It’s nine in the evening. The boys have just come back from their chess club, which they love. I can see that Marcel (9 years old) is not himself. I’m curious, because he usually comes back from these classes beaming from ear to ear.

I ask the children to go upstairs together and slowly get ready for bed, because the next day we were due to get up very early. Marcel didn’t like that. He got upset that it was too early, but he went anyway.

He didn’t want to brush his teeth together with all of us in the bathroom. He stood against the wall and waited for us to leave.

I straightened up, drawing my shoulder blades together, felt the support of my spine, focused on my centre, took two breaths and calmly walked over to him. I knew that if he sensed any unsettled energy in me, he wouldn’t open up and would only become more frustrated.

I crouched down next to him and asked:

“Would you like to tell me how chess was today?”

“It was OK,” he shrugged.

“You usually come back from those classes really happy.”

“I’m just sad,” he replied, curling up on the floor close to my legs.

I hugged him and we moved onto the bed. We cuddled tightly when Marcel said:

“I’ve been sad for 20 days. I don’t like being sad.”

(In fact, over the past few days Marcel had been moving through different states of anger, judgement and sadness.)

“Would you like me to tell you why you’ve been feeling sad for so long?”

He nodded yes.

“Because you don’t like this feeling.”

“I don’t like it! I hate it!” he exclaimed.

“That’s why it keeps coming back so often. It wants you to like it. Marcel, can you tell me where you feel it in your body?”

“I don’t know,” he replied after a moment.

“Would you like me to help you feel it?”

After a short pause, he said yes.

“OK, let’s take a deep breath together into the belly.”

We did.

“And now another one – fill your belly with air, really strongly, like a balloon. As slowly as you can.”

We did.

“And one more time.”

“Can you feel now where that place is?”

“Still not.”

“That only shows how long you’ve been judging and chewing over these thoughts in your head,” I said calmly. “It’s all right. Would you still like me to help you discover where this feeling is?”

“Yes.”

We breathed slowly and deeply for a long time, and then we did Breath of Fire (quick inhale and exhale).

“You know, Marcel,” I said, “thoughts and feelings are like waves in the ocean. They just come and go. You are not them. Let them be when they come, don’t push them away – then they will leave freely and lightly.”

We cuddled for a little while longer, when Marcel said:

“Mum, I can feel it now… the second chakra.”

And we celebrated, hugging each other even tighter.

A week has now passed since that moment, and Marcel has stopped holding sadness and frustration inside himself.