The Way of Stillness
A Contemplative Practice for the journey within
from seed to sapling, from sapling to tree
In a world of constant motion, this practice offers a sacred pause, a return to stillness, breath, and the quiet awareness beneath thought.
The Way of Stillness offers three streams of guided practice. Here the journey unfolds slowly, from seed to sapling, from sapling to tree, until silence itself becomes your teacher.
Each Sit Time weaves gentle teaching with guided practice, inviting you into the deeper rhythm of Presence, a way of seeing, resting, and becoming more fully alive.
The Way of Stillness is not upward but inward, a spiral that deepens with every return.
For some, the best way to engage is simply to step inside and start. If you’re looking for the tools of stillness, The Garden Shed is a quiet corner where you’ll find guided sits, teachings, and soundscapes to help you begin right away. Enter The Garden Shed,
However, if you’d like to follow the path more slowly, from seed to sapling, from sapling to tree, keep reading below to explore the journey of Tending the Garden.
About This Practice.
This practice of 12 Guided Sit Times is not something to master, but invitations to return, again and again, to the stillness at the heart of things.
Each sit blends a short teaching with a time of guided silence. You can begin anywhere, but most people start with The Seed Stage, a gentle introduction to Centering Prayer and the rhythm of inner stillness.
The journey is not linear or upward. It moves in widening circles, returning, deepening, softening, like the rings of a tree or the spiral of the butterfly’s path. Each round through the stages reveals new layers of Presence.
Choose the time that feels right for today. Sit with open hands. Let silence do its quiet work within you.
If you’re new to contemplative practice, begin with “The Seed.”
twenty minutes is enough to begin the journey.
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Learning to Be Still
Every beginning holds a mystery.
The Seed is where stillness begins, where we learn to listen beneath the noise, to feel the soil of our being soften again.
These four practices invite the first roots of contemplation to form.
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Abiding in the Space Between
From Sapling to Tree, Deepening in Presence
The Sapling teaches us how to stand, to stretch toward light, and to trust the unseen roots below.
These four practices guide the soul through early growth, where faith deepens and resilience forms.
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Living from the Inner Room
The Tree is the soul matured, no longer striving to grow, but quietly abiding.
In time, stillness becomes a way of life. The mature tree stands as a symbol of integration, rooted, spacious, and awake.
These four practices rest in the spaciousness of Presence, where giving and receiving become one. Here, contemplation becomes communion.
This is not a climb to the summit, but a slow circling toward the heart.
THE SEED STAGE
Learning to be Still
From Seed to Sprout - The Beginnings of Presence
Every journey of stillness begins in hiddenness.
The seed stage invites you to slow down, breathe, and learn the gentle rhythm of returning to your Inner Room.
Through short teachings and guided sits, from seed to sprout, we begin to sense the Love that holds all things.
These early practices root the soul in quiet trust, where growth unfolds naturally in the light of grace.
The Breath Prayer – Breath awareness and sacred rhythm
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Breath awareness and sacred rhythm.
Each breath is a prayer, each inhale and exhale a whisper of the sacred name, Yah…weh.
Long before words or beliefs, there is this living rhythm within us, the pulse of creation itself.
As you settle into this practice, allow your breathing to become slow and gentle, a doorway to Presence.
You are not trying to change or control anything, only to remember what has always been.
Every in-breath receives the gift of life; every out-breath releases what you no longer need.
In this quiet rhythm, you begin to hear the silent prayer that never ceases.
The Body Scan
– Listening to the Temple
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Awareness through the body, grounding in Presence.
The body is not an obstacle to the spiritual life; it is the temple in which the Spirit breathes.
In this sit, we turn awareness slowly through the body, from the soles of the feet to the crown of the head.
We notice the weight of being here, the sensations, the aches, the warmth, the pulse of aliveness.
There is no need to fix or analyse; simply listen.
As you welcome each part of your body, you also welcome the One who dwells there.
This is the gentle rediscovery that holiness is not somewhere else, it is embodied, breathing, and present within you.
The Gateway to Silence
– Just Here, Just Now, Just This
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The sacred phrase, surrender to the present moment: Letting grace soak through the layers of resistance.
Sometimes the mind races in a thousand directions, searching for meaning or control.
This simple phrase, “Just here, just now, just this”, brings you home to the present moment.
Each word is a stepping-stone into stillness, a reminder that this moment is enough.
As you repeat the phrase softly, you begin to notice the quiet underneath the noise, the awareness beneath the thought.
Don’t force the silence; let it arrive in its own time.
You may discover that what you were seeking is already here, waiting patiently beneath your attention.
