Beyond the navigation line

So, we come to the image of the human navigator who, without mastering the elements, still charts his course. But even this metaphor risks being too simplistic. It assumes that there is a certain unchanging “captain” separated from the ‘ship’ and the “ocean.” But what if this is not the case? What if the captain himself is woven from the same fabric as the storm he is fighting?

The philosophy of existentialism and Eastern contemplative traditions push us toward an even more radical conclusion. They suggest that our very “I,” the very control center that we so desperately defend, is not so much an essence as a process. The “I” is not a point, but a trajectory; not a substance, but a continuously created story. And we are not the only authors of this creation. We are in constant dialogue, and sometimes in conflict, with what can be called “the Other” — be it the unconscious, collective culture, or the very structure of being.

Our thoughts are not just internal objects that we can accept or reject. They are part of us; they shape us. Every thought, even a fleeting and rejected one, leaves its mark, like a wave changing the contours of the shore. A disturbing thought that we dismiss still makes our heart beat faster. An inspired idea that we were unable to realize continues to live in us like the ghost of a missed opportunity. We cannot simply “give up” a thought without paying the price, without changing under its influence. We are woven into the fabric of our own thinking.

This is where the concept of **co-authorship** comes in. We are not absolute masters, but neither are we passive slaves. We are co-authors of the reality of our inner world. We do not choose the raw material — sudden flashes of fear, irrational desires, fragments of other people’s phrases — but we choose how to process it. Our consciousness is a workshop where ore extracted from the dark mines of our past and present flows in a continuous stream. Our freedom is the freedom of a craftsman: from the same piece of clay (a spontaneous thought), one can mold both an ugly idol and an elegant vessel.

In this process of co-creation, **attention** plays a decisive role. Attention is the currency of our mind. Where we direct it is what becomes real for us. By immersing ourselves in rumination, we fertilize the soil for anxiety, and it grows, overshadowing our entire inner landscape. By focusing on gratitude, we highlight moments of joy that would otherwise go unnoticed. We cannot prevent weeds from appearing in the garden of our mind, but we can choose which flowers to water. This metaphor of a garden is perhaps more accurate than that of a ship, for the gardener is not separate from his garden — he himself is part of this ecosystem, feeding on its fruits and suffering from its drought.

And perhaps the highest form of power over thoughts is not control or management, but **acceptance**. This is a paradoxical act in which the “I” renounces the struggle for the throne and becomes not a master, but a hospitable home. A home that allows all thoughts-guests to come and go. It observes them without identifying with any of them. It understands that the thought of anger is not anger itself. The thought of sadness is not sadness itself. These are only shadows passing through the room of consciousness. And when we stop fighting these shadows, they lose their power over us.

In this calm observation, in this silence that is not afraid of the noise of thoughts, true freedom is born. We realize that we are not our thoughts. We are the space in which they arise. That silent sky against which clouds float. True stewardship is not tyranny over our subjects, our thoughts, but wise governance of a space where anything is possible, but nothing is you to the end. This realization is the ultimate answer that transforms the eternal question of power into an invitation to the deepest knowledge of oneself.

With gratitude and silence,
Zohar Leo Palffy de Erdod
“Between Thoughts”