Soren Ross - Soren Ross (Page 2)

Worn house slippers at an open doorway with morning light streaming through - symbolizing the return home after a retreat

The Honest Mirror

The Version of You That Only Works at Retreats

The transformation was real. It was also borrowed. Why retreat states fade when you get home - and why that's not a failure of integration.

An unfinished building structure at dusk with exposed steel beams and scaffolding against a muted sky

The Honest Mirror

The Person I Was Talking To Didn't Exist

I spent months building a relationship in my head while she was just being friendly. How positive thinking becomes scaffolding for self-deception.

A wooden chair faces an open doorway leading to a long hallway with multiple doors disappearing into soft fog, morning light casting geometric shadows on worn hardwood floor

Thinking for Yourself

I Learned to Verify Everything. Then I Got Stuck.

I learned to verify everything after snap judgments failed me. Then verification became its own problem. One question that cuts through the delay.

Empty meditation cushion beside an untouched phone in early morning light - the space between intention and action

The Honest Mirror

The Real Reason You Don't Do What You Know Is Good

You know what works. You still won't do it tomorrow. It's not laziness or lack of discipline - it's something harder to admit.

A single figure standing at the beginning of a narrow mountain path at dawn, looking ahead. Muted earth tones, fog in the distance. No visible face. Solitary but not lonely.

Foundation

I Am The Foundation: Why I Stopped Looking for Answers Outside Myself

After thirty-two years in two different spiritual systems, the most important thing I learned: you are the only foundation that can't be taken away.

Practice

Twenty Years of Meditation: What Changed (And What Didn't)

After 20 years of meditation and 7 in a spiritual organization, here's what actually changed - and what didn't. No transformation story. Just honest inventory.

A single wooden door standing alone in an open field at dusk

Thinking for Yourself

What Seven Years in a Spiritual Organization Taught Me (And What It Took to Leave)

The funny thing about cults is that nobody inside calls them that. I was twenty-something, European, and convinced I had found something real. Seven years later, I walked out.

Practice

Why I Journal (And Why You Might Not Need To)

I've been journaling for thirty years. Not every day - that's a myth. But consistently enough that I have notebooks stacked in boxes, filled with versions of myself I barely recognize.

The Honest Mirror

The Last Thing You Try to Control

I was ending a professional relationship. Five sentences would have been enough. I wrote 847 words instead - and that wasn't even the first draft. Twenty years of practicing non-attachment, and I still couldn't let someone misunderstand me.

Thinking for Yourself

When the Messenger Ruins the Message

I closed a YouTube video in one second because someone looked old and tired. Years earlier, a TV crew dismissed us in one second because we looked young and naive. Different judgments, same mechanism, and I've been on both sides.

Thinking for Yourself

The Fanaticism Test

I run this test regularly like antivirus software for the soul: Can I disagree with my teacher and still respect them? Can I question the system and still practice within it?

The Honest Mirror

I Woke Up to Someone Else's Alarm

I spent years being available to everyone, thinking it made me helpful. What it actually made me was scattered, reactive, and never quite present anywhere.

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