When your inner child throws a tantrum in the middle of Brooklyn
Last Thursday, my inner child had a full-on meltdown.
Not the cute kind where she needs a hug and a juice box.
I mean: she did not want to work.
She did not want to play.
She just wanted to complain and cry and rage quietly into the trees during my morning walk.
Ever have one of those days?
The kind where you’re not mad at anyone in particular…
But you’re just in a bad mood?
Well, there I was, tantrum on full blast, marching through the park with a pout that could rival a 4-year-old denied a cupcake, when I saw this gorgeous falcon.
Sitting majestically in the middle of my Brooklyn park, my sirens blazing, kids screaming, rats running park.
A big puff of feathers and magic.
Just being. Perched in a tree. Not trying to “get through its inbox” or “hit Q3 revenue goals.”
And suddenly, I remembered.
Spirit is everywhere.
Magic is everywhere.
Even in Brooklyn. Even in tantrums. Even in me.
I stopped walking. I looked up. I watched.
And what I noticed next broke my heart just a little.
No one else stopped.
Not one person asked what I was looking at.
Heads down. Eyes glazed. Earbuds in.
Walking fast toward somewhere else, something else, someone else.
It hit me:
We work so hard to create joy.
We hustle for happiness.
We even take drugs to manufacture a sense of spiritual connection…
And yet we miss the real thing because it doesn’t come wrapped in a strategy or served in a sound bath.
It comes in a single moment of presence.
Of wonder.
Of breath.
When I got home, I remembered a poem by Kabir—an ancient Indian mystic who, I swear, understood us better than Instagram ever could.
“Are you looking for me? I am in the next seat.
My shoulder is against yours.
You will not find me in stupas, not in Indian shrine rooms,
nor in synagogues, nor in cathedrals…
When you really look for me, you will see me instantly—
you will find me in the tiniest house of time.
Kabir says: Student, tell me, what is God?
He is the breath inside the breath.”
I’d love to say my inner child suddenly sparkled into serenity.
But she didn’t.
But she did take a breath.
She allowed me to do somatic dancing for 20 minutes.
To take a warm bath.
To find ways to soothe her.
And eventually she even smiled.
And for one day, that’s plenty.
Where can you let the moment be enough, even if the moment is messy?
What’s the bird in your Brooklyn today?
What’s reminding you to breathe?
If you are willing to comment below and tell me, I’d love to know!
