Already Free: Timeless Parenting Insights From Therapy and Buddhism

Insights from Already Free by Bruce Tift

Therapy and Buddhism hold different yet essential views about how to find wellbeing, according to therapist Bruce Tift in his book Already Free. It’s a position that fits our approach at Uplift Kids, where we integrate the best of modern science with ancient wisdom in all its forms (Stoicism, Buddhism, Taoism, Christianity, Sufism, Judaism, etc.). So we read Tift’s book and used it as the first in a book club for Uplift members.

During the book club, parents asked a host of thoughtful questions, including a question about how to handle kids who are expressing big emotions — particularly when those kids are out of control and are even hurting other kids. In this post, we’ll set up the context for the book and then get into those specifics answers.

You can hear more about Already Free from our three podcast episodes about it:

An Insight From Therapy: We Sometimes Live As Though the Past Is Present

Tift starts Already Free by spelling out the wisdom of therapy, which he says is about changing our habitual patterns and responses to discomfort. He says that as kids kids we all develop coping skills to help us deal with the discomfort we feel from difficult situations we face. As we get older, however, we find that some of our coping skills are no longer as helpful as they once were. We act as though we’re still kids — as though we still need the coping strategies we used back then, even though those strategies don’t serve us.

Tift writes, “While Western therapy is sometimes seen as overly focused on the past, it’s actually about the present. It’s about how most of us are, in a variety of ways, living as if the present were the past. We’re operating as if we’re still young children in our families of origin, especially in the realm of relationships.”

Then Tift adds that in his 30+ years as a therapist, he’s noticed a common trend where clients will say they want to change, but they then resist the uncomfortable feelings that are essential to change. He writes, “Clients claim that they want to change their habitual patterns, but when we actually start to investigate what would be required — which is to feel exactly the feelings they have dedicated their life to avoiding — a lot of very mixed feelings come up. And that becomes exactly our work: to acknowledge and be kind toward the feelings they’ve been running away from since childhood.”

An Insight from Buddhism: We Are Already Free

This is where the wisdom of Buddhism comes in. According to Tift, Buddhism claims that no matter what we are experiencing in any moment of our lives, we are already free. In practice this means that we can tune into what Tift calls our “embodied immediacy” — the sensations we are feeling at any given moment — and see that the sensations themselves will not destroy us. It’s important to note here that our sensations are distinct from the emotions and narratives we have in our minds.

“We’re not trying to “achieve” enlightenment or wakefulness,” Tift writes. “It’s already here. Our work, then, becomes holding the intention to relax, over and over again, into what is already present.” In other words, when we fully relax into what is already present again and again, we realize that even when we feel discomfort at the level of sensation, we are free.

Parenting Requires Skillbuilding

Importantly, learning this insight from Buddhism doesn’t mean that we only need to be aware of sensations in the body and then everything will be great in our lives. In one of the most powerful passages in the book, Tift writes, “Just because we have woken up does not mean we suddenly know how to speak Swahili and play the piano. Neither do we suddenly know how to have satisfying human relationships or how to handle our conditioned history. If we experience some degree of wakefulness but then go off to live in a cave alone, we are less likely to get captured by everyday problems. But if we want to live in society — if we’re going to be a parent, a partner, a teacher, or somebody trying to be of benefit to others — it’s very important to do the developmental work. … Because even though we might not feel identified with those issues anymore, the people we relate to may still be profoundly affected by our unresolved reenactment behaviors.”

In short, if we want to be in community with other people — again, if we want to be good parents — we must develop specific skills. This is what our lessons help families implement at home, providing resources to learn social skills, grit, compassion, humility, and much more.

5 Takeaways for Parents from Already Free

Here are a few takeaways for parents from the book, based on our discussions in our book club and on the podcast.

