obnoxious meddling of his parents. Instinctively, emotionally, he had
fought and resisted each intervention. Who are these idiots to tell me
what to do? Why are they always trying to boss me around? Why
are they so unfair?
Each of us on occasion has surprised ourself with a strong
reaction to someone’s innocuous comments, or thrown a fit when
some authority figure tried to direct our actions. Or felt the pull of
attraction to a type of relationship that never ends well. Or to a type
of behavior that we know is wrong. It’s almost primal how deep these
feelings go—they’re rooted in our infancy.
It took therapy and self-reflection (and probably the observations
of his wife) for Apatow to understand that the movie studio was not
his parents. This was a business transaction and a creative
discussion, not another instance of a talented boy being bossed
around by otherwise absent parents.
But with that realization came stillness, if only because it
deintensified arguments at work. Think about it: How much better
and less scary life is when we don’t have to see it from the perspective
of a scared, vulnerable child? How much lighter will our load be if
we’re not adding extra baggage on top?
It will take patience and empathy and real self-love to heal the
wounds in your life. As Thich Nhat Hanh has written:
After recognizing and embracing our inner child, the third
function of mindfulness is to soothe and relieve our
difficult emotions. Just by holding this child gently, we are
soothing our difficult emotions and we can begin to feel at
ease. When we embrace our strong emotions with
mindfulness and concentration, we’ll be able to see the
roots of these mental formations. We’ll know where our
suffering has come from. When we see the roots of things,
our suffering will lessen. So mindfulness recognizes,
embraces, and relieves.Take the time to think about the pain you carry from your early
experiences. Think about the “age” of the emotional reactions you