The first step is to be aware of the internal voice that controls our life. The “judge voice” is relentless and says, “you can’t pretend - you are a failure and I can give you examples to prove it.”  

When that happens, turn TOWARD the judge, harness energy from deep in your body and say, “SHUT THE FUCK UP!”  This stops the judge and allows you to question whom exactly you’re yelling at.

For me, this inner judge is my mother’s voice. I can visualize and feel my parent’s disappointment that I took on as a child. But were my parents really disappointed in me? Probably not. So, what is the fear truly about? Did I want my parent’s love, but was afraid of losing it?
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As a child, I took on their feelings and mixed them into how I thought about myself - a failure. This is what we call a double bind. Visualize a rubber band that is pulled so tight on both ends that I can't let one end go. I can’t win in a double bind. Instead, I stay stuck in the middle and if one end goes, it will hurt since the love will go away and I will be alone on the other end. In this scenario, my judge wins. I can’t allow that.

So, as I turn toward the rubber band, I know that the sting will hurt, but afterwards I will be free of the double bind - and my prison. Isn’t it worth the pain? If I can get away from this inner judge voice that is truly not me, I can feel how much it is causing me pain and suffering, making me small and collapsed on a daily basis.

Ultimately I decided to let me mom go. I now feel compassion for my younger self and see that I am not a child now, but an adult. Life is really good in this very moment. I can be in the world without my mom (ironically she died when I was a teenager) and I can let go of the lingering fear that I am alone and afraid of the world. This relaxes my nervous system and the tension I have been holding. I feel a gentle warmth and appreciation for myself.

If we want growth and change, we need to turn toward the pain, specifically this double bind. Let’s allow ourselves to un-merge from our old stories. We are enough. We are not worthless, ugly, or weak. We don’t need someone else’s love - the source is within us. Nobody can do this for us - our shift in consciousness is the key and the key is to look inward.

One reason why you might seek out an attuned coach or therapist is based on John Bowlby’s Attachment Theory. John Bowlby (1907-1990), along with his colleague, Mary Ainsworth (1913-1999), developed the attachment theory based on the idea that an infant needs a secure relationship with a primary caregiver in order to fulfill the child’s social and emotional development. Through extensive observational studies of infants with their primary caregivers, Bowlby and Ainsworth noticed that security is a basic need for toddlers to grow and explore their surroundings.

So, how does this apply to you as an adult? The attachment theory states that as adults, it allows us to feel secure, enabling us to go out and explore the world without stress and anxiety, but instead with trust that we will be taken care of by life. Bowlby published many books in this lifetime (all worth reading). But, in summary, I’ve posted two charts (below).

Do you ever feel that someone else is running your life and it isn't the life you actually want?
 
I recently witnessed a true shift in consciousness. For the first time, this person (let's call her "Julie") identified and then let go of her inner judge voice.
 
When I started working with Julie, who is in her 70s, she didn't know what she wanted to do with the rest of her life. Julie struggled with depression and merging with her children. She felt as if her life was going by so fast, but she was stuck in this double-bind of not being able to fulfill her desires while simultaneously keeping everyone happy. 
 
In her processing, Julie recognized that she had difficulty moving toward what she truly wanted because of her strong inner judge. After recognizing this hurdle, we went through the following steps together.
 
The first step was working on identifying who the judge was and how it controlled her daily life. While grounded into her body, Julie found that she was collapsed by her mother’s energy riding on her back (metaphorically, of course). Julie's mother has been dead for 16 years. She allowed herself to feel how this energy lived in her body.
 
The second step was being the judge voice. Julie preceded to voice out loud what the inner judge voice was saying. The true energy of her mother was allowed to come out in that moment and we could feel that this voice was not actually Julie's voice (it even sounded like her mother).
 
The next step was standing up to the judge voice. Julie had to STOP the judge and not rationalize, defend, or collapse (all childhood strategies). She needed to ground her body again and feel how the inner judge voice was crippling her from moving forward. She had to feel how this inner critic had caused her pain.
 
This was not an easy step. Julie practiced many different strategies to try and stop the judge. But, finally, she found the strategy that set her free. She now feels and exerts a new strength in her mind and body. 
 
Now that Julie is free of the judge, she is fully in her body - relaxed and standing without her mother on her back. She is full of strength, which allows her true essence to shine - a playful joyfulness.  
 
If you want to experience true joy and your true essence, like Julie has, and let go of old wounds that keep you 'stuck' or un-empowered - consider signing up on the link below and Commit to Freedom from your inner judge today!

​What is your biggest fear? Mine is speaking in public or in front of a large group of people.

How do you confront your biggest fear? Well, I confronted my deep fear of public speaking rather unexpectedly just two weekends ago when I was pulled up on stage while attending a conference in Las Vegas. After I walked under the spotlight and grasped the microphone, I looked at the eyes of over 400 attendees staring back at me. But, I quickly realized that these were the eyes of supportive, loving people. And I realized it wasn’t really that scary. (Watch the full video below).

The Power of You (POY) is a 2-month online course with Mel Robbins and her amazing team. She invited the POY class participants to a reunion in Las Vegas so we could get to know each other in-person, share our experiences, and hopefully get answers. At the registration desk, we dropped our names in a hat, which were entered into a drawing for a live, onstage coaching session with Mel. Of the 400 attendees, I was one of 4 names drawn from the hat.

Mel has an Audible series called, Kick Ass with Mel, where she coaches 8 people through habits or issues in their lives that are keeping them stuck. Mel helps each person go beneath the surface level - to the root cause. And this is what she did with me two onstage weekends ago!

