The Witness

There’s a place inside us that’s always here, even when we don’t notice it. Not the part that plans, or worries, or tries to fix everything. Not even the part that loves, or grieves, or longs. It’s quieter. Wider. It just sees. It watches the thoughts, the feelings, the body trembling—and it doesn’t interfere. No agenda. No judgement.

Ramana Maharshi called it awareness. In Internal Family Systems its called Self or Self-energy. Some traditions call it the heart. In yoga, it is Hridaya, the inner heart-space that holds presence and awareness, the silent seat from which life is witnessed. In Vedanta, it is the sakshi, the witnessing consciousness that observes without attachment. In Buddhist mindfulness, it is the observing mind, present and awake to what arises without judgement. In Sufi and Christian contemplative practice, it is the soul’s quiet gaze, resting in the divine presence. I call it the Witness.

It is not dissociation. It is not spiritual bypassing. True witnessing is embodied. The chest can ache, the belly can twist, the throat can tighten—and Hridaya, the heart as witness, holds it all, lets it be, lets it speak. To bypass, to dissociate, is to hover above or step outside. To witness is to inhabit the trembling, the fear, the longing, with curiosity and gentleness, allowing each movement of life to pass through the openness of the heart.

To witness is to lean in. To inhabit. To stay. We remeber to witness through meditation.

In the therapy room, I see it all the time. Parts that were silenced, left unseen. Armour of protection, hiding, rage to survive. When they meet the Witness—Self, or a heart that can contain them—they soften. Trembling parts begin to relax, to step forward. Gabor Maté says trauma is the loneliness of un-witnessed experience. Marion Woodman calls the inner witness a bridge. And I see it: the pieces of us that once trembled, beginning to breathe.

And then there’s the heart of it. Hridaya. Alive, breathing tenderness. I drop into my chest. It holds all of me—the shy, the anxious, the rejected one, the angry, the grieving, the wild. Doesn’t demand fixing. Doesn’t demand understanding. Simply receives.

The Witness doesn’t erase. Doesn’t judge. Loves what’s raw, trembling, messy—because it 'is'.

Yoga calls it Hridaya. Vedanta calls it sakshi. Buddhism calls it observing mind. Contemplative traditions call it the soul’s gaze. The eye's of the Heart. Ramana Maharshi points to it as awareness itself. Different names. Same essence. Steady. Tender. Awake. Compassionate. Seeing all. Judging none.

The Witness is always here. Quietly alive beneath the noise, beneath the storm, beneath the story. In meditation. In therapy. In the tiny pause between moments. It’s the open sky in which everything moves. Hridaya. Soft. Infinite. Always awake.

To rest here is to know both the fragility and the resilience of being alive. To rest here is to return home to ourselves, again and again.

This poem by Rumi symbolises the Witness as a guest house.

The Guest House

This being human is a guest house.

Every morning a new arrival.

A joy, a depression, a meanness,some momentary awareness comes

as an unexpected visitor.

Welcome and entertain them all!

Even if they’re a crowd of sorrows,who violently sweep your house

empty of its furniture,

still, treat each guest honourably.

They may be clearing you out for some new delight.

The dark thought, the shame, the malice, meet them at the door laughing,

and invite them in.

Be grateful for whoever comes,

because each has been sent as a guide from beyond.