What is a Good Life? #86
Knowing That We Belong with Nic Askew
On the 86th episode of the What is a Good Life? podcast, I'm delighted to introduce Nic Askew as our guest. Nic is a filmmaker who has discovered a powerful way to use the camera to deepen people's awareness. He has been described in various ways—an itinerant confessor, a disruptive influence, a monk independent of any religion, and an explorer of the inner world.
Over two decades of exploring human connection, authenticity, and insight through film, Nic has uncovered a profoundly simple way for us to be together, which he calls Inner View. This method has led to the creation of the acclaimed Soul Biographies Film Series, an experience of human presence that has resonated with millions.
In this enlightening conversation, Nic clearly articulates and points to a deeply felt sense of universal belonging, without the need to do, improve, or follow steps—simply by virtue of our existence and the lack of separation between us. He discusses how he uses the camera, stillness, and nothing to reveal our innate sense of belonging. With an awareness of this belonging, we can move through the world working on behalf of everyone and everything with life living itself through us.
If you're struggling with feelings of unworthiness, a lack of belonging, or the belief that you need to fix or improve yourself, Nic's insights may help you see beyond these barriers to the simple truth of your inherent worth and obvious belonging.
The weekly clip from the podcast (5 mins), my weekly reflection (3 mins), the full podcast (88 mins), and the weekly questions all follow below.
1. Weekly Clip from the Podcast
2. My weekly reflection
There is a repeated point that Nic makes in this interview: that we all belong to each other, as we are, and there is no separation.
It is rare for me to hear someone say this with such simplicity, without offering any intellectual justification or sounding in any way grandiose. Nic exudes a stillness and being that makes it as plain as stating “I have a nose on my face.”
For Nic, this has become so clear through his work with the camera. He starts each interview with nothing—only stillness. The interviewee begins to talk or not, and it goes wherever it goes.
He makes it clear that he is not "holding space" or using any terminology that we might try to impose on stillness and nothingness, or perhaps it is the subtraction of something that gets in our way.
The more he embodies this stillness, the more he finds life living itself through him; the more he feels connection with another, a belonging, and no separation. When he takes action from this source, and with the awareness of being part of everything, he finds himself working on behalf of everyone and everything, as that is what he is a part of.
It becomes an inevitable eventuality rather than a willingness or an effort to be “good” or virtuous. The simplicity he points to echoes much of what I am discovering and noticing in my own life.
We have become so conditioned to think we are separate, self-made, independent, or in competition with one another that we believe we have to be worthy of belonging, we must do or improve something about ourselves, or be struck by a bolt of enlightenment to even consider the possibility of our connectedness.
I often find that our spiritual paths can mirror those of our striving self-development paths, where at their core, we are trying to get somewhere, improve, believing we must do something to be.
However, I see it much more as a problem of subtlety rather than a need for transformation or the requirement to reach a destination. The synthetic busyness of modern life currently squeezes our perception of time, that we rarely take a moment to notice.
If you truly took the time with someone, without an agenda, imposed time limit, or the perspective that there was something to fix or become, listened with all of you without trying to listen, and were still, you would not only see the wonder in them but also get a very clear sense of the interweaving of our beings.
We have become so accustomed to offering solutions, so uncomfortable with the pulsing and fluctuating nature of human experience, that we have lost the ability to sit with another without a series of labels, mechanical responses, or platitudes. We have piled rubble upon our deep sense of connection and belonging.
What continues to give me optimism is how easy and natural it can actually be.
I run Silent Conversations, free gatherings on Zoom (just send me your email if you would like to be added to a mailing list to be kept informed of their scheduling), where I open up the conversation with anywhere from 10 to 45 minutes of silence.
In the most recent silent conversation last week, after just twenty minutes of shared silence, when the group had the chance to reflect on the silence, even though many were meeting each other for the first time, they spoke of an undeniable bond between us. They felt that we somehow had each other’s back, that we could see the best in each other, and that it felt like we had shared a journey together.
The more we come together in silence—or better put, stillness—I am observing and feeling that this sense of a deeper connection is inevitable.
It does not require you to do anything; rather, it involves letting go or opening your clenched fists to release the conditioning that keeps us apart, even when that conditioning may appear, on the surface, as a desire to help.
Nic gives several examples in this interview of not needing to say or do anything to support someone or offer comfort. Simply our presence and stillness can offer more than any words can.
As obsessed as we are with wanting to say the “right” thing, I am finding that silence opens up dimensions of relating that allow me and another to sit together, whatever has been said, holding each other in attention, without suggesting that something is wrong or that there is somewhere to go, our beings merely saying, “here we are,” and letting things unfold as they will.
Tears may come, laughter, words too; I am not suggesting we should sit in silence perpetually, but there is a significant difference between words that flow from stillness and those that forcefully seek to solve an intellectual puzzle.
At a recent silent conversation, a participant said, “Words don’t break the silence, but an agenda does.” When words come from that source of life, free from the pressure of what we are expected to say, the conversation and relationship can benefit profoundly from the wisdom of that stillness.
As Nic himself points out, “I suspect this all might be simpler than we could have ever imagined.”
3. Full Episode - Knowing That We Belong with Nic Askew - What is a Good Life? #86
Click here for Apple and Amazon
4. This week’s Questions
If you felt a deep sense of belonging to everything and everyone, how might you show up differently in the world?
Consider for a moment that there is nothing for you to do or become in order to belong. What does that evoke in you?
About Me
I am a coach and writer based in Berlin, via Dublin, Ireland. I started this project in 2021, for which I’ve now interviewed over 200 people. I’m not looking to prescribe universal answers, more that the guests’ lines of inquiry, musings, experiences, and curiosities spark your own inquiry into what the question means to you. I am also trying to share more genuine expressions of the human experience and more meaningful conversations.
If you would like to work with me to explore your own lines of self-inquiry, experiences I create to stimulate more meaningful group conversations, trust, and connection, or you simply want to get in touch, here’s my email and LinkedIn.
Thank you for all of this Mark. I added to my substack with the following note;
If someone were to set out with the task of capturing the sightedness with which Soul Biographies have been made, I imagine it would be quite some task. However, I believe this podcast might in many ways have done just this.
I did not remember what had been said, but on listening back to the recording I recognize it to possess the quality of the biography of all of this. Of the conclusion thus far of two decades of undivided human attention. And for those who have followed this Inner View work for years, this podcast may be time well spent.
In a world that often values productivity over presence, your reflection on the quiet power of stillness is a much needed reminder. It's in the pauses, the unspoken moments, where true connection and understanding reside. Thank you for inviting us to appreciate the profound simplicity of being.