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Now think of a time when you were truly happy. See if you can picture or even feel the way you held your face, the way you moved, the way you sounded when you laughed. Describe what you see.
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Now let"s look at thoughts. See if you can think of a belief you had when you were little that you no longer believe. Maybe you believed in Santa Claus? Write that down.
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What are some really serious thoughts you have had? Maybe about your health? Or finances? Let your eyes go closed for a moment and see if you can picture yourself in the middle of those thoughts. Write a few down.
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Think now about roles you have had in your life. When have you been a child, a student, a team member, a bully, a victim? What about a parent, a teacher, a coach, a spouse, someone who was left or who did the leaving in a relationship?
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Now, get a mirror and take a look into your own eyes, and see if you can see the you in there that looked out of the eyes of that child, that teenager, that sick body, that healthy body. See if you can let it sink in that there is a you that has been there the whole time.
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Who was it that noticed all those bodies, emotions, roles, thoughts?
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An Answer from the Me I Would Be: A Letter to the Past
For this exercise, get a pen and paper. It might help if you can find a picture of yourself when you were a child. If not, then just close your eyes and imagine your own face as a child.
Begin the exercise by imagining, even if it does not seem to be true right now, that you are right on track in your life in this moment. Not that everything is great right now, but that you are on the road to a life you could really love. If you are very off track right now, you notice that it is possible that today is a crossroads and that looking back later in your life, you would look at today and say, "That was the day things began to shift. I could not even see it then. Things looked hopeless, but I was wrong. And I can see now that that was the day I put my feet on the ground and began my journey to a better life."
Close your eyes for a moment and allow yourself to imagine that it is so. We don"t mean this as some sort of self-esteem builder. We covered that ground earlier in the chapter. We also don"t mean it as a promise. None of us can know the future. Just imagine that it is so. Let it be possible, even though your mind may say, Impossible! Just allow your eyes to go closed. Picture your self on this day, and let it be so, in your imagination, that this day was the day, the turning point. If your mind gets busy in this imagining, just practice Six Breaths on Purpose and let the thoughts bubble. You don"t need to drive them away. Really try to see your own face in your mind"s eye and let yourself see in that face someone who is on the path. Take a couple of minutes.
On a sheet of paper, jot down a few notes about what your mind had to tell you during that little meditation. These will be just for your reference after you complete the rest of the exercise. After you have written down what you need to, turn your paper over.
If you have a photo of yourself as a youngster, set it in front of you. Look into your own eyes and come to stillness. If you don"t have a photo, allow your mind to reach back to a moment from your childhood that you remember clearly. See yourself in that moment: what you looked like, what you were wearing, and your surroundings. Sit for as long as you like while you breathe in and out this image of yourself as a youngster.