“No,” says the surgeon. “I won’t operate now. See me after two months.”

I smile immediately. There is energy in my voice, a spring in my step as I say, “Thank you, doctor. See you in two months!” A tiny part of me notices all this: the involuntary smile, the sudden energy, the cheerful departure from a consulting room where we have been discussing surgery for my son. Ah. You are elated.

Walking back towards the parking lot, I begin to examine that elation. So you didn’t actually want to go ahead with the surgery now. Intellect-me promptly pipes up: Was the physician wrong? She wasn’t, no? Do you WANT to wait till your kutti fellow develops perforations and all the other ghastly issues she talked about? Of course not, replies emotion-me. But this reprieve means we get another two months to keep trying and see if he improves.

Krishna’s reflux is no longer adequately controlled by medication. His physician wants us to seriously consider surgery before his condition deteriorates; his surgeon agrees in theory, but thinks the risks don’t yet justify operating while Krishna is still pushing along somehow. I understand both positions. Neither has to be wrong for me to wish that the choice were easier. The surgeon hasn’t said Krishna doesn’t need surgery. He has given us a reprieve, and I am delighted to have it.

That delight is information. Before I have consciously worked through the appointment, something in me has already responded to it. Examining that response begins with a question: why was I so relieved?

Your Inner Landscape Is Also Reality

Facing reality means looking at what is happening, the evidence, the constraints, the resources available, and what is yours to do. But your inner landscape is also reality. Your fear, relief, reluctance, eagerness and exhaustion participate in how you see the situation and decide what to do about it. Leaving them unexamined leaves part of the situation unexamined.

You are the instrument through which you experience the world. Your observations pass through your experience, memories, preferences, hopes, fears and present capacity. Knowing how and why that instrument functions is essential to evaluating your judgement and course of action. What are you giving weight to? What are you overlooking? What do you already know but haven’t articulated? What do you desperately want to be true?

In my case, there are practical reasons behind the relief. Maintaining the hygiene of an abdominal surgery site will be insanely challenging. If a gastrostomy is also required, it isn’t manageable now: today Krishna wouldn’t keep the tube in place for six seconds, not to speak of indefinitely. I know this through the everyday experience of caring for him. It is knowledge my body carries in each cell; I don’t have to think through and verbalise every difficulty for it to be present in my response. Examining the relief brings that knowledge into words, where I can work with it.

How do I work with it?

The two months give us time to investigate other options and gather information, including further genetic testing, and to see whether his body responds better to medication over the next month or two. Perhaps it will become possible to postpone surgery further; perhaps it won’t. The practical difficulties remain real, and so does the medical concern that brought us to the surgeon. Noticing my emotions and naming what I am feeling as relief helps me bring more of the situation into the decision, though it doesn’t settle the decision for me.

Your response to a situation can reveal knowledge you haven’t consciously acknowledged. A sudden reluctance, irritation, eagerness or relief tells you something about the direction you are already leaning towards. Become curious about it. What experience lies behind that response? What are you anticipating? What are you trying to protect?

Sometimes your response draws on a practical understanding acquired over years. Sometimes it reveals that you have reached your limits and cannot take on another demand without something else changing. Sometimes it is an instinct for self-preservation, and examining the situation tells you that you need to gather the courage to do the very thing you want to avoid. Naming and facing your inner reality alongside the reality outside you helps you distinguish these possibilities.

An emotion gives you information to examine. Its intensity doesn’t establish the accuracy of your interpretation, but it tells you how strongly you are responding—and that, too, deserves examination. Your understanding develops as you examine the response, its reasons, and the rest of the situation. Sometimes you can name the feeling before you understand its reasons; those may take time, reflection, or a conversation with someone else.

And therefore, self-awareness belongs in the framework of face, name, act, adjust—the framework through which you face reality, name it for what it is, act as you think appropriate, and adjust your action if needed based on the outcome. It runs through the entire process. You face what is happening within you as well as around you, name what you can understand about it, and decide how to act. After acting, you look again. What happened? What has changed? What is your response to the result, and how is that response influencing your next decision?

