Welcome my beautiful dreamer.
If your eyes aren't closed yet.
Then please close your eyes and get as comfortable as you can.
And to begin,
Just take some long,
Slow,
Deep breaths.
For the next little while.
Just let the outside world carry on without you.
Let everything outside of you just wait.
The emails and text messages.
The job,
Tasks,
Responsibilities.
The people and me unfinished conversations.
None of that gets you for the next little while.
Because I'm taking you somewhere within.
To meet someone you've forgotten all about.
So now.
Using your beautiful and powerful imagination.
I'd like you to find yourself standing on a street at night.
The street feels familiar in some way.
And a little way ahead of you,
Underneath a flickering street lamp.
There's someone waiting.
Someone waiting for you.
The leaning against a wall with their arms folded.
And there's impatience all over their face.
You know this person.
Because this person is a younger version of you.
This is your inner teenager.
And despite all the years that have passed since you were them.
They still exist within you.
And they are still waiting for you to acknowledge that they're there.
Look at them.
This is your Inner Teenager.
This is you at that strange,
Intense age when you're no longer a child.
But you had absolutely no idea who you were yet.
This is you at that intense age where everything was changing so fast.
Your body,
Your friendships.
Your opinions,
Your desires.
The things you loved and the things you suddenly couldn't stand.
This version of you.
Was the one that tried so hard to work out what was he.
What music made you come alive?
Which clothes made you feel like yourself?
Who you wanted to kiss,
How you wanted to be.
It all felt so enormous.
And on top of that.
.
.
You had to deal with all the people around you.
Their opinions.
Their judgments.
Their criticism.
Their point of view.
You heard over and over again.
Which parts of you were welcome.
And which parts of you made life more difficult for everyone else.
Family.
Teaches.
Grown-ups,
Society,
All making you feel like you're in some way wrong.
Sometimes you disappeared into music.
Fashion,
Books,
Friendships.
Fantasies.
Anything that gave you somewhere to just be yourself without permission.
And here's the thing.
Underneath all of that teenage angst was something so incredibly simple.
You were trying to become yourself.
While everybody else seemed to have an opinion about who that self should be.
So please see your inner teenager leaning against the wall.
Underneath that flickering streetlight.
Look at the face you once wore.
They're still there inside you.
They are part of you.
And they are so fed up with the fact that you don't know they exist.
See the impatience all over their face.
And understand now that it's because they've been waiting for you.
For a very,
Very long time.
They turn and look at you now.
Dead in the eye.
Without saying a word.
They don't look at you with hate.
But they don't look at you with love either.
They just look you dead in the eye.
And then they turn away and start walking.
No explanation.
No invitation.
Just the unmistakable assumption that obviously you're going to follow them.
So please follow your inner teenager now.
They lead you along a narrow road until,
A little way ahead,
A house comes into view.
And the moment you see it,
Something in you recognizes it.
Not necessarily because you lived there once upon a time,
Although you may have.
But you recognize this house because it's been built from all the rules you learned about how a person should be.
How you should behave.
What you should want.
How you should act.
How you should speak.
Perhaps part of this house looks familiar to you.
Maybe there's a front door from somewhere you once lived.
A window from your childhood bedroom.
Maybe the walls are painted the same color as an old school.
Your teenager stops outside the house.
And despite their irritation and impatience.
They're completely still for a moment.
They're looking at the house.
And suddenly you understand exactly why they brought you here.
This is where so many versions of you learn to live.
The version of you who learn to keep everyone else happy.
The you who knew when it was easier just to keep quiet and silence your truth.
The responsible,
Logical,
Practical you.
The you who became excellent at reading other people.
But clueless at listening to yourself.
Here's the thing about us human beings.
We learn very quickly what earns us safety,
Love,
Approval and belonging.
And we adapt.
We become astonishingly skilled at changing ourselves completely.
So skilled that years later we can no longer tell which parts of the life we're living were actually chosen by us?
And which parts were handed to us that we just accepted.
Your teenager turns and looks at you now.
But their eyes have softened.
There's no more impatience.
They reach into their pocket and they pull out the key.
They walk over to you and place the key in your hand.
The house is yours to enter now.
I'm hoping that you walk up to that door now.
And that you slide the key into the lock.
And step into the house that shaped you.
Please go inside and take a moment.
Notice what your imagination has put here.
Perhaps there are family photographs on the walls.
Moments in time when your teenager was smiling on the outside but screaming on the inside.
Maybe there are trophies on a mantelpiece from all the times.
You tried so hard to make someone else proud of you.
Maybe there are certificates framed on the walls.
Signifying all the times you hoped.
That if you achieved enough.
Somebody might finally look at you in the way you were longing for.
Look around.
At the house where you learn to disappear.
The place where you swallowed anger because your anger was inappropriate to everyone else.
The house where you learn that honesty costs you love.
Just notice how this house makes you feel.
Notice how you tense up.
Like suddenly you have to be on your best behavior.
Turn yourself down.
Be anyone but you.
Now I want you to notice your teenager is looking at something that's leaning against the wall.
A baseball bat.
Your teenager looks at the bat.