Resting in God
– Resting in Me
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Surrender, rest, and union with Presence: The tender “yes” of awakening, when new life begins to rise.
At the heart of contemplation lies rest, a letting go of all doing and becoming.
This sit invites you to release the need to achieve, explain, or even pray with words.
There is a deeper current carrying you, and it asks only that you surrender to its flow.
As you rest, notice how the line between you and God begins to blur.
There is no separation, only one quiet Presence holding you in love.
This is not escape or withdrawal, but a homecoming.
Here, rest and God become one and the same.
THE SAPLING STAGE
Abiding in the Space Between
The Sapling stage deepens what began in the Seed.
Here, the movement into the Inner Room becomes more familiar, the descent more natural, and the heart more open.
Through softening, resting, and sitting with the Trinity, you begin to recognize an inner spaciousness, a grounded centre, and a growing awareness of God’s presence within you.
The Inner Room becomes a place of belonging and transformation, where hidden life quietly strengthens, roots deepen, and your soul learns to abide rather than strive.
The Decent – Finding the Inner room
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Session One introduces the movement from the thinking mind into the Inner Room - the quiet spiritual centre where we are invited to meet God in secret.
Through the five movements of pause, soften, open, rest and trust, we learn how to descend gently from head to heart to the deep centre of being.
This session lays the foundation for all Sapling practices: cultivating presence, loosening the grip of thought, discovering inner spaciousness, and recognising that we are already held by love.
It is a simple, repeatable pathway into stillness and an invitation to meet God in the quiet centre of our lives.
“May the door to your Inner Room open gently today, and may you find yourself welcomed by Love already waiting.”
Softening – Opening the Heart to Presence
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Session Two deepens the movements that help us enter the Inner Room: softening, opening and resting.
Through the posture of humility Jesus described, we learn to step down from certainty, defensiveness and self-effort into a childlike openness. This session explores why resting in God’s love can feel difficult, how our early experiences shape that ability, and how trust gradually opens the heart.
Through guided practice, we soften the body and mind, open into the warmth and spaciousness of the Inner Room, and rest in a love that is safe, personal and welcoming.
It is an invitation to deeper surrender and gentler being.
“May your softening be tender,, your opening courageous, and your resting held in a love deeper than thought.”
The Trinity – Sitting with Love, Light, and Life
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Session Three invites us to sit within the living reality of the Trinity - Father, Son and Spirit - not as theological concepts but as Love, Light and Life dwelling within us.
Through reflection and guided practice, we explore how our relationship with each Person has been shaped, where it flows easily, and where it hesitates.
Using a contemplative Gateway, we sit in the Inner Room surrounded by the threefold presence of God, resting in the secure, hidden space Paul describes.
This session deepens our relational prayer life, expands our inner awareness, and gently widens our capacity to experience God in fullness.
“May the Love, Light and Life of the Trinity surround you, and may your heart learn again its hidden place within God.”
The Inner Room - Discovering Life Within
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Session Four invites us to explore the fullness of what may already be present within the Inner Room.
Drawing on scriptural imagery, we discover that this sacred space is not empty but richly layered - a place of living water, hidden treasure, vine-abiding, divine indwelling, rest, and transformation.
Through gentle reflection and guided practice, we notice which images draw us, which feel alive, and which speak to our present season.
This session widens our inner imagination and deepens our capacity to recognise God’s presence within.
It reveals the Inner Room as a home, a sanctuary, and a landscape of grace.
“May your Inner Room reveal its quiet treasures, and may you discover the home within the home that has always been yours.”
THE TREE STAGE
Seeing from the Inner Room
The Tree stage marks a gentle but profound widening of contemplative life. Having learned to enter and rest in the Inner Room, the invitation now is to live and see from that place. Stillness begins to shape perception. Awareness softens. Separation gently loosens.
These sit times explore what it means to recognise Christ in all things, to stabilise awareness in the Divine Centre, and to grow in awe, wonder, and non-dual presence. The Inner Room is no longer simply a refuge. It becomes the place from which the world is lovingly met.
The Inner Room - Looking From
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Looking From the Inner Room introduces the Tree stage of contemplative practice, where stillness begins to shape perception
Having learned how to enter and rest in the Inner Room, participants are now gently invited to see from that place. This sit time explores the subtle but profound shift from observing life through the thinking mind to perceiving from the Divine Centre - a way of seeing that is receptive, participatory, and grounded in presence.
Rather than analysing or interpreting what is seen, this practice encourages a softened gaze, where perception arises from stillness rather than effort. The simple act of looking from the Inner Room becomes a doorway into contemplative awareness.
