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The Child Who Is Still Here: How Childhood Shapes Our Adult Lives · Infinite Threads with Bob Barnett

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  [music]
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_01: and time.
• 0:29
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome back to Infinite Threads.
• 0:31
  SPEAKER_00: I'm your host, Bob.
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_00: This week, We've been talking about time.
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  SPEAKER_00: Yesterday, we looked at the strange way life keeps moving from what will happen
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  SPEAKER_00: to what is happening to what has already happened.
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  SPEAKER_00: Today, I want to bring that idea closer, much closer,
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  SPEAKER_00: because if the past is still moving through us,
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  SPEAKER_00: then maybe the younger versions of ourselves are too.
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  SPEAKER_00: I don't mean that in some mystical way.
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  SPEAKER_00: I mean something very ordinary.
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  SPEAKER_00: There are parts of us that grew older,
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  SPEAKER_00: and there are parts that simply learned how to hide better.
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  SPEAKER_00: Think about the things that can still make you feel like a kid.
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  SPEAKER_00: A certain song, walking into a place that smells exactly like somewhere
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  SPEAKER_00: from childhood, or seeing something That you loved when you were 10.
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  SPEAKER_00: Suddenly age becomes a strange thing.
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  SPEAKER_00: You know how old you are.
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  SPEAKER_00: Your body knows how old you are.
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  SPEAKER_00: But for a second, some other part of you feels much younger.
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  SPEAKER_00: And that fascinates me because we usually talk about childhood as though we left it.
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  SPEAKER_00: We say things Like when I was a kid,
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  SPEAKER_00: past tense, finished.
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  SPEAKER_00: But I'm not sure it works that way.
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  SPEAKER_00: The child may not be running the whole show anymore.
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  SPEAKER_00: At least hopefully not.
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  SPEAKER_00: But some of that child is still in the room.
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  SPEAKER_00: The things we learned early have a way of staying with us.
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  SPEAKER_00: What made us feel safe?
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  SPEAKER_00: What made us feel ashamed?
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  SPEAKER_00: What made us laugh so hard we could not breathe?
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  SPEAKER_00: Those things, those things can become part of the architecture.
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  SPEAKER_00: We build the adult on top of them.
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  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes, sometimes that is beautiful.
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  SPEAKER_00: A child who felt loved May carry a deep sense that connection is safe.
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  SPEAKER_00: Someone who was encouraged early may find it easier to believe that they can learn new things.
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  SPEAKER_00: A person who grew up around humor may use laughter as a way to connect for the rest
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  SPEAKER_00: of their lives.
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  SPEAKER_00: Good things travel forward too, guys.
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  SPEAKER_00: I think that matters because conversations
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  SPEAKER_00: about childhood Can sometimes become focused only on damage.
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  SPEAKER_00: And of course, damage does matter.
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  SPEAKER_00: Some people carry very real wounds from those years.
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  SPEAKER_00: But childhood also leaves us gifts.
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  SPEAKER_00: Wonder.
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  SPEAKER_00: Playfulness.
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  SPEAKER_00: Curiosity.
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  SPEAKER_00: Those parts, they are definitely worth keeping, guys.
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  SPEAKER_00: Maybe growing older should not mean Becoming less alive.
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  SPEAKER_00: Maybe maturity is learning which parts of the child need healing
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  SPEAKER_00: and which parts need protecting.
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  SPEAKER_00: And I like that idea because I think
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  SPEAKER_00: that people sometimes confuse adulthood with hardness.
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  SPEAKER_00: We are supposed to become more serious, less easily impressed, less emotional.
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  SPEAKER_00: More practical.
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  SPEAKER_00: And yes, adulthood requires responsibility. That's for sure.
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  SPEAKER_00: Bills do not care how playful that your inner child feels.
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  SPEAKER_00: But, but, I don't think wisdom requires us to lose the part of ourselves
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  SPEAKER_00: that can still be delighted.
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  SPEAKER_00: I hope I never outgrow that.
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  SPEAKER_00: There is something healthy About still being able to look at something and think
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  SPEAKER_00: that it is wonderful.
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  SPEAKER_00: No defense.
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  SPEAKER_00: No embarrassment.
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  SPEAKER_00: Just wonder.
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  SPEAKER_00: The child is still there, but so are the old fears.
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  SPEAKER_00: Those can be harder to recognize.
