I’m responding.

Making decisions.

Reading the moment.

Reacting to what’s happening.

At least, I think I am.

I call it awareness.

It’s automation.

Default mode.

I didn’t realize

I wasn’t responding to reality.

I was responding to a frame.

A frame I didn’t build.

One I inherited.

Built around survival.

Or performance.

Or perfection.

Or fear.

I didn’t choose it.

I didn’t name it.

I accepted it without questioning it.

Without acknowledging it.

Seemingly knowledgeable about where I am.

The loop of unquestioned assumptions

guiding unquestioned actions.

The more invisible the frame,

the more control it has.

The more it dominates me.

It distorts what I see.

It shapes how I act.

That’s a fact.

That I have to uncover for myself.

Like entering a conversation

already bracing for failure,

calling it feedback,

reference.

Did I build this frame?

Or did I inherit it?

Can I reframe it

with intention?

I can’t always change what’s happening.

I can always choose the reference,

the frame, I respond from.

I don’t have to keep reacting to a story I defaulted to.

I can build a new frame.

One that sees clearly.

One built on answering,

What is here?