Yesterday, I woke up to the tragic news about Robin Williams.

I wondered, “What story was he believing when he died? What stories had he held in the secrecy of his heart and mind for so many years?”

I think of the people I’ve sat with and listened to in therapy and coaching. It think of all the moms I’ve chatted with and they share something I would’ve never imagined they were dealing with. And I think, “My God, how many stories we are holding.”

Books upon books of stories are within each of us. Stories of triumphs and tragedy, sorry and joy. Stories that we never share with anyone. Stories of our parents and grandparents. Stories that have emerged from the experiences of our lives. Stories that have shaped our image of who we are and who we will become.

Some of these stories are helpful – they inspire us and remind us of who we really are.

Some of our stories are hurtful – we cling to them and they cause us a lot of suffering.

In my work as a therapist and coach, in my commitment to building community, I hear stories. The stories we’ve been acting out for years, maybe even decades. The stories that influence every single action we take – how we get up in the morning, how we greet our dear ones, what we eat, what we do for a living, who we hang with, who we choose as a partner, how we look at others, and how we go about our day. The stories that we are unconsciously passing on to our children (no pressure, folks. I mean it. Keep reading!).

Some of these stories have caused a lot of suffering, like:

“I’m fat.”

“It’s been like this my whole life. It’ll never change.”

“I think they’d be better off without me, everyone. I want to kill myself.”

“I’m a monster. I yell at my children all the time.”

“I’m alone.”

“No one will ever really love me.”

“I’ll never amount to anything.”

Any of these sound familiar?  We have all carried stories around with us – for too long – that do not serve us.

It doesn’t have to be this way.

You can remember the story of who you really are.

~ Maybe you are deep in your addiction. It has torn your family apart, wreaked havoc on your body, and emptied your bank account. You feel hopeless. You’ve thought about dying.

Say to yourself, “It doesn’t have to be this way.” Say to yourself, “This isn’t the full story of who I really am.”

~ Maybe you are a mom and you wonder if you’ll ever get your body back. You look in the mirror and don’t like what you see. You go downstairs and eat the left-over birthday cake while no one is looking. You feel ashamed again.

In that moment of swimming in shame, say to yourself, “It doesn’t have to be this way.” Put down the fork, put your hand on your heart and say, “I want to love you.”

~Maybe you commute to a job that pays well but it’s sucking your soul. You don’t see any other choice.

Say to yourself, “It doesn’t have to be this way.” Say to yourself, “Tomorrow I’ll do one thing that delights my heart.”

~ Maybe you are a writer, a baker, a leader, an artist and you have these moments when you believe you aren’t good enough and you’ll never make it.

In that very moment, say to yourself, “This is just a story I’m telling myself.” Say to yourself, “I’m going to remember the story of who I really am.”

~ Maybe there’s a growing distance between you and your partner. You blame him for being closed off. He blames you for being too needy. It’s the end of the day and it looks like it’ll be another night where you two turn away from each other, where you lie wide awake as he snores, soundly asleep.

This is when you can say to yourself, “It doesn’t have to be this way.” Say to yourself, “I can choose to turn toward him.”

Here’s the thing: we KNOW it doesn’t have to be this way. But we forget. We’ve been telling ourselves these stories for so long now that they have become a truth we live. We forget the story of who we really are.

But there’s hope.

Neuroscience shows us how every single decision we make changes the architecture of our brains. Literally. Every single moment is an opportunity to make a new connection in your brain, a new neural pathway. That’s neuroplasticity.  (Dr. Dan Siegel, interpersonal neuroscience, does an incredible job of explaining this in his book, The Whole Brain Child. Check it out.)

Neuroscience just validates what we KNOW within us. Wholeness is our birthright. Feeling a deep sense of contentment that under-girds the “ups and downs” of our emotions in everyday life – something within us KNOWS this is possible.

“Home” always calls to us.

And I call that “home” – “Delight.”

Delight is our true nature. It’s a deep sense of contentment. It’s wonder and awe, it’s stillness and vastness. It’s the story of who we really are. It’s the story of “homecoming,” as meditation teacher, Tara Brach would say.  Far from fivilous, delight is our true nature.  In yogic traditions, it’s called “bliss.”  Delight IS the Divine.  It IS who we are at our essence.

The thing is, we get so used to feeling awful and disconnected, that we forget this birthright of delight.   It seems so foreign, even unfathomable.  We forget that we really CAN go about our day with a deep sense of true contentment, feeling aligned with the Divine.

But something in us remembers and tethers us to the story of who we really are.

How do we remember THIS story?

What changes the stories? Changes our mood, our thinking, the path we are going down? What creates a new neural pathway – one of a deeper sense of contentment, one that lets go of the shame, one that opens your arms to embrace what you truly love with an unbounded heart?

If you are looking for a complicated solution (crazy, but we all do this), the real “solution” isn’t complicated. But it’s challenging. It takes discipline. It takes going against the cultural norm.

The ancient poets and sages had it right.

“Turning toward what you deeply love saves you.”

-Rumi

In the moments of shame, regret, suffering, and going down that old familiar path…

You have to pause.

Interrupt your myopic thinking with just one phrase, “It doesn’t have to be this way.”

Talk to yourself with tenderness (even though it’s the LAST thing we “want” to do) by gently putting your hand on your heart and saying, “There’s another way, Love.”

Yes, call yourself “Love.”

Say, “This is just a story I’ve been telling myself. And it hurts.”

Spend some time there, not rushing over how it hurts, and breathe with the hurt. Say to the hurt, “I see you.”

With breath and gentleness, soon you create spaciousness.

And in it is in spaciousness (and out of fight-flight-freeze) where you reconnect to that deeper knowing within you, that Home, that Delight, that vastness, reminding you of who you are.  You touch the hem of hope.   You see possibilities.  You catch a glimmer of who you really are and you can say, “THIS is the story of who I am.”

And then you start to believe in Your Story again.  You begin to speak your story, share your story, and BE your true story in the next moment and then the next.

THIS is how you begin to remember the story of who you really are. That is how you begin to remember that you come from and return to Delight, your true home. Not someday, but in this very moment, it begins.

It’s not easy, but it’s simple.  It’s not complex, but it can be hard.  The science of mindfulness, the science of compassion are all confirming what many ancient traditions have known for centuries.  The old stories we’ve told ourselves are powerful.  But the story of who you really are is weaved within you.  It keeps calling to you to remember.

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Friends, we can help a dear one remember the story of who they really are when we pause in our day to tell them, “You matter” and “I see you” and “I wanted to tell you what I love about you.”  This can be a life-saver.

Blessings,