Am I Too Much for the People Who Love Me — A 10-Minute Meditation for When You Feel Like a Burden

This session is for a close friend of mine, and no, you're not a burden. There's a thought that arrives quietly, usually afterwards, usually when you've been talking for a while. Am I too much? And they were kind, they were still listening, and somewhere underneath it, you had already started apologizing in your head for taking up the evening.

That's what we're sitting with today, my friend, the fear that people who love you are quietly tired of you. Welcome. This is calming anxiety. I'm your host Martin.

I'm a clinical hypnotherapist, and for the next ten minutes, nobody needs anything from you at all. Today's episode is brought to you by Anchored, my own app. There's a whole section within it called Confidence and Self-Worth, and you can go back there as often as you like. Now find your quiet place where you won't be disturbed, somewhere comfy to sit or lie down.

Because feeling like a burden is one of the loniest feelings there is. Partly because you can't really mention it, mentioning it feels like more of the same thing. So here's what I'd say, if I was sitting across from you, sometimes, somewhere along the way, and I'm not going to pretend I know where, well for you, a person learns to keep a running total. But they've given what they've taken, who's owed, and anxiety does something rather unkind with that total.

It only ever counts one column. You remember the evening you ran the ministry. You do not remember the eleven times you were the one who picked up, and there's one more thing, and I'll hedge it properly because I don't know your people, and neither in that moment to you. You may be reading somebody's tithesness as being about you.

It might simply be their tide. People are tied for hundreds of reasons, and most of them have nothing whatsoever to do with us. So let's do something that argues with that feeling rather than talk about it. Today's breath is a three-part breath.

You fill the belly first, then the ribs, then right up to the top of your chest. Three parts, one smooth breath in, and here's why it's today's breath. This one asks you to take up the whole of your own lungs, all of them, not polite little breath at the top third, the whole lot. There's nobody to apologize to you for that.

It's your own chest. There's plenty of room. So let's go gently. There's no target here.

If the third part feels like a stretch, just stop it too. That's completely fine. And if there's anything at all, feels uncomfortable. Just let your breathing go back to normal.

Let's take one breath, now breathe out first all the way out. Now into the belly, breathe in, up to the ribs, and now up to the top of your chest.

Then let it all go slowly from the top down. Again, let's breathe in to the belly. Now through the ribs, and now to the top of the chest, and out, soft and unhurried, all the way down. One more, and notice you don't have to learn any of this.

Breathe into the belly, now the ribs, now the top. And out. Then let your breathing go back to whatever it feels like doing. Nothing to manage, just this moment.

This gift of time to heal your soul. Now if you can, imagine that warm and polite, somewhere behind the breastbone this time.

It's a little rough and gold, spreading slowly outward, up through the throat along the shoulders, down into the hands. And I want to put something with you. The people who love you are not keeping the total, only you are keeping it on their behalf, without ever having been asked. And you've been extremely diligent with it, so bring to mind one person who is glad you exist.

Don't examine whether they ought to be. Just let them be there. And then notice this. You have never once, not for a single second, thought of them as too much.

But when they were angry, not when you told them the same worry three times over, you gave them all of that freely, and you didn't count it. The same arithmetic is available for you, my friend. You're just not on your own list yet. So in this space, visualize and feel these words.

And if you wish, I am safe. I am here. I am not too much for the people who love me.

I am allowed to take up space. Reading people is not the same as being a burden. I give freely, and I am allowed to receive.

There is nothing to replay. I am wanted, not tolerated. I am enough as I am, on a bad day, as well as a good one.

I am safe. I am here. And there is nothing to fear right now. Now relax and truly release the negativity that holds you back.

Love all that you are, because simply put, you are worthy.

Within this space of calm and reflection, here are your three daily caring tips. One, when somebody asks you how you are today, notice the little urge to say fine, sorry, and just let yourself say how you are, without the sorry on the end. Two, bring to mind one thing you gave somebody this week that you've already completely forgotten about. It counted.

Three, if somebody offers you a new plan, you will be free. As you something small today, a lift, a cup of tea, ten minutes of their time, let them. Being received is a kindness that you are doing for them. Now come back gently my friend.

Being aware of the space around you. Wiggle your fingers and then your toes. Feel whatever you are resting on. Take a deep breath in, hold at the top and then as you exhale, roll those shoulders, stretch out the arms and when you are really, let your eyes open.

You are not awake, you are a person that somebody is glad to have in their life, including I hope increasingly you. There is more of these sessions inside anchored. It's on iPhone and Android and I, wrote it and it's there because it's to heal the 14-year-old me. I always feel if I'd have had this understanding when I was younger, what I would have achieved, but I found me and through this session, through anchored, I hope you find you too.

Take care of yourself. I'll be here with you again tomorrow, so in everything, be kind. you