2 - The Rhythm of Existence

Toye Oyelese

Hello again, friends. Welcome back to Navigational Mind. It’s me, Dr. Toye Oyelese, today we are going to talk about what I call "The Broken Promise of Constant Progress". If you look around at our culture—in business, in self-help, even in social media—there is one dominant, unspoken promise: You should be improving all the time. We internalize this as a demand for a linear life. The graph of your well-being, productivity, and happiness should be a perpetually rising line. If you are successful today, you must be more successful tomorrow. If you feel clear this month, you must feel clearer the next. We were all taught to love the straight line. You start at point A, work hard, and arrive directly at point B—success, happiness, stability.

Toye Oyelese

Well I have news for you my friend, The truth is, life is not linear; it is rhythmic. Imagine you are sailing on the ocean. Do you expect the tide to always be high? No. You know the water will move through cycles—high tide, low tide, calm seas, and storms. Does the low tide mean the ocean has failed? Of course not. It means the ocean is moving through its necessary, predictable rhythm.

Toye Oyelese

What happens when you hit a wall? When that focused week ends in an inevitable crash? When the energy you had last month vanishes, and you just feel... low?Under the linear model, that drop is a failure. You conclude you did something wrong, lost your momentum, or simply don't have what it takes. This is where self-shame and paralysis set in.

Toye Oyelese

The universe doesn't operate in straight lines. Everything that lives—the seasons, the breath, the moon, the markets—moves in cycles. Your internal world is no different. The Rhythm of Existence is the acknowledgment that our inner experience is constantly moving through necessary, predictable, opposing cycles and this is not dysfunction; this is the operating system.

Toye Oyelese

Think of your inner life not as a machine that should be "on" all the time, but as a living garden. A garden doesn't always bloom; it moves through cycles. It has seasons of growth, followed by seasons of rest and integration. The Rhythms in this framework are simply the names we give to these natural, inevitable cycles of your mind. They explain why you feel ready to conquer the world one day and need to hide under the covers the next. They are not a sign of failure; they are simply data about your current internal climate.

Toye Oyelese

We primarily experience our internal climate through four major Rhythms and at the risk of boring you to tears, I will go over them because this is importmant. The first one is what I call Capacity Rhythm like an energy battery this rhythm tracks your available mental and emotional bandwidth. When it's high you feel energetic, focused, motivated, and capable of tackling complex tasks. You can manage stress and hold onto a lot of information. It feels like your battery is fully charged and Icall this expansion. When it's low you feel overwhelmed, easily stressed, foggy, and exhausted. Small tasks feel monumental, and you constantly want to simplify or withdraw. and I call this contraction - it is a crucial rest and recharge period.

Toye Oyelese

The next one is called the Meaning Rhythm, a bit of a brain twist, I am not talking about the meaning of rhythm, I am talking about the rhythm that gives meaning. Now that you are nicely confused it is the "why" Connection and it tracks your sense of purpose and relevance.When it's high you feel deeply connected to your work, your choices feel significant, and you understand the point of what you're doing. Everything feels aligned with your values, you have clarity .When it's low things start to feel hollow, routine, or pointless. You find yourself asking, "Why am I doing this?" or "Does this even matter?" You have confusion, however this dip is a signal that your structure needs new purpose or a fresh angle of orientation.

Toye Oyelese

Now let us talk about the third rhythm, Identity or what I call the Shifting Self. This rhythm tracks the stability and coherence of your self-concept. When it's stable: you feel grounded, consistent, and confident in who you are and what you stand for. Your actions align neatly with your self-narrative and you feel stable. When it's shifting you experience internal tension, contradiction, and confusion about your identity and you experience instability. This is often triggered when you are outgrowing an old version of yourself—you are ready to be the person who writes the book, but your old self only identifies as a private thinker. This shift is messy but necessary for growth.

Toye Oyelese

The last one, don't fall asleep on me yet, is the Connection Rhythm or what I nicknamed the Boundary Meter! It tracks the quality of your relationship dynamics—both with others and yourself. When it's strong you feel safe, supported, and able to be vulnerable. You know where your boundaries are and feel secure in your belonging, , like and expansion. When it's weak you might feel isolated, overwhelmed by others' needs, or unsafe to express yourself like a contraction. This signals that you need to either reinforce a boundary (Autonomy) or seek out deeper emotional connection (Trust).

Toye Oyelese

Many people want a fixed, steady state where the rhythms never fluctuate. This is impossible. You might as well ask the ocean to stop moving its waves. The true goal of navigation is to move gracefully with your internal cycles - synchronization like the steering wheel? Well, sometimes you end up with those classic moments of indecision, sabotage, or just mixed feelings you can’t pin down. Like, maybe Identity and Intimacy are at odds—do you open up fully, or protect the story you’ve built? In those moments, it's not about finding “the real you”—it’s about noticing who’s leading, and who’s making a fuss in the back seat.

Toye Oyelese

So as you go about your week, maybe ask yourself: who’s at the helm inside your house right now? Is it Industry pushing you forward, Initiative dreaming up new adventures, or Trust pulling you back to what feels safe? The cast rotates with your context—parenting, career moves, even just chatting with a friend. Next time you face a big decision, pause and listen: which resident’s voice is loudest? Me, I’m still learning to keep an ear out for mine.

Toye Oyelese

All right, let’s stop there for today before I end up chasing more tangents than usual. Remember— rhythms are not a sign of failure. They are simply data. The ultimate lesson of the Rhythms is that the goal is Synchronization—learning to dance with these cycles—rather than Stability—trying to force a cycle to stop moving. In our next episode, we’ll talk about the myth of the unified self, until then enjoy the rhythms of your existence.