the entire universe.
And in that recognition, the choice becomes not whether to move when confusion arises, but how to move in harmony with the deeper intelligence and consciousness that flows through all things.
Maybe a revised phrase would be:
From movement comes deeper understanding of who we are.
Because we are not separate from the movement that flows through all things. We are that movement, even if only temporarily aware of itself and able to choose how it expresses itself, right here, and right now.
And that, perhaps, is the most profound movement of all.
The movement of life becoming conscious of its creative power.
One moment of confusion at a time.
In solidarity,
P.S. As always, thank you for reading this edition of Freedom Papers. If you found this piece meaningful, share it with a friend. If it moved you, consider supporting with a paid subscription or buying me a coffee. This creative exploration happens because readers like you believe words and stories matter.
Your support gives me the freedom to write from the heart.
This resonates so loudly! I just finished writing a series on this and I'm thrilled to see others writing and sharing these techniques.
Excellent observations and beautifully articulated. 🙏