Earlier this week, I noticed a dominant theme in the thoughts swirling in my head. I’ll give you a little peek into the flavor of the movies that seemed to play on loop for many days in a row…flipping from one unrelated scene to the next with no apparent rhyme or reason:

She shouldn’t speak to me like that. Who does she think she is?! One day I’m going to give her a taste of her own medicine. She’s so freaking judgmental and hypocritical. Oh my god, again my neighbor parked his car right next to my trash cans. Doesn’t he know the trash collectors will skip my house if the cars are parked near the cans? He’s an idiot. Seriously, another notice that I am overdue for my car’s 90,000 mile check-up? My car has 78,000 miles on it, dumb-asses! What is so difficult to understand about the fact that 78,000 is less than 90,000? Idiots.

OK, you get the gist of the movies that were playing all week. Maybe you’re even giggling because you can identify with these all-too-familiar movie scenes from the Universal Film Collection. They’re from that popular movie genre called anger.

Thankfully, after a few days of swirling and twirling in the movies, forgetting for long moments at a stretch that I was simply lost in a movie, I woke up.

“Oh,” the feeling in my belly said, “Anger is here. And she is loud. She is demanding my attention.”

And then the feeling in my belly softened and felt warm.

“Oh, anger is here, and she is worthy of my attention. She is not wrong or bad. She makes sense.”

An image of a little Missy emerged. Five years old. Angry enough for her face to turn red and hot. And then sensing that it is not OK to be angry. Anger is not good. Anger does not belong. Just be happy. Smile harder.

And poof—just like that—anger was left behind like an unwanted toy.

Cast aside.

She, anger, was quickly covered over by the best survival mechanism available: a better, safer identity of a good, happy, positive girl. That identity became the shiny sticker placed on top of the anger.

So, back to waking up from the movies in my head earlier this week...

I found myself able to pause. Just for a moment since that’s all that was available at the time.

And in that moment, I simply acknowledged her presence. Her perfection. Her beauty.

Somehow, the movie scenes in my head—the ones with all the so-called villains—faded quietly into the background. They didn’t disappear, but they were no longer the big brass band playing over the still small voice of the piccolo.

Anger was here. She filled every part of my body; most pronounced in my throat, shoulders, and chest. I could feel her arise as tension. Tightness. Squeezing.

And I smiled. A genuine, loving smile.

Hello, sweet girl. I sense your presence. You are not bad or wrong. You make sense. You always have. Please stay as long as you would like. I will make no attempts to rid you from my throat or my shoulders or my chest. Please stay. Make your presence known.

Funny how just that one little moment was enough. Life pulled me right back into the flow of client sessions, taking care of a sick daughter, and tending to the needs of a hundred other things. I was carried effortlessly through it all.

It has become abundantly clear that the things I call triggers—the neighbor who parked his car next to my trash can, the obsessive reminders from my car dealer, the friend who seemed judgmental—they are compelling distractions from the little ones within me who have been left behind.

And none of this is about blame or shame. Every single one of us acquired these coping strategies and survival mechanisms because they made the MOST SENSE at the time.

But now, we’re ready. It’s time to meet those children—the ones that got covered over, cast aside, and left behind. When triggers arise (and they WILL arise, often much louder and with greater frequency), there will be miraculous moments in which something within you stirs. You will wake up. And you’ll be ready to let the villains in your mind’s movies fade to the background so that you can greet the little one who is ready to be acknowledged. She will be the lump in your throat, the ache in your belly, the tightness in your chest, the flood of emotions in your heart. Go to her. Greet her. Let the movie wait.

And if the movie screams and shouts to grab your attention back to the mind—back to the ruminating and the figuring out and the solving—gently come back to the little one whose voice has been diminished for decades. Listen to her. Feel how she shows up in your body.

Paradoxically, when we pause the movie of the “world out there” just long enough to see the world within, actions are taken from integrity. Words are spoken. Arrangements are made. The flow of Life itself guides the voice, the hands, the feet…

Reclaiming these children that were left behind is never about inaction or non-doing. It’s trusting that the same intelligence that wakes you up in the morning and holds the planets in perfect alignment will also direct your decisions, words, and actions in perfect time.

I recently listened to an Angelo Dilullo podcast in which he described this so eloquently:

Whatever is coming up, especially if it feels triggering, that’s the entry point.

It's the lost child knocking at your door, saying, it's time to feel me. Thank you for making time and space for me. We make time and space for the lost children that we've been innocently ignoring.

Our parents, when they innocently ignored us, same thing. They didn't notice what they were doing. Even trying their best, some of them were rather harmful, because they didn't do this work.

They didn't know you could do this work, probably. They had no model for it, no context for it. But you can.

You can do it for everyone. You are doing it for everyone. You're doing it for your family. You're doing it for everyone you come into contact with. You're doing it for the lineage of generational trauma that you've inherited. And that can seem like a burden, but the beauty of it is that love is infinite. It has no limitation to its capacity.

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So, let’s begin. It all begins with a single trigger.

Followed swiftly by a flood of emotions and sensations.

And a noticing that the movie playing in your mind is simply the catalyst for bringing you closer to those children that were left behind. Let’s meet them and find the JOY and the LOVE that were their true nature all along.