Name Your Sensations. We can help our kids by being aware of our sensations (again, what Bruce Tift calls “embodied immediacy”). The more we are aware of and name our sensations (e.g., “I feel tension in my shoulders”), the more we can help our kids learn to name their sensations as well.
Choose a New Behavior. As kids learn how to name their sensations, they start to intuit that just because they are feeling a certain sensation doesn’t mean that a certain behavior has to follow. This takes a lot of practice, but a child starts to learn that when they feel the sensation of hunger, for instance, they don’t have to be mean to a sibling or talk back to a parent. They can just eat some food. (“Oh, I’m just feeling the sensation of hunger. I should eat something.”)
Develop Healthy Coping Skills. We can help kids develop healthy coping skills (many of which we talk about in our coping skills lesson) while remembering that it’s impossible for a human being to grow up without develping any unhelpful coping strategies, such as running away from all conflict, or numbing out to video games, or having an unhealthy relationship with food, etc. None of us have the capacity as kids (or even entirely as adults) to make the healthiest decisions in every moment.
Learn to Tolerate Discomfort During Transformation. Given that we all develop unhelpful coping strategies, part of the growing up process entails helping kids transform their unhelpful coping strategies into helpful coping strategies. This is difficult because our current strategies are always comfortable to us (after all, they’re well-known and well-practiced by us) even when they’re unhelpful. (This is where therapy can be especially helpful!)
Stay Patient. Parents can help kids learn to stay with their disturbing sensations, rather than numb or distract from those sensations via unhelpful coping strategies. This is a challenging process for people at every age, but especially kids. It requires a lot of patience. But as kids learn new coping skills, they start to see that they have the freedom to choose new ways of being in the world that are healthier than their old patterns. They can choose coping skills that don’t leave them feeling regret and don’t harm others.

What About When a Kid Is Expressing Big Emotions or Having an Outburst?

Let’s return to the scenario we outlined at the beginning of this piece — about what to do when a child is expressing big emotions or even actively hurting other kids.

To frame things up, we recommend that parents think of this situation as requiring a sequence of solutions, since there’s simply no way to handle a situation like this perfectly all at once — especially when multiple kids are involved.

First, if it’s possible, we can separate the child who is expressing big emotions or harming other kids so this child has physical space to express themselves without causing more damage or stirring up more big emotions in a space with other kids.

Second, we can be a “regulation station” by remaining calm ourselves. In this way we can “attune” to the emotions of that child — letting them know that we see them in their outburst and are there as a source of comfort. (On this note, we can also give ourselves plenty of kindness, recognizing that there will be times when we simply cannot remain perfectly calm. We are human too, and we will sometimes get dysregulated ourselves. It’s a totally normal part of parenting!)

Third, we should avoid telling kids they aren’t being logical when they’re emotionally wound up by saying things like, “This isn’t a big deal!” or “Nothing you’re doing makes sense!” When a child is in a dysregulated emotional state, they need attunement, not a list of logical propositions. They need to know that you are meeting them where they are — at the level of emotion and sensation. (In practice, this might look like giving them a hug instead of a lecture!)

Fourth, once the child has calmed down a little bit, you might work with them to name the sensations they felt or are still feeling. If they can’t name anything, you might give a bit of guidance, such as, “Do you feel a tightness in your chest or throat? Do you feel a buzzing sensation in your head?” Help them understand that sensations are different than behaviors.

Fifth, work to repair the situation. If you became dysregulated in the process, offer an apology and a reminder that you’re always trying to do better. If there were other kids present when the meltdown happened, check in with them to make sure they don’t feel forgotten or neglected. Let them know you see them.

Again, the key insight here is that complicated situations like this require a sequence of actions. You might revisit the situation hours or days later (or even weeks or months or years later, if necessary) to full resolve things. You don’t have to instantly arrive at a neat, tidy solution. You have time to return and repair.

Remember: The Sun Is Always Above the Clouds

We’ll end with a metaphor about the core concept of the book — that we’re already free.

As Bruce Tift writes about it, we might feel like there are “clouds” above us, in the form of intense situations and disturbance. But we can remember that the sun is above the clouds:

“Imagine that we live where it’s always cloudy. We never see the sun. And we, of course, take our everyday experience as if it’s reality — the only reality. The clouds are perhaps a little claustrophobic in some vague way, but they’re comfortable and familiar. One day we meet a visitor who tells us that what we’re used to isn’t the whole story, that there’s something else. Curious, we go with him, and he guides us up a mountain. We climb up and up, through the cloud cover. There, at the top, we step into this incredibly intense experience of sun and expansive sky. It completely changes our sense of what’s possible, what’s available to us. We return to our daily lives, but we’ll never be the same.”

It’s a simple metaphor, but it can help us remember that no matter what we’re facing in a given situation, we are always already free.