At my retreat, we had several evenings of authentic relating exercises. The day after the trip, we were broken into groups of two for one of the exercises. We took turns repeatedly asking the other person, “What is holding you back?”

“Procrastination.”

“What is holding you back?”

“My impossibly high standards for myself.”

“What is holding you back?”

“Fear.”

“What is holding you back?”

“Worry that I’ll disappoint my parents/partner/kids.”

Etc., etc.

The thing about this line of questioning is that if you go deep enough, you start to realize most of the things that are holding you back are in your control. That night, fresh-post trip, I was so open and clear that I felt like NOTHING was holding me back.

Of course, after I got home, real life crept back in and I started feeling hemmed in by limitations again.

But I’ve never forgotten that night. I believe what I said that night was the truth. Nothing is holding me back.

Now, when I start to feel limited by my ways of thinking, I go back to that idea. Nothing is holding me back.

I’ve hit up against my perceived limitations nearly every day on our trip to Tobago this year.

I’ve found again and again that when I go to places from my past, pre-trip self – especially spending time with family – that I very easily slip into my old ways of being, and start to feel limited and frustrated as a result.

It’s not just the presence of family and my interactions with them – I start to go back to my own tendency to judge myself and everything around me as negative or positive, situations as winning or losing. And typically in those equations, it’s a negative or losing outcome because of Impossible Standards (see above). (I’m reminded of a quote from Madam Secretary: “Can’t we just call it all neutral news?”)

I’ve wanted to write about our vacation, but there have been so many small moments of magic that didn’t seem enough for a whole post, and a bigger arc of wrestling with my own expectations. And of course, on a trip with a big family, there has been a fair amount of frayed nerves, noise, fighting, and whining. We’ve had to have conversations about how we treat each other, and how we should react to our own emotions when they are big and feel out of control.

I do want to write about Tobago 2019. Today, though, this is the thing on my mind: What is holding you back? Have you thought about it? Would you let someone ask you that question over and over until you ran out of ways to answer it?

Here is one little memory from Tobago: I was listening to an acapella playlist on Spotify at the round table in the living area of our guest house. Five came over and sat across from me and just watched me as I sat at my laptop, typing this post. “Shut up and Dance” was playing. I made eye contact across the table and we smiled at each other. Then I danced over to her, swooped her up, and had a mini dance party with her. It’s hot enough here that that caused me to break a sweat. It also made both of us smile. I’m smiling just writing about it. It was a little spontaneous moment of connection, and that is probably my favorite kind.