Hi Reader,
A client of mine sent me a message the other week.
I had given her a simple reflection exercise while she was traveling:
“Ask yourself once a day:
Am I moving from fear, or from alignment with who I really am?”
She messaged me days later and said:
“This is so much harder than I expected.
Once I see the difference… I can’t unsee it.”
She told me she started noticing the subtle ways she makes choices to keep the peace, to avoid conflict, to keep everything in her home from collapsing.
She said, “How do you move from survival mode dressed up as hope?”
When I read that, something in my chest tightened.
Because most people don’t know when they’re in survival mode. They only know when they’re exhausted.
She also sent me a post she found — something about partners who accuse you of “moving the goal post” when you name your needs.
She said, “This is the phrase he uses every time I express my feelings.
I’m at a loss with it now.”
And when she told me how triggering that phrase “moving the goal post” had become, I asked her, “What if your needs aren’t changing? What if they’re just finally being named?”
There was a long silence.
Most people spend so many years contorting themselves that the moment they stop contorting, it feels like they’re changing the rules.
But they aren’t.
They’re just stopping the performance.
She had been playing not to disturb the peace, instead of playing in alignment with herself.
And she knew it.
She finally said, “So simple. How’d I miss that? That’s the key.”
Then she added something even more honest: “And even if they were changing… that should be okay too. Moving the goal post should be okay. Why is that bad unless someone is too insecure to grow with you?”
It landed like a quiet truth she’d been circling for years.
The terror of telling the truth
Most people don't fear their partner's reaction.
They fear what happens when they stop abandoning themselves.
Naming a need — especially one you’ve ignored for years — doesn’t create conflict.
It reveals it.
For her, that revelation was disorienting.
When someone spends decades in survival mode, alignment can feel dangerous.
It can feel like disloyalty.
It can feel like breaking something that was barely holding together.
But alignment isn’t the problem.
Alignment is just honest.
The fear comes from what honesty might cost.
I asked her a question I ask a lot of clients:
“What does your body feel when you tell the truth?”
Not the rehearsed truth.
Not the strategic truth.
The quiet truth.
She said, “My chest gets tight. My stomach drops. And I feel… sad.”
And that sadness is important.
Sadness is what shows up when we stop pretending.
When people have spent years carrying everything — the emotional labor, the household labor, the relational labor — sadness is the first sign that their system is trying to come back to life.
It’s the body saying, “There is more of me than the version who survived this long.”
This is where people get stuck.
They confuse sadness with wrongness.
They think the discomfort means they’re breaking the relationship.
But often, they’re finally breaking the illusion that everything was fine.
Alignment isn’t calm.
Alignment is clear.
And clarity isn’t comfortable.
It’s disruptive.
It’s tender.
And it’s almost always the beginning of real choice.
Most people want alignment to feel empowering.
But before it feels empowering, it feels like grief.
Exploration
Once a day, pause and ask your body:
“Is this coming from fear, or from alignment?”
Don’t think — wait.
Notice:
- what tightens
- what softens
- where your breath goes
Then write one unedited truth that rises.
Examples:
- “I’m staying quiet because I don’t want to lose the little peace I have.”
- “I’m calling it patience, but it’s actually self-abandonment.”
- “I’m calling this love, but it’s fear of being alone.”
- “I’m saying yes so I won’t upset anyone.”
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Be well. Be kind. Do good.
Inward,
Fred
P.S. If this work feels like something you want support in, this is exactly what we practice inside Connection Blueprint — a live, 3-week group experience where we slow down, get honest, and build the muscle of alignment in real time.
Applications are open now. If you want first access to the January cohort, you can apply here: Connection Blueprint Application
You don’t have to do this by yourself.
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