From my experience with Mel (see video above), I found that I am fearful of saying words, any words. I fear I will not find the words or that I will not be able to accurately articulate what I mean. I am scared that I will look or sound stupid. I am fearful of being laughed at, or being judged by others. I dread eyes looking at me because I think they might find me lacking, without value. Or, perhaps they will find me ugly. In other words, I am terrified of people thinking that I am a piece of shit (root).

​A quiet childhood
Throughout my upbringing, my mother was not fully attuned (my brother and I were 13 months apart and he had some physical issues that needed special attention) and my father was an alcoholic. While a small child, my dad did not like noise in the house. To receive the love I wanted from him, I had to stay quiet. So, I quietly played in the corner. If I cried, he would often say, “do you want me to give you something to cry about?” Sometimes he did. 

Misbehaving has consequences 
My father would return from work on Fridays (he worked out of town during the week), hoping to come home to peace and quiet. Instead, he was responsible for disciplining us if we had misbehaved in his absence. My father did not want to spank us with the belt. But he did because my mother expected that from him and he was frustrated with the situation. I remember feeling bad for him, and yet at the same time I was upset for being hit. I would cry (because of course it was very painful) and this would only make him more angry. 

Grandma embarrasses us all in church 
Once, when I was 5 years old and my crippled grandmother was staying with us, the neighbor forgot to pick us up for church.  My grandmother found us another ride and we slipped in the side door since mass had already started. While the priest was talking, my grandmother decided to yell across the church at the people that forgot to pick us up. Every eye turned towards us and the judgements flooded in. I wanted to shrivel up into nonexistence. Since that moment, I haven’t walked into a church without worrying about what people thought of me. 

Teasing has consequences 
During my adolescent puberty stages, my brother would come into my bedroom without knocking, and say to me, “boy you’re ugly” or “boy you’re stupid.” And sometimes “you’re so flat chested.” When you are told something often, you start to believe it. Plus, my brother was popular and cool, so I figured he would know. I decided I better stay hidden so people would not tease me like he did. 

Staying small 
I was going into the 4th grade when we moved to a new city. At the new school, the pretty girls pretty much ran the playground; they decided who could play with them on a given day and who couldn’t. As the new girl, I was bullied and told that I was not allowed to play with the poplar girls. This validated my belief that I should stay small in the hopes that I would not be picked on. I never raised my hand in class to read or answer a question. In fact, if we were reading out loud, I would count down the lines so I could practice reading the paragraph before I was called on. I would literally take an “E” in a class before I would get up and speak. I would even get to the end of the bus line over and over again so I could take the last shuttle to junior high school and avoid walking the halls before class.

In my 40’s I embraced the concept of anything is possible. I began to start unraveling my character patterns - seeing the continuum from you, me, we to oneness. I realized that there is no way to skip up the ladder to oneness without doing the work first. My motto in my 40’s was life is an adventure.

I truly thought I had worked on my issues around my mother’s death. I thought I had moved past it. I thought I was good with death and that death was my friend. I believed that I was good at helping people die; I could hold space for them and create a beautiful experience, which I have done. I felt it was a gift I had to give - helping people feel comfortable with dying.

But, I truly had barely skimmed the surface of understanding death. I had been holding on to my mother - not truly letting her go, I was NOT ok with letting her go again! 

How was I doing this? Well, by keeping myself small, not good enough, not lovable enough. I was enforcing my core beliefs about who I was. I could even find myself merging with her in the clutter of my drawers and closet. Every time I walked into my closet or pulled open a drawer - wham! - my judge voice kicked in and I would feel less than.

It was a very subtle way of keeping my judge alive, which just happens to be my mother! My bad tone of voice I would use with my family was my mom’s voice. The popcorn I wanted to make and eat each evening was my mother's favorite. The way I kept myself avoiding true contact with people was similar to my mother's actions when she was alive.

But, if I stopped beating myself up with my inner judge voice (which is my mother), then I would need to figure out a way to let her die all over again. I would have to feel that raw, numbing pain again!

Ironically this is all imaginary in my thinking, stored in my cortex as my perception of my memories. 

Yesterday while lying down, I could feel the roots coming up from the earth into my feet and spreading  through my entire system. I could feel that my mother was absorbed into this root system and part of  consciousness (Avatar comes to mind now). I could feel the Earth mother (archetype) of consciousness and the flow of this life system through my system. It was  feminine energy - not masculine. I could feel how this new energy flowed and the true strength of this space was just being. Simply lying on the table Being - not being pulled or needing to do anything for anyone - there was value in my just ​being. 

I could feel myself at all ages, into my 90’s, feeling the same as I did when I was 2. I could feel how time was irrelevant and my previous anxiety about being a minute late to my appointment became funny. I could feel that there is no need to be held, that I was part of this Universal consciousness - of which my mom was too.

I could feel myself no longer needing anyone or anything. I was everyone and everything! What could I need or want? I had been keeping my mom alive through the gravesite, pictures, my tone of voice, my smallness, my nervous system. I was totally vibrating and relaxed at the same time.

My mother has been part of this collective consciousness since she died (and while she was alive). I was born knowing about the oneness, but had since merged with her wounded identity.

AHHHHHHHH………………..finally, I could FEEL the whole picture and KNOW that I was part of the Oneness. I had it so wrong and it seems so simple. My motto in this moment is life and death are the same, they are everything and nothing at the same time. I KNOW of Oneness and its spacious vast awareness of everything all at once.