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  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes an adult reaction begins much earlier than the moment
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  SPEAKER_00: that we're standing Somebody criticizes us
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  SPEAKER_00: and the reaction feels much bigger
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  SPEAKER_00: than the criticism.
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  SPEAKER_00: A person pulls away and suddenly we feel abandoned in a way
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  SPEAKER_00: the present situation doesn't fully explain.
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  SPEAKER_00: Someone raises their voice and our body reacts before our mind has even decided
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  SPEAKER_00: whether we're in danger or not.
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  SPEAKER_00: The adult is standing in the room, but something younger
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  SPEAKER_00: That doesn't mean that every reaction has to be traced back to childhood either.
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  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes people are upset because something upsetting just happened.
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  SPEAKER_00: We don't need to turn every bad mood into an archaeological dig,
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  SPEAKER_00: but I do think that it helps to ask once in a while, how old does this feeling seem?
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  SPEAKER_00: That can be an interesting question if you really, really are honest with yourself.
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  SPEAKER_00: Because sometimes a fear feels strangely familiar.
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  SPEAKER_00: We know this one.
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  SPEAKER_00: We've carried it before.
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  SPEAKER_00: And if we can recognize that, we may be able to respond differently.
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  SPEAKER_00: Not by arguing with the child either, but by understanding them.
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  SPEAKER_00: That is something that I've come to appreciate more as I've gotten older.
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  SPEAKER_00: We spend years trying to outgrow parts
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  SPEAKER_00: of ourselves that might actually need compassion.
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  SPEAKER_00: Maybe the scare kid did not need to be tougher.
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  SPEAKER_00: Maybe they needed to feel safe.
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  SPEAKER_00: Maybe the shy kid did not need to be pushed harder.
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  SPEAKER_00: Maybe they needed someone to notice what they were good at.
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  SPEAKER_00: Maybe the child who always tried
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  SPEAKER_00: to make everybody laugh was doing more than being funny.
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  SPEAKER_00: Again, three possibilities are enough.
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  SPEAKER_00: The point is not to diagnose our childhood,
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  SPEAKER_00: but rather to recognize that the person we were Did not simply vanish.
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  SPEAKER_00: They became part of us.
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  SPEAKER_00: And I think that connects beautifully with what we talked about Monday.
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  SPEAKER_00: You and I will always be back then.
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  SPEAKER_00: There is still a place in time where that younger version of us exists.
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  SPEAKER_00: They do not know what happens next.
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  SPEAKER_00: They don't know who we become.
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  SPEAKER_00: They don't know which things they are worrying
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  SPEAKER_00: about will turn out to be completely unimportant.
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  SPEAKER_00: And they do not know which moments will still matter to us decades later.
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  SPEAKER_00: We do.
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  SPEAKER_00: That gives us an odd perspective.
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  SPEAKER_00: If you could sit beside your younger self for five minutes,
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  SPEAKER_00: what would you tell them?
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  SPEAKER_00: Not a list of investment tips, although that would be tempting.
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  SPEAKER_00: I mean, what would you tell them about themselves?
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  SPEAKER_00: Would you say, you're going to be okay, kid?
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  SPEAKER_00: Would you tell them that some of the people they're trying so hard
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  SPEAKER_00: to impress
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  SPEAKER_00: Would you tell them to pay attention to somebody
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  SPEAKER_00: who will not be around forever?
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  SPEAKER_00: That one, that question, that always makes me think differently about the past.
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  SPEAKER_00: Because we often look back at our younger selves with judgment.
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  SPEAKER_00: How could I have been so naive?
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  SPEAKER_00: Why did I care so much about that?
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  SPEAKER_00: What was I thinking?
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  SPEAKER_00: But of course, guys, we were naive.
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  SPEAKER_01: We had not lived yet.
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  SPEAKER_00: That kid was doing the best they could with the information they had,
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  SPEAKER_00: just like we are now.
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  SPEAKER_00: And isn't that humbling?
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  SPEAKER_00: Because somewhere in the future,
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  SPEAKER_00: an older version of us may look back
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  SPEAKER_00: at today and think the same thing.
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  SPEAKER_00: Maybe kindness toward our younger self teaches us something about how to treat
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  SPEAKER_00: the present version too.
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  SPEAKER_00: We are unfinished.
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  SPEAKER_00: Still learning.
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  SPEAKER_00: Still becoming.
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  SPEAKER_00: That doesn't stop at 18 or 30 or 60 or 80.
