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Transcript

Living Without Fear - The Gifts I Didn’t See | With Esther Buerki · LIVING WITHOUT FEAR

• 0:13
  Welcome to the podcast Living Without Fear.
• 0:17
  I'm your host, Esther from Switzerland, and I'm deeply
• 0:21
  grateful you're here with me today.
• 0:24
  This is the 140th solo episode, and it's the last episode of
• 0:32
  2025. I want to dedicate this episode
• 0:37
  to my parents, to my mom, who passed away in February at 90
• 0:44
  years old, my dad who turns 91 in a week.
• 0:49
  This episode is not about lame, it's not about perfection.
• 0:55
  It's about love, growth, and the meaning we give to our stories.
• 1:02
  If you're new here, welcome. And if you've been walking this
• 1:07
  path with me for a while, thank you for your trust.
• 1:12
  For those of you who don't know my story, you're in my poverty
• 1:17
  and even later, I hated my parents.
• 1:21
  Truly, I had countless arguments with my father.
• 1:26
  He was authoritarian, always convinced he knew better, always
• 1:32
  needing to be right. My mom, on the other hand,
• 1:36
  didn't respect my my boundaries. She opened my closed bedroom
• 1:42
  door without knocking. She came in whenever she wanted
• 1:48
  and emotionally I often had to be the strong one for her.
• 1:54
  I had to comfort her when she was sad, disappointed or
• 1:59
  overwhelmed. When I moved out at 21, there
• 2:06
  were times when I completely stopped being touched.
• 2:11
  I needed distance to survive and what we all did, me included,
• 2:18
  was never talking about what we truly felt.
• 2:23
  We never acknowledged the good. We never said the loving words.
• 2:31
  For a long time I lived in victim mode.
• 2:35
  I believed my suffering was caused by my upbringing, by my
• 2:42
  parents emotional limitations. They were intelligent people,
• 2:48
  but emotionally they never learned to grow.
• 2:53
  They stayed at the level of an 8 year old child and I stayed
• 3:00
  stuck in that story for decades. I don't say this to brag, but I
• 3:08
  say it with humility and clarity.
• 3:12
  I'm the first one in my family and the generations before who
• 3:19
  chose to step out of victimhood, Who did and who is doing the
• 3:25
  inner work, who is healing, Who decides every day to change the
• 3:31
  story instead of repeating it. And today I can say something
• 3:38
  that took me a very long time to feel.
• 3:42
  I love my parents dearly. They did the best they could.
• 3:50
  I wrote this already in my book Living Without Fear.
• 3:55
  They truly believed they gave us all the love they had.
• 4:01
  It just didn't feel like love to my brother and me because their
• 4:07
  love was wrapped in stubbornness, self righteousness
• 4:13
  and emotional blindness. And still it was love.
• 4:20
  Dad, I want to thank you. Thank you for working so hard so
• 4:26
  we could grow up safely. We had the beautiful house with
• 4:31
  a garden. We had food, clothes, holidays,
• 4:36
  excursions. Young you introduced us to
• 4:40
  classical music, to concerts, to art and museums.
• 4:46
  You awakened our interests in history.
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  You worked with us on Roman streets in Switzerland, showed
• 4:56
  us amphitheatres, stories, time. You sat with us when we didn't
• 5:04
  understand math. You helped me prepare lectures
• 5:09
  in high school. You were present in your own
• 5:13
  way. Mom, I want to thank you too.
• 5:18
  You were a hard worker too. You kept the house and the
• 5:24
  garden alive. You baked bread, cakes,
• 5:29
  Christmas biscuits with us. You crafted gifts with us for
• 5:34
  our grandparents and godparents. You taught us how to use our
• 5:40
  hands, how to create, how to invite people, how to host, how
• 5:48
  to laugh, how to be silly. You taught us how to care for a
• 5:54
  dog and how not to take life too seriously.
• 6:01
  These are immense gifts. They shaped me.
• 6:05
  They made me curious, open minded, determined, loving.
• 6:13
  So going back to my story, what I didn't understand for a long
• 6:19
  time was this. I'm allowed to choose myself.
• 6:23
  I'm allowed to change my story. Just because I didn't inherit
• 6:30
  self-confidence doesn't mean I can't build it.
• 6:34
  Just because my parents didn't didn't model emotional
• 6:39
  intelligence doesn't mean I'm doomed.
• 6:43
  Hardship is part of every life. The question is not what
• 6:49
  happened to us but what meaning we give to it.
• 6:56
  Do I tell myself I had to be strong for my mother so now I
• 7:03
  always forget myself? Or do I say this made me deeply
• 7:10
  empathetic, present and able to hold others?
• 7:17
  Do I say my parents emotional immaturity made me suffer or
• 7:25
  it's turned me into someone who understands people deeply,
• 7:30
  almost like a natural psychotherapist?
• 7:36
  My parents also gave me the gift of choosing a different way with
• 7:42
  my two sons being emotionally present, supporting their inner
• 7:48
  growth. My father taught me through
• 7:53
  contrast that work does not determine worth.
• 7:58
  Worth comes within. And I'm still integrating this
• 8:04
  truth step by Do you see where I'm guiding
• 8:20
  you, the listener? You can always look at your
• 8:25
  story from different angles. You can keep suffering, or you
• 8:31
  can transform, meaning your stuckness is not permanent.
• 8:38
  If you want change, it starts with the story you tell yourself
• 8:43
  today. And if you're listening right
• 8:47
  now and you were in pain because of your parents or your family,
• 8:54
  know this, You have a choice. You too.
• 8:59
  You can see the gifts you received from your parents.
• 9:04
  You too. You can choose to change the
• 9:08
  meaning of the story you're telling yourself.
• 9:12
  You too. You can stop your suffering, you
• 9:16
  too. You can change your story and
• 9:20
  please do it now. Don't wait any longer and let me
• 9:28
  tell you, you don't have to walk this path alone.
• 9:34
  If you feel cold, Ioffer a free one-on-one coaching session, a
• 9:40
  safe space to gently turn your story into something empowering.
• 9:47
  Just reach out. And as this year comes to a
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  close, I want to thank you for listening, for feeling, for
• 10:01
  being willing to look inward. I wish you a soft, meaningful
• 10:08
  transition into 2026. May you carry less weight and
• 10:15
  more truth with you. May you honor your story and
• 10:21
  rewrite it where it no longer serves you.
• 10:27
  My next podcast will be released on the first day of 2026.
• 10:33
  Until then, take gentle care of your heart with love from
• 10:40
  Switzerland.