The Tootsie Pop Center
Have you ever eaten a Tootsie Pop?
You lick, and lick, and lick—unless you are one of those people who bites them right from the get-go (and then this story maybe doesn’t work as well for you). You keep going until finally, after slow, steady effort, you come to that magical center. The part that isn’t hard candy anymore, but a full-on, chewy Tootsie Roll.
I think that’s what the Deep Seat is like. What? You ask. Allow me to explain.
It can be so easy to confuse stillness with “nothing happening”—which couldn’t be further from the truth. It’s easy to confuse peace with “boring.” But when you find that Tootsie Roll center in life, it is anything but boring. It is vibrant. Vital. Full of life.
It reminds me of how, as a child, I developed a strange idea of “heaven.” In my version of paradise, everyone who had died was laying still in what appeared to be stainless steel butter molds. Each person, immobile, in their own little compartment for eternity. I wasn’t in any hurry to get there.
We often think that “excitement” is where the action is. We think that external adventure is where the vitality is. You have to go. You have to do. But I think it may be in the stillness where life is most alive.
It’s not an idea I’ve come to by thinking about it but by tasting it.
Take the other day while riding Fortuna through the estuary. We had no agenda. No plan. No “purpose.” We were just riding together, enjoying the scenery - and the connection.
Earlier that day at the ranch, I simply sat with Fortuna. She was not haltered; she could have gone anywhere. Instead, she chose to rest her head in my lap as I sat on the wall of her corral. Pacas, the dog, ran to us, dragging her “stick”—really just a gnarled-on piece of palm branch.
Later that afternoon riding along the trails Fortuna and I had a “momentum of stillness” from our time in the corral. That was when the image of the Tootsie Pop appeared in my mind - and with it, a shift in our connection.
Had you been there you wouldn’t have seen it. But I felt it. It flowed through me - a profound sense of “all is well.” Deep. Rich. Nourishing. As though the stillness in Fortuna had finally made its way through my hard shell and encountered the stillness within me.
Like reaching the center of a Tootsie Pop. All that goodness, hidden inside. Slowly, layer after layer, removing the “hard shell” of the hurry until the center finally appears.
We so often find ourselves living in the “hard shell” of life—the part where we are licking the surface of our lives, caught in the crunch of the hurry, and wondering if there is actually anything more in the middle.
We’ve been told that to get to the center, we have to do more or work harder, or run faster - or start over, somehow, without all the distractions. That we either have to outrun the hurry or find some way to escape it.
But what I’ve found is that the center of stillness is found through rhythm, not rush. This is what I’d love to share with you in The Return.
Over 10 weeks, we aren’t adding more “hard candy” to your life. We are simply practicing the art of dissolving the shell. We are finding the “Tootsie Roll” center of our own selves—that vibrant, vital stillness that replaces the void with vitality.
We begin this Sunday, April 5th (Easter morning).
I have intentionally designed this to be flexible. It’s a 15-minute weekly “Inhale” and daily “Breadcrumbs” to keep you on the trail. No butter molds. No spiritual perfection. Just the slow, steady work of finding your center.
Join The Return for $97 (Early Bird pricing ends Saturday! Price increases to $147 on April 5th.)