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  SPEAKER_00: I think that's one of the comforting things about time.
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  SPEAKER_00: We are allowed to keep changing.
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  SPEAKER_00: The child is still part of us,
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  SPEAKER_00: but the child does not have to remain in charge of every fear they learned.
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  SPEAKER_00: We can update the story.
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  SPEAKER_00: We have that ability.
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  SPEAKER_00: We can give ourselves experiences We did not have then.
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  SPEAKER_00: We can become the kind of adult that that younger version needed.
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  SPEAKER_00: I love that idea because it turns memory into something more than nostalgia.
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  SPEAKER_00: It becomes a relationship and not with a separate person,
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  SPEAKER_00: but rather with a previous version of us.
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  SPEAKER_00: And maybe, guys, maybe that relationship can be repaired.
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  SPEAKER_00: Maybe we can stop being embarrassed by the kid we were.
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  SPEAKER_00: Maybe we can appreciate what they survived.
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  SPEAKER_00: And maybe we can thank them for carrying us this far.
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  SPEAKER_00: I think there's something powerful in that, don't you?
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  SPEAKER_00: The younger version of us made choices that eventually created this moment.
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  SPEAKER_00: Some good, some not so good.
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  SPEAKER_00: But guess what?
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  SPEAKER_00: Here we are.
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  SPEAKER_00: Still carrying pieces forward.
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  SPEAKER_00: And those pieces show up in strange places.
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  SPEAKER_00: Like the television show that we still love.
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  SPEAKER_00: The food that instantly feels like home.
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  SPEAKER_00: The joke.
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  SPEAKER_00: That still makes us laugh because someone from long ago used to say it.
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  SPEAKER_00: The past does not need permission to keep showing up.
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  SPEAKER_00: It is built into us.
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  SPEAKER_00: And that doesn't mean we should let childhood determine everything in our lives.
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  SPEAKER_00: Part of growing is learning that some old rules no longer apply.
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  SPEAKER_00: Maybe you were taught that showing emotion was weakness.
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  SPEAKER_00: We know that's ridiculous.
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  SPEAKER_00: Maybe you learned that conflict meant danger.
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  SPEAKER_00: Maybe you decided very young that needing people was risky.
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  SPEAKER_00: At some point, the adult though gets to examine those rules.
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  SPEAKER_00: Are they still true?
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  SPEAKER_00: Were they ever true?
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  SPEAKER_00: Do I want to keep living by them?
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  SPEAKER_00: My choice.
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  SPEAKER_00: That is where the present becomes powerful.
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  SPEAKER_00: We can't change what the child experienced, but we can change what happens next.
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  SPEAKER_00: That's one of the places where will happen,
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  SPEAKER_00: happening, happened becomes very real.
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  SPEAKER_00: The child experienced something.
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  SPEAKER_00: The adult is carrying it now.
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  SPEAKER_00: And the future version of us will be shaped by what we choose to do with it.
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  SPEAKER_00: The thread keeps moving, guys.
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  SPEAKER_00: I love you all very, very, very much.
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  SPEAKER_00: And tomorrow, I want to talk about another strange thing that memory does.
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  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes a memory does not feel like information.
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  SPEAKER_00: It feels like a place.
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  SPEAKER_00: A song starts or a room smells a certain way and suddenly we're not thinking about the past.
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  SPEAKER_00: We are almost standing within it.
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  SPEAKER_00: I want to explore that.
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  SPEAKER_00: But for today, maybe think about the child who's still here.
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  SPEAKER_00: Not as someone to outgrow, not as someone to obey,
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  SPEAKER_00: just someone who became part of you.
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  SPEAKER_00: The fears, the humor, The wonder.
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  SPEAKER_00: The things that still feel like home.
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  SPEAKER_00: That child didn't disappear.
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  SPEAKER_00: They grew into us.
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  SPEAKER_00: And maybe one of the gentlest things we can do is stop looking backward
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  SPEAKER_00: with embarrassment and begin looking backward with understanding.
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  SPEAKER_00: They didn't know what was coming, but we do.
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  SPEAKER_00: And somehow, after all that time, we're still carrying them forward.
• 15:36
  SPEAKER_00: I love you guys very, very much.
• 15:38
  SPEAKER_00: And you know what I need you to do.
• 15:41
  SPEAKER_00: Go out and pass that on, okay? Later, Gators.
• 15:45
  [music]