Several months ago I received a visit from someone whom I had directly dismissed as my friend. She came back to see me in blazing red hot color as fast as the speed of light. And the visit came when I least expected it, catching me off guard.

Last year I was so blessed to take a cruise to Greece with my mother and two sister-in-laws.   Twelve wonderful days—we all got along beautifully and no walking on each other’s nerves or even small irritations which can happen when you have been together awhile.  The last night, however, things got a little testy with me at least.   We were sharing our last scrumptious meal together.  We had ordered and were patiently waiting.  We had not eaten much lunch so we are all very tired and hungry and thinking of the tantalizing meal we had ordered.

Suddenly, I looked around us and saw that people that had arrived later than us had already received their meals and were laughing and eating away!  I had this sudden feeling  -the servers were taking advantage of us because they had come to know us and knew how friendly and easy going our group had been.  And then without warning—there it was!  Out in the open she came running freely without supervision. My False Self called the young girl who was our waitress over to our table.  I was not going to allow these “kids” they had working there to treat  “my  mother”  (who was actually enjoying another wine with little stress)  to go without food.  It just wasn’t fair! It was up to me to give them a piece of my mind!

Jayne’s False Self:  “You know, young lady, we have been waiting here for over thirty minutes.  We need our food and we have paid a lot to be on this cruise.  We need some service now or I will be calling the head waiter over about your poor service!” Wham! She was out full steam ahead.  One of my sister –in-laws who unfortunately, or fortunately, for me just happens to be a coach and has done training in my Mindset philosophy, said to me: “Oh dear!  Jayne’s False Self is out and on the loose!”  It stayed out a couple of more minutes while I told her to not use that psychological mumbo jumbo on me.

Then as quickly as she had come—she disappeared into nothingness.  I called the tearful young lady over to our table and apologized.  The rest of our trip returned to its joyous conclusion and I returned to my kind self.

My little friend, the False Self, had reared her ugly head again.  I could have sworn I had gotten rid of her!  Those close intimate life -long friendships are sometimes hard to end!  Lesson: Keeping in touch and listening to our False Self is required.  This dark shadowy part of us I call the False Self is valuable –and must be heard, appreciated and cared for or it feels left out and decides to rejoin us. This is one of those friends who are helpful to us if only to show us what we don’t want to be!