Kevin is a truth seeker from Co. Down in Ireland. A Compassionate inquiry® facilitator, educator, steward, life coach, meditation teacher and sound bathing experience facilitator. He works privately with individuals and organizations around the globe, is passionate about people, healing, happiness and encouraging compassionate connection. A lover of music, poetry, conscious conversation and spiritual growth, Kevin’s favorite word is ‘awe’.
This post is a short edited excerpt of Kevin’s healing journey, from survival strategies to meditation, mindfulness, wholeness and spirituality. Listen to his full interview on The Gifts of Trauma Podcast.
“I could hide myself so well that I was a delight to look after.” – Kevin Young
My mum was 21 with three kids, living in an underprivileged area of Belfast, at a very dangerous time. I have an older sister, an absolutely beautiful woman, who if born today, would be diagnosed with ADHD. Then I came along. My mum said, “You just arrived. You were just so peaceful and so quiet.” I imagine myself landing out of my mother, a waddling baby with a smile and an, ‘I’m okay, I don’t need anything’ expression on my face. Very soon after, my younger sister came along. She was very attached to my mother.
So I was between ‘crazy sister’ and ‘clingy sister’ and my mum recalled, “You were just a delight.” When her family came to help, they’d say, I’m not taking not taking her (my older sister), and I’m not taking her (my younger sister) but I’ll take him (me). So I would go with them and get looked after because I was an easy child, ‘a delight’. And while part of my nature is easy going, I now understand, through the work that we do, that I learned very early: There’s no point making noise. You’re not going to get attended to. My mother was preoccupied, stressed and overwhelmed. So I learned how to read her, to know what was going on, where to be and where not to be. I learned to read bodies, energy, people, faces, whatever… and that ability has stayed with me.
I also learned to be very self-sufficient, to look after myself, be pleasant, polite and helpful, traits that are still present today. The people pleaser in me didn’t like to upset people, to be a bother, a burden or an annoyance. That part of me also led me into very difficult situations where I wasn’t able to stand up for myself. I would sacrifice myself so that the other wouldn’t be upset.
It’s been a lot of work to return to that loving, kind, gentle, nice child, because there were 30 years of chaos between then and now. As I look back, I see that I ran away from myself, and hid myself, for a long, long time…
I wrote a blog post about this idea of hiding myself. I hid myself so often over the years that I couldn’t see myself. I couldn’t find myself. I did such a good job of hiding that when people reflect me back to me, I’ve only lately been able to see what they see, to really acknowledge and lean into that. For example, one of my colleagues was just telling someone at our conference, “I’m so happy you’re working with Kevin. He hugged me on the last day of the conference and it was the safest hug I have ever had.” I’m really coming into this space now where I can really see what I do for people and how people seem to be when they’re near me, or with me. It’s a great privilege when people say that sort of thing to me, but I still find it really difficult to receive, because….
There’s still an aspect of myself that sees me as a crazy, bumbling Irish man who doesn’t really know much about anything and breezes through life seeming to be unannoyed, if there’s such a word. Not upset by anything. When I’m working with people, in groups, if they are upset or annoyed, I really can’t find any anger or annoyance in me about this thing that’s upsetting everyone else. Should I be more annoyed? More upset? More angry? It just doesn’t seem to be there. It really doesn’t.
Reflecting back on my early years in a dangerous area at a very dangerous time, fear was normal. I learned very early to live with a lot of fear, to be careful, vigilant and mindful of where I could and couldn’t go. Recently, I met a longtime friend of my sister’s. He asked if I remembered when he first met me. I didn’t. He said, “You were being beaten up on the street.” He and another guy intervened and took me back to my father’s fish and chips shop. I don’t remember that incident specifically, but that’s how it was… Here I was, this little, soft, pleasing, accommodating boy getting beat up on the street. So yeah, I learned to be very vigilant.
When we talk about attachment, adaptation, addiction, and trauma, we’re really talking about a disconnection from the self. I was so disconnected from myself I didn’t even remember being rescued and brought back to dad’s fish and chips shop. I was in sheer survival mode, completely tracking the world outside, because, what other choice did I have?
I would have loved to have found today’s version of myself when I was 20, to have found spirituality, to have found a world where I could be compassionate, without being criticized or shamed. I’m sad that my survival instincts prevented me from finding that so much earlier in my life. And when it comes to spirituality, or religion… growing up in the north of Ireland, there wasn’t much distance between religion and bombs. It was a short journey from God to guns. There was no space to be spiritual or religious where I came from, unless you were also involved with segregation and separation and sectarianism, and I knew from a really early age I absolutely did not want to be involved with that.
I ran so hard to get away from this Source calling, this compassion calling. I ran so hard and used so many vices to move myself away from this genuine spiritual calling, because to survive, I had to. It’s not a regret, but there’s sadness. I wish I had found this home for my spirituality and my compassion 30 years ago.
But I am here now, and I got here through an indirect approach. I didn’t have to grow my desire to connect to Source or presence or consciousness or compassion. Instead, I had to remove the barriers to it, my shame, fear, addiction and grief. I had to work on getting to know these things, on being aware of them. When I did, my compassionate spiritual connection to Source shone automatically. It was already there. There was no work to do with presence, no work to do with Source. I just had to do the work of untangling and detaching the parts of my personality I created years ago to survive.
The Gifts of Trauma is a weekly podcast that features personal stories of trauma, transformation, healing, and the gifts revealed on the path to authenticity. Listen to the interview, and if you like it, please subscribe, rate, review and share it.