Then they turn and look at you.
With a smirk that only you can understand.
Please walk towards the bat.
Please pick the bat up and feel the solid weight of it in your hands.
Let your fingers tighten around the handle.
Your teenager is standing beside you.
And they are holding a bat too.
This is your moment.
For now,
Please just hold the bat in your hand.
And feel the presence of your inner teenager beside you.
Gaze upon this house that contains old worlds.
Old rules,
Old ways of being.
And when you're ready.
.
.
I want you to swing that bat for every time you weren't heard or respected.
I want you to swing that bat for every time your truth was made to feel unimportant.
Swing for every time you said yes while everything inside you was screaming no.
Swing for every time you apologised for yourself simply to make someone else stay.
Swing for every time you abandoned yourself to keep the peace.
This is your moment to break down the walls.
So don't hold back.
Smash it all down now.
Smash up the mantelpiece.
Smash the framed certificates off the wall.
Smash everything and set yourself free.
So you can become.
.
.
Whoever you want to be.
So you can live.
The way you want to live.
And now.
.
.
Drop the bat.
And look at the beautiful mess you've made.
Feel how delicious it feels.
Feel the liberation.
Feel the freedom.
Feel the release.
Your inner teenager smiles at you proudly.
And you smile back.
Your inner teenager then reaches behind them and from their backpack they pull out two cans of spray paint.
They hand one of the cans to you and it can be any colour you want it to be.
Now I'd like you to spray paint all over the walls.
Spray paint your truth.
Who you want to be.
Spray paint your voice on the walls,
Your choices.
With your inner teenager,
I'm asking you.
.
.
To proclaim yourself in graffiti all over the walls of this house now.
This is your inner liberation.
This is your rebellion.
So write your truth everywhere.
Now stand back.
And look around you.
The house is barely recognisable.
Your truth is written all over the walls.
There's smashed glass everywhere.
Doors hanging from their hinges.
Dust dances through shafts of moonlight.
And it all looks like a masterpiece.
This house with all of its rules.
Was never really your truth.
This house was not built by you.
So you don't have to live controlled by its confines anymore.
Please understand this isn't needless destruction.
This is purposeful and powerful inner demolition.
You can't build a new Technicolor life.
From a place like this.
So please walk outside now with your inner teenager.
And take a last look at this house.
I mean really look at it.
You're not stuck inside there anymore.
You don't have to make yourself smaller.
You're not powerless.
You are now standing strong in yourself.
Standing strong in your own power.
Standing proudly beside your glorious and rebellious inner teen.
So now please find inside your pocket a box of matches.
Please open this box of matches.
Take out a match.
And when you're ready,
I want you to strike that match and watch the old world burn.
Strike the match against the box,
Hear that tiny rasp and watch the flame appear.
So small and yet so alive.
Bright,
Beautiful,
Powerful.
Don't throw it in anger,
Place it down with deliberate intention.
And watch how quickly the fire catches.
Because that house was so dry with repression.
So flammable from all the years of swallowed words.
Watch the flames grow.
Watch the old house burn.
And as you do.
.
.
Feel yourself becoming completely and utterly liberated from the inside out.
Like everything that was never true about yourself just disappears in the flames.
Feel the heat against your skin.
Watch the house blaze against the dark night sky.
You are completely safe.
And you are completely free.
Everything burns into ashes now.
Accept the truth of you.
Your heart,
Your soul.
Your inner child.
Your inner teenager,
Your choices,
Your life.
Watch the rest burn.
And see the incredible person standing next to you.
This glorious teenage version of yourself.
The one who waited so long for you.
See them now in the light of those dancing flames.
And as you do.
.
.
Please let them hear the following words from you.
Simply by repeating after me.
I am so sorry I forgot about you.
I love everything about you.
Thank you for being the rebel in me.
I believe in you.
And I want you here with me from now on.
You And then your teenager smiles at you.
Walks into you and becomes part of you.
Notice how the flames are settling now.
Everything feels quieter.
Karma.
Easier.
As all the old turns into ash and embers.
Smoke drifting lazily into a night sky full of stars and wide open space.
Look at the land where that house once stood.
Feel the heat still rising from the earth.
Feel the cool night air against your face.
And notice how huge your life feels now that there's nothing blocking it.
You've spent long enough being.
Who they told you you should be.
From now on,
Just let there be this wide open space for you to discover yourself.
Let there be nothing but you.
Let there be possibility.
And as you start to return back now to the outside world.
.
.
Feel your inner teen within you.
Part of you.
And always remember this moment.
The sky and the space.
You don't need to live in fight mode anymore.
You don't need to prove anything to anyone else.
You don't need to keep fighting old ghosts.
The house is gone now.
So as you come back to your body and the space you're in,
Feel a whole new chapter beginning.
With all of the glorious wide open space you just created.
Feel your breath.
Feel your body.
Feel your inner teen very much alive inside you.
Take a long,
Slow,
Deep breath in through your nose and exhale with a delicious,
Long,
Satisfying sigh.
You didn't lose anything in that fire.
You found yourself.
You didn't burn your life down.
You just cleared the way for the most spectacular life to begin.
