How interesting that most of us start life as toddlers singing the song “If You’re Happy and You Know It, Clap Your Hands.” “If you’re happy and you know it, clap your hands. If you’re happy and you know it and you really want to show it, if you’re happy and you know it, clap your hands.” We were not taught to sing about other kinds of feelings. “If you’re gloomy and you know it, clap your hands. If you’re angry and you know it, clap your hands. If you’re fearful and you know it, and you really want to show it, if you’re fearful and you know it, clap your hands.”
Years ago I had a client, Clare, who was a great mother. She had two young girls who were almost teenagers, and they did many projects and went on many outings together. She came to see me because she was starting to worry that something was wrong with her because when she was in the kitchen with her girls, she became an entirely different personality. In all other areas, she was lighthearted, fun, and open, but in the kitchen with her kids, she would yell at them as they were making muffins and often hurt their feelings.
I closed my eyes and could see an image of her mother with her in the kitchen. I could see little Clare being so heartbroken because her mom was being so mean to her in the kitchen. I looked at her and said, “This is how your mom treated you. When you forgive your mom and yourself, when you feel the feelings of the little girl within you, you willbe free from the need to continue to repeat this pattern.”
She woke up just from this one conversation and went home and worked on her pattern. Since then, she has been free and has lived like an eagle, no longer distracted by feelings that were truly not hers.
We often do this in our lives and we are so asleep to it. We carry energies we adopted from our parents or other big people when we were little, and we relive them over and over until we are willing to have an insight (“IN sight”) about them. We must be willing to feel the feelings and then acknowledge the feelings so the reality can change. Once the dynamic is brought to the surface, we will be free of it forever.
Temple Hayes, HA!!! Brilliant! I love the idea of singing: “if you’re upset and you know it…” Remember the game show Name That Tune? What a perfect gift it would be for grown-ups to play Name That Feeling with youngers. Actually, we “olders” would do well to play that game ourselves as well. How freeing. Maybe we can all learn to soar like eagles by keeping in sight how in the world we want to show up and tapping into the tools that will lift us up beyond old limitations from the old stories of our childhoods.