003 • Five words and a question mark
I was ready to receive.
What does this moment need?
It took me a little while to rationalize how this question has become the backbone of my work and a key reflective anchor in my day-to-day.
It came to me through two different experiences over the past months, asked by teachers of different disciplines, united by a similar intention. The first time, I was part of a movement intensive in Norway. The second, I was joining a Mindfulness session from my living room. Different contexts, different rooms and yet the impact was identical.
To give you a sense of what it felt like: there’s a common understanding among writers and makers that you hold off on choosing a title until the work is done, because the right one only arrives once the final dot is written. When I paused and received this question, it felt like being offered exactly that, the title I had been unconsciously waiting for. Five words and a question mark to hold the intentions, reflections, learnings, and experiences of the past few years, and to encapsulate what I now bring through my work.
Proof, once more, that most of the time we simply need to listen rather than reinvent the wheel.
And speaking of listening, what a great question to fine tune such skill. Genuinely, what a great question.
Also, speaking of listening… Most days, we pass through hundreds of moments on autopilot. Choices get made under the influence of urgency, stress, and the noise of everything competing for our attention without us even realizing this has become our “normal”.
What those moments need, to start with, is a good question. Together with, if you will, a space to hold it and the support to dive deeper than what you believe, alone, you could bear.
What does this moment need? anchors you to the present. It cultivates non-reactive awareness by inviting a pause between the stimuli we receive and what we choose to do, feel, or think next. It opens curiosity, because rather than searching for the perfect answer, it gathers new information about what you’re actually experiencing. In that mode of navigating circumstances, the distinction between “good” and “bad” quietly dissolves.
It’s also practical, not only meditative. It finds its place in difficult conversations, under pressure, and equally in moments of celebration, joy, and pleasure.
Like all that forms a practice, its power reveals itself most in the small, ordinary moments more than in the big, defining decisions. Because it’s precisely in those everyday fragments that our capacity for presence tends to disappear the most.
Without hesitation, I knew I wanted this question at the heart of my business.
No statement, no slogan. No dream-selling, formula, or shortcut.
My world is real, and so is my work. Experienced as slowly as possible, often reflective, and with the capacity to welcome complexity rather than resolve it prematurely.
This question is worth hundreds of words and capable of illuminating a way of living that is as experiential and explorative as much as our courage allows. Asked 47 times in a day, it might offer 47 different insights: varied feelings, actions, behaviors, thoughts, memories. Our experience is that rich. And the invitation is to find the tools to truly listen to it and, little by little, fall in love with the search itself.
Lume
Over the past two months, there were many things I “should” have done or at least, that’s the story I told myself.
Two months ago, my now almost six-month-old dog Lume came into my life and flipped it pretty much upside down.
Lack of sleep, 10,000 steps in up to six walks a day, a house that looks different, a schedule that feels different. Less energy, more responsibility and a first, genuine understanding of what it means to be a caregiver.
It still amazes me how quickly and purely the bond between me and Lume formed. And at the same time, it has been intense, demanding, and mostly deeply fulfilling.
In the middle of all of it, asking myself “What does this moment need?” kept coming in as support to simply come to peace with what I was going through and not necessarily to meet or fulfill what I was uncovering in that moment.
Some days I needed the sun out and warm. Others, I needed someone to take Lume for the 10:30pm walk so I could stay in my pre-bed cocoon. At times, I needed rest, better organization, reassurance, or a friend on the walk who didn’t mind my divided attention.
Most days, I needed a hug.
Other days, I needed to let myself appreciate the newness of the increased time outdoors, or the spontaneous conversations with strangers whose eyes Lume had caught first.
The bigger the change, the bigger the invitation for self-reflection. It still makes me laugh and I still feel “too much” when speaking in these terms about raising a puppy. And yet it’s the most honest version I have.
Lume brought a love-dense, responsibility-charged reality into my life. If there’s one thing I know, it’s that it will keep evolving. For everything I don’t yet know, I’ll keep asking the same question and I’ll keep listening.
In the past couple of days, on our walks around town, we crossed paths with two different people. Brief encounters, nothing more. They both said the same thing: “This dog looks happy.”
I smiled back and said “Thank you, you noticing makes me happy too”. And I understood that was the question answered, quietly, by life itself.
Take care.
These reflections are part of my ongoing practice. The newsletter goes deeper, and offers something that might invite your curiosity. Subscribe here.
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Eleonora Ricci is an Embodied Wellbeing Coach, ICF ACC credentialed, based in Amsterdam, working in person and online with individuals, teams and communities who are ready to quiet the noise, deepen self-awareness and live with more curiosity, intention and clarity.
