The book
The Sense and Nonsense of Being
How you are present determines what you are able to perceive. Eight chapters on perception, with the senses as the way in.
The English edition is being translated. The book is available now in Dutch; the English edition follows.
Paperback, 208 pages · foreword by Alan Seale · Invicti
The senses are the gateway.Presence is the ground.
What it is about
Not by knowing more. By looking differently.
We never perceive neutrally. The same eye sees differently at rest than in fear; the same ear hears differently in connection than in vigilance. The senses are the gateway — but who goes through it, and in what state, determines what appears.
That is less abstract than it sounds. Think of a meeting you walk into with your own unrest still in your pocket, and how you notice the room moving with it. Or of that one conversation in which your presence is so steady that the other person dares to say something he has never put into words before.
Each chapter explores one sense — not as a biological mechanism, but as a portal. Rooted in personal stories, deepened by contemplative traditions and by what we now know about the nervous system. Each chapter closes with one exercise and one question.
Presence is not a soft skill. It is the most fundamental leadership competency there is.
From chapter eight
Eight chapters · six senses
Seven questions. One per chapter.
Eye — The art of truly seeing
‘What do you see when you are not looking to confirm what you already know?’
Ear — The resonance of being
‘What do you hear when you stop listening for what you already know?’
Nose — Memory of origin
‘What do you smell when you stop filtering what you are willing to receive?’
Tongue — The art of tasting
‘What do you taste when you stop swallowing what you would rather not receive?’
Body — The intelligence of touch
‘What do you know when you stop forcing your body?’
Heart — The whisper of the heart
‘What appears when you stop regulating your emotions and listen to what they want to tell you?’
The ground — You are how you perceive
‘From which state do you perceive — and what becomes possible when you recognise that?’
Read before you buy
What Steven offers is not a technique. He enlarges our capacity to perceive.
Whoever finds value in it finds value in it — whether or not it was paid for.
- Alan Seale’s foreword
- Three pages · pdf, in Dutch
- The workbook
- Five exercises per sense, free of charge
The English edition
In translation.
The Sense and Nonsense of Being is currently being translated into English. Leave your first name and email address and you will hear as soon as it is available — along with the occasional letter on presence, perception and the work itself.
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Specifications
The Dutch first edition.
- Publisher
- Invicti
- Foreword
- Alan Seale
- Binding
- Paperback
- Pages
- 208
- Language
- Dutch
- Edition
- First
- ISBN
- 9789083720203
- Published
- 24 August 2026
About the author
Steven Stephania.
Steven Stephania works as an integrative coach. He accompanies people in entrepreneurship, work and life who long for lasting change in the way they meet themselves, others and their role.
His work does not centre on performance or optimisation, but on the question of how you are consciously present — in yourself, in your relationships and in your leadership.
With The Sense and Nonsense of Being he brings his integrative view together in book form for the first time. A personal, scientifically grounded and contemplative invitation to stop searching for connection and to learn to recognise it again.
Alongside the book
Where this work becomes practical.
The book describes a way of perceiving. In my practice in Utrecht that is not an idea but a two-hour conversation — for the person behind the role, because clarity does not come from thinking harder. Illness. Burnout. An acquisition. Growth that outpaces what the organisation can carry. A conflict that stopped being about the content long ago.
Not everyone who reads this book is looking for a coach. If you are, this is where it begins.