This reflection is drawn from Practicing Living Presence: Discovering the Mind of Christ Within by Cynthia Bourgeault. Chapter 5 of her course explores how we “find our way by smell, by feel,” and it upends our modern fixation on defining who we are. This piece is my take on that insight, a field note from the wilderness between personality and presence.
The course itself is based on Living Presence: A Sufi Way to Mindfulness & the Essential Self by Kabir Helminski. If you want to deepen into the roots of this teaching, Helminski’s book is a perfect companion—direct, luminous, and full of the fragrance Bourgeault keeps pointing toward.
Somewhere between therapy culture and TikTok spirituality, we decided “finding your true self” was the ultimate quest. As if the divine could be cornered in a Myers-Briggs chart or a trauma-informed Enneagram circle.
We hold retreats to “reclaim our authenticity,” buy hoodies that say Be You, and pay coaches to help us “stand in our truth.” But the harder we stand, the more we stink of performance.
Cynthia Bourgeault once said you don’t find your real self by definition, you find it “by smell, by feel.” The soul, she insists, is not a product you can brand. It’s more like yeast, alive, active, invisible until the heat hits.
Our culture hates that. It wants a downloadable identity, not a fermenting mystery.
Presence doesn’t care who you think you are. Presence just wants to breathe through you.
It’s like incense, you can’t grab it, you can only scent the air and know something holy passed through.
The Cult of Self-Definition
Modern spirituality keeps polishing the ego and calling it soul work. We take quizzes to prove our uniqueness and then spend the next decade defending it.
But personality isn’t the enemy, it’s just a tool. A costume for crossing the stage. The problem is we mistake the costume for the actor. We keep editing our bios while the play moves on without us.
Trying to “find yourself” is like trying to smell your own nose. The moment you name it, you lose the scent.
Presence isn’t self-knowledge, it’s self-forgetting.
It’s that moment when the doer dissolves and what remains is pure seeing.
Virgin Monk Boy would say the moment you think you’ve nailed enlightenment, it wriggles off the hook and swims away. You were never supposed to catch it. You were supposed to notice the water.
Field Guide: Personality vs Presence
You’re in Personality when…
You’re curating your emotions for the algorithm.
You’re calculating how enlightened you sound while describing your shadow work.
Praise and blame dictate your mood for the day.
Every conversation is a subtle résumé update.
You think stillness is “doing nothing.”
You’re in Presence when…
Silence doesn’t demand an explanation.
You can feel the difference between thinking and sensing.
You forget to manage how you appear because you’ve actually arrived.
The moment smells alive, fresh bread, cut grass, candle smoke, rain.
Love moves through you faster than your opinions can.
Presence can’t be summoned by affirmations. It grows in the compost of attention. You notice what’s here, the sounds, the body, the breath, and let reality be what it is. That noticing becomes scent.
Virgin Monk Boy translation: The Kingdom of Heaven has better things to do than update your personal brand. It shows up every time you stop trying to make a good impression on God.
How to Lose Yourself Correctly
Stop polishing the mirror and start breathing on it.
You can’t achieve presence, you can only stop interfering with it.
The more you chase your “authentic self,” the more you guarantee you’ll miss it.
Instead, experiment with Bourgeault’s back-door method.
Find your way by smell.
By the faint musk of peace when you stop arguing with life.
By the scent of humility that rises when you quit proving your worth.
By the fragrance of mercy that appears whenever you stop fixing everyone else.
You’ll know you’re close when words feel too loud and the air feels thick with recognition.
Virgin Monk Boy tip: Don’t ask the divine for directions, it’s already riding shotgun. The problem is you keep arguing with the driver.
Closing
Maybe the “true self” isn’t something we become. Maybe it’s what’s left when personality relaxes its grip and the divine gets a whiff of fresh air.
Stop hunting your identity like a truffle pig.
Start noticing the aroma of being itself.
It’s already everywhere, on your skin, in your breath, in the quiet space between thoughts.
All you have to do is smell.
Blessed be the ones who stop trying to find themselves long enough to notice they were never lost.
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Well nuts I got busted 😳😅 sorry but gonna argue with driver