As this way of seeing deepens, the separation between inner and outer begins to soften. Objects are no longer merely observed; they are encountered. Over time, this practice can extend beyond objects to people, situations, and everyday life.
This sit time lays a foundational stone for the Tree stage, offering a gentle, embodied practice that teaches how inner stillness engages the world - and how the Inner Room becomes not a retreat from life, but the place from which life is truly met.
Seeing Christ in Everything - and Everyone Else
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Seeing Christ in Everything and Everyone Else invites a widening of contemplative awareness at the Tree stage of practice.
Rooted in the Christian creation story, this sit time explores the understanding that God creates not from a distance, but out of Godself. The Word is spoken, Spirit moves, and all that comes into being participates in divine life. From this perspective, creation is not separate from God, but infused with Presence.
Through resting in the Inner Room and engaging a contemplative Creation Meditation inspired by Genesis 1–2, participants are gently invited to recognise the Christ - the living Logos - within all things and all people. This is not a practice of analysis or belief, but of perception: learning to see from a deeper centre where separation begins to soften.
As the Christ within recognises the Christ in everything else, the world is no longer encountered as “other,” but as belonging. Wonder replaces judgement. Reverence replaces distance.
This sit time offers a spacious, grounding practice that opens the heart to a sacramental vision of life - where everything becomes a doorway into divine presence.
Two additional Practices entitled “When the Gaze begins to Soften” are also available in the “Gardeners Notebook” section of “The Garden Shed”
The Creation Meditation - and Stabilising
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More on the Creation Meditation and Stabilising in the Inner Room deepens the Tree-stage invitation to see Christ in everything and in everyone else.
Building on the Creation Meditation introduced in Session Two, this sit time explores a panentheistic vision rooted in the Christian story of creation - where God creates not from a distance, but out of Godself. All that exists participates in divine life, yet God remains infinitely greater than creation.
This session reflects on how the Christ within us recognises the Christ in all things, gently dissolving the illusion of separation and “otherness.” Drawing on Jesus’ teachings and lived examples, participants are invited into a way of seeing that moves beyond dualistic categories and into belonging.
A contemplative practice follows, inviting participants to ponder the deep interconnectedness of all creation - at the level of atoms, bodies, and breath - and to rest in the truth that everything belongs and is continually sustained by God.
The second half of the sit introduces a stabilising practice rooted in embodied memory. By recalling moments of balance, flow, and effortless movement, participants learn to anchor awareness more fully in the Inner Room.
This session offers a grounded, spacious practice that weaves together theology, embodiment, and contemplative prayer - supporting a steady, lived awareness of Christ in all things.
A reflection entitled “Stabilising in the Inner Room” is also available in the “The Compost Heap” section of “The Garden Shed”
Awe and Wonder - the God Who is Cosmic
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This Session invites participants into a wider, more spacious way of seeing and being.
This sit explores the difference between dual awareness (either/or thinking) and non-dual awareness (both/and presence), and how contemplative practice gently reshapes the way we engage life, suffering, paradox, and mystery.
Dual awareness is essential for daily functioning, but it struggles to hold the deeper tensions of the spiritual journey. Non-dual awareness, cultivated within the Inner Room, learns to remain present without the need to resist, react, or reject. It becomes a receptive awareness that sees life in wholes rather than fragments.
This session also explores awe and wonder as essential movements of transformation — moments that capture us with beauty and truth, then invite surrender into deeper belonging.
Participants are gently led to sense God as cosmic, global, and personal - filling the universe, drawing humanity home, and quietly breathing life within the details of our own lives.
Meet your guide
Brian walks the same path he invites others to explore, one of learning to listen, to rest, and to trust the quiet work of stillness.
His journey of faith is woven through family, loss, and the quiet work of grace.
Alongside Garry, his Christian contemplative path commenced in 2016 under the guidance of Pip Nicholls, who opened the way into what she calls the Heart of Hearts - the Inner Room within.
Since then, Brian’s journey has continued to deepen through the wisdom of the Christian contemplative tradition, inspired by the teachings of Pip Nicholls, the Centre for Action and Contemplation, Richard Rohr, and James Finley.
In his own gentle way, Brian simply shares what and how he practices.
He opens a quiet doorway, not with many words, but through stillness, humility, and welcome.
Those who sit with him often find themselves resting again in the Presence that has been there all along.
Closing Blessing
May these Sit Times root you in stillness,
and awaken you to the Love that breathes through all things.
May the seed of Presence grow in you, until the day you stand, steady as an oak, quietly proclaiming with your life:
Be still and know.
The way of stillness is the way home.
