Sit Spot: A Practice for Coming Home to Being

The term "sit spot" was coined, I believe, by Jon Young, who developed the practice as a way to tune deeply into a landscape — to sit still enough, and often enough, in one place that the wildlife around you settles back into its natural rhythms. It’s a tradition rooted in wilderness mentoring and nature connection rather than psychology or therapy. And yet, the more I've sat with it, the more I've come to see it as one of the simplest and most powerful practices we have for meeting ourselves — all of ourselves — from a place of stillness.

Parts, Survival, and the Habit of Doing

In IFS, we understand that our parts are constantly working on our behalf, meeting needs that are fundamentally human: safety, connection, belonging, survival — both physiological and social. This is what parts do. They protect, they plan, they anticipate, they keep watch.

But when we're already carrying burdens — the residue of experiences that felt threatening or dangerous — our systems can move into a kind of overdrive. Parts that have learned to adapt to threat don't easily stand down. They've learned that vigilance keeps us safe, that doing keeps us safe, that stopping is itself a risk. For a system carrying this kind of burden, it can feel genuinely unsafe to simply stop — to be a human being, rather than a human doing.

This is where practices like sit spot become so valuable. They are one of many ways we can consciously choose to create space — space in which to simply be, rather than do. And in that space, without an agenda, something different becomes possible. If we notice an agenda attached to almost anything in our lives, it's usually a part driving it. Self energy itself doesn't need an agenda. It can simply be present, curious, and open to whatever arises.

The Practice

Sit spot is beautifully simple. You choose a place in nature — it might be a corner of a garden, a spot in a local park, a place in the woods, or even a view from a window if getting outside isn't possible — and you return to it, ideally the same place, again and again.

Once there, you settle in and simply sit. Not to achieve anything, not to think anything through, not to arrive anywhere. You let your senses lead: what do you hear, smell, see, feel against your skin? You notice your breath, the temperature of the air, the quality of light. You let yourself be curious about small details, without needing to explain or understand them.

Over time — sitting in the same place across days, weeks, seasons — something shifts. The place begins to know you, and you begin to know it. Wildlife around you settles. Your own system, given enough repeated permission to simply be, begins to settle too. It becomes a relationship, built slowly, the same way any relationship with a part is built: through consistent, patient, non-agenda-driven presence.

My Own Practice: A Tracking Path

For a number of years, my own sit spot practice evolved into something a little different — what I came to think of as a tracking path, a term I first came across through Colin Campbell, drawing on Southern African traditional tracking and nature-connection practices. Rather than one single spot, it was a whole route made up of multiple sit spots: a path I returned to and walked regularly, coming to know it intimately through repetition — in all weathers, through every season, in whatever state I arrived in.

I brought all of my parts with me on this walk. Not just the parts that felt calm or curious, but whichever ones showed up that day — tired parts, anxious parts, parts that would rather have been doing something more "productive." They all came, and the path held them.

This practice became one that enriched my life enormously. It gave my whole system a kind of refreshment that rivalled a good night's sleep. It deepened my connection — to the land, and to myself. It slowed me down and invited me to unblend, to loosen whatever I'd been holding onto. And all the while, I felt supported and held by everything around me — the trees, the ground, the changing light — as I simply noticed. And noticed. And noticed again.

Wherever I Am

Now, my tracking path has become much bigger. I'm often in new places, and sit spot has adapted to become whatever place I happen to be in — a chance to pause, to sit for a while, and to attend to what I notice, both around me in the land and, tuning to the four directions, in the seen and the unseen all around. And then, gently, the same inside: attending to all directions of my inner world, to where parts are — some maybe only vaguely sensed, others acutely present — and reminding them, where it's needed, that I'm here, and that it's good to be with them. I make a “Guest House” (see the poem by Rumi) of my sit spot, welcoming whoever arrives.