When was the last time something took your breath away? Honestly, before last night, I think it’s been a while for me. But late last night, as I got into bed, I noticed my phone light up. It was a Venmo notification letting me know that my client—I’ll call him James—had sent a payment for his coaching package. In the memo section were 4 simple words: “The 5 year old.”
Immediately, my eyes filled with tears. I was overcome with emotion and awe. That simple phrase, “The 5 Year Old” took my breath away. You see, earlier that day, James had spent much of his coaching session with me explaining why he’s so filled with rage all the time. He explained how he didn’t deserve happiness, and how there was no way in hell he deserved any kind of grace or compassion. Those were out of the question.
I watched James’ jaw clench and his eyebrows furrow as he detailed all of the reasons why he was not worthy of kindness or love. He offered me mountains of concrete evidence to support his belief that he was, at his core, worthless. That had been the messaging he’d been given his entire life. In fact he had been “jokingly” called Piece of Shit by his own stepdad for more than a decade.
Near the end of our session, as James recounted yet another example of the awfulness that runs through his veins—the same awfulness that had run through his father’s and grandfather’s veins, he asserted one more time: “I could never be kind to myself. I don’t deserve it.”
And in that moment, I asked James, “Did you know that the same you that looked through your eyes at five years old is the same you that is looking through your eyes at this moment? Your five-year-old you has never left. He’s still within you. Do you think maybe he is worthy of kindness?”
In an instant, everything in James’ demeanor shifted. It was clear that an entire layer of armor had been cracked open. Something in that question had pierced through his concrete wall of protection. For a brief moment, decades of relentless thinking fell silent and James felt something new.
“Yes,” he said quietly. “He deserves everything.”
It was a mic drop moment.
After nearly 60 minutes of being completely lost in thought, completely identified with the story of himself, James’ mind went silent. And he woke up. The lifelong hypnosis of living in thought was interrupted. And a deeper truth about who he is beyond thought was allowed to come into the light.
Sometimes it still amazes me how differently I see Life now; how differently I see who I am—who we all are—beyond a lifetime of thoughts, stories, beliefs, and patterns. There was once a time that I never would have considered that the same presence that looked out onto the world through these eyes at my birth is the same exact presence that is still looking through these eyes today. That was something I had to discover—to see for myself. Who I am is that presence—timeless, ageless, and completely untouched by this world of form.
Since we were toddlers, we humans have been culturally conditioned to believe that the thoughts that flow through our minds are who we are. Even wilder is that we have this notion that we are somehow the owners, authors, and creators of thoughts—that those activities of the mind are of our own making.
So, if this is true, it logically follows from there that I am at the owner and created of my reactions; I am the author of my judgments and comparisons. And I am on the hook for my beliefs, my ruminations, my worries, my anxieties, and my behaviors.
And if this is true, then surely it is ON ME to DO life—to manage Life and all its ups and downs and mountain tops and pitfalls. It is ON ME to be vigilant—to be on the lookout for negative thoughts, for unwanted reactions, and for hours-long ruminations. It is ON ME to make sure things go well—whatever that even means—and to be hyper-focused on every detail that might possibly contribute to someone getting their feelings hurt or getting angry at me. It is ON ME to be sure that no one is ever disappointed, and that everything goes according to my culture’s expectations.
THANKFULLY, believing that any of this nonsense is true leads to suffering. At the core of suffering is the belief, this should be different than it is and I must make it so.
The suffering is the brilliance of the design. It is the impetus for waking up to a lifetime of beliefs and identities that have gone largely unnoticed.
For James, living for decades with the rock solid belief “I am a worthless piece of shit” finally felt so utterly awful that he found himself on the other side of my zoom screen. And as Life would have it, there was a brief moment—no more than a few seconds—in which the spell of that belief was momentarily loosened. The voice in his head fell silent. And something new was glimpsed.
Now, there is no turning back.
One of the things I often guide my clients through is a period of zooming out. Together, we take a step back and NOTICE the character that bears our name. We notice the mechanism of thought, and we marvel at the generations-old patterns that are playing out. Patterns of anger, patterns of passive-aggressiveness, patterns of judgment, patterns of attention-seeking, and patterns of resentment. We notice patterns of behavior playing out like little whirlpools spinning in a river.
We zoom out and simply notice THAT thoughts, beliefs, reactions, and behaviors are happening…or THAT they have happened. Completely neutral. There are NO problems at this level. No judgements. Just “This is happening” or “That happened.” Full stop. Simply saying those phrases sometimes offers a moment to catch your breath, slow down, and see what rises up when the dust settles.
For example, a client of mine is trying to do a better job about not yelling at her dog when he misbehaves. The yelling, she knows, perpetuates the dog’s behavior. But, for months, her only tactic was to berate herself for yelling.
“What the hell is wrong with me” was her mind’s go-to question after yelling. Shame felt heavy like a weighted blanket.
And then, last week, she began seeing that a pattern of anger and yelling was simply playing out. Something in that pattern made sense beyond her own logic. So, she set an intention to feel the anger rising and honor it without projecting it on her dog. But, even more awesome was that, when yelling DID happen, she immediately paused and said, “That happened. Yelling happened. That pattern in still active. And I can be a space of love and kindness for it.”
What was she doing? She was softening the container around the pattern. Instead of attacking the pattern, adding additional layers of shame and regret (which always and only reinforce the pattern), she zoomed out. She noticed THAT a pattern had run. It had been active. But she was not the author of the pattern…she was and is the wide-open container that gives it space to spin itself out.
Zooming out is a really awesome way to give the nervous system a moment to pause, to settle down just enough to catch its breath. To stop taking LIFE personally. To begin seeing THAT a lifetime of beliefs stitched into the costume are not YOU. Those conditioned beliefs—including the one “I am a worthless piece of shit”—have nothing to do with who you are. They cannot touch who you truly are.
Instead of trying to manage and control the contents of the whirlpool, we notice THAT the whirling, spinning pattern of the whirlpool is simply doing what it is doing.
And we begin to get the tiniest feel in our belly for the trustworthiness of the whirlpool.
The activity is not about US. It is not personal. It is the activity of Life, veiled by a trillion beliefs, labels, judgements, and concepts.
But those veils, like children’s bubbles, can be popped in an instant. And the truth of who we are can be revealed.