05/01/2023
It started with a Samoosa…
Actually, no. Rewind. Samoosa-moments are seldom standalone events. They usually begin waaaaaay before, and then culminate in dramatic volcanoes- as was the case for my little girl last night.
It had been a long, hot, exciting and adventurous day of nonstop snorkelling, swimming, beach-walking, and shell-collecting. Add to that probably a few more than “usually allowed” sugary beverages and utter exhaustion from too little sleep… The recipe for an emotional storm of epic proportions. Toss in all the ingredients, stir them up a bit and the result is inevitable...
We decided to grab a quick bite at a rustic beachside restaurant before all heading for a much needed early turn-in. Everyone seemed to be coping okay… until…
My daughter’s four samoosas arrived, and my son wanted one…
If you’ve ever had just-too-tired kids, you may foresee the disaster that awaited…
Didn’t want to share… then shared… wished she hadn’t shared… too late- it had been eaten…
And there it was, the start of a powerful samoosa-moment… not obvious at first, but brewing…
Within less than a minute, I felt a little tug on my arm. I turned to look and the taps opened- okay no, the dam walls broke at extremely high decibels…
I told my little girl calmly that I was going to take her somewhere where she would feel safer to let her big feelings out, but that I would stay with her while her feelings did the “talking”. I scooped her up, found a dark spot on the beach about ten meters away, got onto my haunches and let her sob and wail about the loss of her samoosa, how much she had wanted them all, that she only had one left now, and and and…
In moments of dysregulation, for any human being of any age, there’s no rationalizing, reasoning or turning off the taps. There’s no sweeping and quieting the storm. It’s a vulnerable place to be, and no one, absolutely no one, chooses voluntarily to be in this raw emotional space. When anyone- child, teen or adult, is in that exact state, whether it’s a deep state of sadness, an intense space of rage, or anything in between, they don’t need fixing. I’m just going to say that one again: THEY DON’T NEED FIXING.
They need “sitting alongside”, they need a calm presence, they need a safe person who can hold them while the storm rages, vents, and runs its course.
In those dark moments under the stars, in our sandy patch on the beach, I consciously closed my mind to what I was sure would have been at least twenty people peering in our direction. Their discomfort wasn’t my priority. It wasn’t my responsibility.
All that mattered in the epicenter of that samoosa-moment was already right in front of me. A little girl needing to be loved, and held, not shamed or punished, in her space of intense vulnerability.
It felt like an hour… but in reality, the scene only lasted about fifteen minutes. We returned to the table and delicately managed to tread through the rest of the meal. A while later in the car, she curled up tightly on my lap and stretched her arms gently around me…
I breathed her in and reflected…
As human beings, our times of greatest vulnerability are our times of greatest need. They’re also opportunities for the deepest connection between two beings.
My little girl had come to ME for help… What a gift to have been offered the opportunity to comfort her tormented soul during a moment in which she felt completely disempowered and overwhelmed.
Hurt, overwhelm, grief, stress, exhaustion- so much in our current world can result in samoosa-moments. When you’re faced with these from your child or anyone else, don’t fear them. Embrace them. Reframe them as the gift they are:
An opportunity to walk alongside a fellow human being in need, on the holiest emotional ground, and bear witness to their greatest vulnerability…
An opportunity to experience unparalleled depths of connection between two souls…
An opportunity to hold, embrace and breathe…
The richness of relationships lies woven within the Samoosa-moments of life.
With love
Naomi ♥️
