2001. I was brainstorming with my then-coach, who was also training me to become a coach myself, about what kind of coaching I could offer.
My coach burst out laughing and yelled: “I’ve got it! No one else is doing this, and it would be perfect for you: You could offer revenge fantasy coaching!”
Haha! I never ended up doing that (it could still be an unfulfilled need in the market), and it was of course a joke, but I get how she came up with it.
I’ve never been scared of thoughts. Not my own, and not others. Everyone has dark, rage-y, morbid, unkind, horrible thoughts every now and then. So what? No big deal.
Fantasizing about slashing your ex’s tires is not the same as actually doing it. And that thought alone is nothing to be ashamed of or feel guilty about. It’s just a thought. You didn’t come up with it; you just see it.
I fantasized with more than one friend about the most creative / mean / effective ways to get back at our sleazy exes. We never harmed anyone. Never acted on any of those ideas. But just letting these thoughts out was incredibly liberating and a lot of fun.
Most of my clients over the years have confessed at least one thing to me that they were ashamed of or felt weird or guilty about. Because it was selfish or unkind.
(Oh fucking patriarchy, conditioning all women into believing they need to be kind and act nice. Fuck you.)
I never even blinked hearing any of them. None of these thoughts were strange or something I needed to notify the police about. I’d heard most of them before and/or thought them myself.
Here’s a random selection of thoughts women told me over the years. Maybe reading them takes a load off of you as well.
Oh, and let’s start with one of mine:
When I work with too many private clients and/or have too much social interaction, I start resenting and deeply disliking all of humanity, and I need to withdraw completely to recharge.
(That never happens, because I only work with a handful of clients at a time and don’t socialize often.)
And now the random selection I’ve heard more than once over the years:
– I no longer want to work with X type of clients, because I don’t really like them;
– I’m not sure I still like my partner;
– Sometimes I hate everyone;
– If I could start over, I wouldn’t get kids again;
– It’s not a nice thing to say, but when I heard that X’s launch bombed, I felt secretly happy about that at first;
– I don’t like my friend’s partner;
– I sometimes wish person X was dead already.
Recognize anything?
None of these thoughts are wrong.
Again, I’m not talking about acting on thoughts. I’m only talking about the thoughts themselves.
No thought is wrong or right.
It just is.
No thought is created by you.
It just comes up and you happen to notice it.
No thought has power.
It’s nothing but a bag of wind.
There’s no need to feel guilty or ashamed about any of them.
(And if you do, that’s just a thought as well.)
Love,
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