Nothing Is Missing

Why We Feel Something Is Off (Even When Nothing Is)

“All of humanity’s problems stem from man’s inability to sit quietly in a room alone.” — Blaise Pascal

I remember when I was a kid, I would get in trouble for just about anything. I don’t fully recall all of the various reasons why my mother shut me in my room as punishment, but I do remember spending loads of time alone behind a closed door that I wasn’t allowed to open.

I was trained to believe something was wrong with me before I even knew who I was.

By the time I was 7 years old, I remember being severely spanked and then locked away for at least an hour in isolation at least once a week. At that age, it really felt like a life sentence or some kind of cruel karmic revenge. I felt like I was purposely being cut off from everything and everyone just to give my mom space to be alone.

And within that incarceration chamber, I didn’t just sit there and repent my ‘sins’. I formed the belief system that I was a very bad person who needed to be locked away, and there was something very wrong with me.

I started to believe that certain parts of myself weren’t acceptable, that I was punished for. I was too unruly, obnoxious, hyperactive, a free thinker, and basically not lovable.

My mom confirmed (almost daily) that I was a troublemaker who deserved to be reprimanded, and the more consistently I was punished, the more this belief settled into the firmament of my being.

“The greatest illusion is to believe that something is wrong.” — Adyashanti

So, as I was sitting there in my room feeling restless and anxious, I got caught in a loop of repetitively thinking about how much my mom hated me and how scared I was to be close to her.

I wasn’t thinking about what I should have done or said differently. My mom never had the patience for that type of conscious caregiving without punishment. I just knew that whatever I did or said was very wrong, and so my entire being must also be wrong.

Each week, while I was waiting for my life sentence in jail to pass, I got more creative with my time and became more proficient at dealing with my inner world.

I wouldn’t spend the entire hour dwelling on what a horrible child I was, but instead I learned how to rebel against the system and any controlling, authoritative beings.

There was always this point during my time in my safe little isolation chamber where I would simply let go of the world, forget that my mother even existed, and start to get super creative.

I began to discover a deeper peace within myself and enjoyed spending loads of time in solitude. I loved reading, listening to music, drawing, writing, making model cars, and exploring the endless creativity within my own mind.

When I became a teenager, I remember not wanting to come out of my room after my jail time was done. Mom would knock on the door and I would just ignore her and pretend I was sleeping. I remember hiding a lot from my mom through the TV, alcohol, drugs, and I spent most of my teenage years lying to her and trying to avoid her at all costs.

“What is in the way is the way.” — Mary O’Malley

After I turned 17 years old, I was determined to escape from my home and make a life for myself out in the world. I slept on friends couches for a summer and got a job bussing tables at a restaurant. Luckily, my dad managed to find me and offered to send me to college. I ended up graduating with a psychology degree, which I thank him for every day.

I struggled for decades on how to have a healthy relationship with my mom, and perhaps this is what caused me to get married and divorced a few times. It wasn’t until I had my first baby a few years ago that I discovered mom’s ‘obnoxious child’ judgment was still engraved deep in my psyche.

It didn’t matter what I would say or do. If it caused an emotional reaction in someone, I felt like I was going to be severely punished and had to lie my way out of it. My mind would fall back into the same loop of thinking that I needed to be punished and became afraid of the wrath of the angry feminine.

What I didn’t realize then… is that this pattern would shape every relationship, every decision, and every moment of my life moving forward.

And what finally broke it… was a true miracle that changed everything.