Witnessing Your Emotions

A tiny part of you watches as you experience all this; that part of you quietly witnesses. The witness notices your involuntary smile, the tension in your body, the anger while you are angry, the tiredness you have been pushing past. That part of you doesn’t stop you, block you or lecture you. It notices and gathers information. You then work with that information.

You may be in the middle of your own meltdown, thoroughly angry, and say or do something you regret later. The witness notices that too: the words, the action, the effect. Afterwards, that information tells you that a relationship needs repair. You need to acknowledge what you did, apologise, or have a conversation you would rather avoid. You also have something to examine about what brought you there and what you want to handle differently next time. Observing doesn’t prevent every mistake; it helps you face what happened, including your own part in it, and decide what to do next.

You don’t have to remain serene while feeling something that is anything but serene. There is strength in crying, raging and despairing, alongside the strength to laugh, celebrate or remain peaceful. These emotions exist. You can acknowledge them, experience them, and watch what happens without immediately suppressing them, fixing them, turning them into gratitude, or extracting a lesson before you have finished feeling them. You can also notice, while still angry, that you need to step away. Awareness gives you information at different points in the experience; you remain responsible for how you use it.

And since I love metaphors, let me drag one in here. Your emotions, your inner world—the sea, which is movement, change, peace, and agitation all in one. And the beach that stays still, always present—the observer part of you.

The waves wash in on the sand and recede; one feeling arrives and then another comes. There is sometimes an infinitesimal pause between. You experience the movement and watch what you can, without having to stop the wave in order to understand something about it. Sometimes you are so overwhelmed that you lose awareness of the witnessing part of you. Eventually, you notice that you weren’t observing. That noticing is already a return. Through practice, witnessing becomes an inherent part of how you live, during an experience or afterwards. Its role continues through the feeling, the action, the consequences and the next choice.

Knowing Your Limits, Choosing Your Actions

Knowing yourself includes recognising your limits. There are times when you need to step back, put the load down for a while, or continue with one course of action while putting others off. The answer to “What is mine to do now?” depends on your capacity as well as the demands outside you. There may be something to investigate, a conversation to have, an action to take, or a situation to monitor. There is also a point at which you have done what can presently be done and need to rest.

Your wellbeing belongs among the realities you are facing. It matters to the people who depend on you, and it matters because you are a human being living this life. Exhaustion doesn’t disappear because a decision is important. Recognising it allows you to account for it, ask for help, rearrange demands, or defer what can wait.

There is a dance of letting go for a while and then picking up the reins again. Agency doesn’t require continuous activity. Sometimes waiting, monitoring or resting is what the situation calls for. Self-awareness helps you examine whether you are putting something down because there is presently nothing more to do, because you have reached your limits, or because you don’t want to face it. The answer helps you decide what needs to happen next.

That same awareness accompanies adjustment. A disappointing result can make you defensive; a good result can make you more certain than the evidence warrants. You may want to abandon a course because you cannot bear another disappointment, or continue because changing direction would feel like admitting defeat. Examine these responses alongside what happened and what you now know. What has changed? What can you learn? Does the course still make sense? Sometimes you change the action; sometimes you continue. Self-awareness helps you examine your reasons for either choice.

This is dispassionate action with love: experiencing your feelings while remaining willing to examine what they tell you and what the situation requires. You love fiercely, acknowledge your desire for a particular outcome, and recognise the limits of what that desire can do. Sometimes the action you choose agrees with your inclination; sometimes it asks you to act despite it. You need to understand what you are bringing to the choice.

Autism parenting offers frequent opportunities to practise this, sometimes far more frequently than you would like. But the practice belongs to the wider human experience. Whatever your circumstances, you experience the world through yourself. Love, fear, responsibility, desire and capacity influence how you navigate it. Knowing that instrument is ongoing work, carried out while you are using it.

For now, we have two more months, and I am glad of them. We will investigate, watch how Krishna responds, and revisit what needs deciding. I can enjoy the reprieve while knowing the question remains.

Meanwhile, Krishna pounds his fists, and I have to work out whether something hurts or whether he would like the music back on.