How SEEDs Grow
We all know someone brilliant on paper but struggling to make an impact. The colleague with multiple degrees may hesitate to speak up in meetings. Or your highly trained professional friend loses all sensibility when it comes to dating happily.
This isn’t a lack of intelligence or even confidence. It’s a lack of empowerment.
You also know people with fewer professional or personal qualifications who seem to move through life with confidence, clarity, and purpose. They may not have the most impressive credentials, but they trust their voice, take risks, and make things happen.
The difference, you wonder? Empowerment is what turns knowledge into action and potential into impact. It’s not just about what you know but whether you believe you have the right to use it.
As I’ve mentioned in my memoir “Too Much Love is Not Enough” and several articles, my credentials did not give me the confidence to lead, sell, or be seen. Even after therapy that healed my childhood wounds, I was still left to discover on my own what made me willing to shrink and hide.
Empowerment is what turns knowledge into action and potential into impact.
Enter SEEDs — Subtle Experiences of Emotional Disempowerment. Over a decade of work, research, and healing taught me that empowerment was the missing ingredient in my life. This realization inspired me to create the SEEDs framework, a tool designed to reveal the hidden patterns of disempowerment that affect our personal and professional lives. The framework offers a clear path toward reclaiming agency, building confidence, and fostering growth.
Rooted Reflection
Understanding the SEEDs that were sown in my youth has helped me become more purposeful in my healing journey. It guides my affirmations and shapes my behavioral intentions. Whenever I’m stuck, I check in with myself to see which SEED is growing.
For example, while preparing to publish my forthcoming book, Seven Exits, I nearly opted for traditional publishing even though I had successfully self-published previous books. A session with my mentor revealed that I was struggling with playing small again. I had convinced myself that if the book was destined for the mass market, someone else should be responsible for its success.
As an empowerment coach, I’ve witnessed my clients’ “aha” moments when they learn about SEEDs. They express that their choices finally make sense, and that challenges like maintaining boundaries or experiencing a lack of motivation can be understood as narratives they have the power to change.
Sowed Seeds
Below are some of the most common SEEDs that may have quietly shaped your sense of empowerment. These patterns can feel like personality traits or just “the way things are.” But when you recognize them as conditioning rather than truth, you create space for transformation.
1. Being Praised Only for Compliance Instead of Critical Thinking
- You may have learned that following is safer than leading if rewarded for obedience rather than curiosity.
- As an adult, you might hesitate to trust your ideas, fearing disapproval for questioning norms.
2. Having Feelings Dismissed Instead of Validated
- Phrases like “Stop crying, it’s not a big deal” or “You’re too sensitive” may have taught you that your emotions were excessive or unimportant.
- You may now find yourself doubting your experiences, apologizing for your emotions, or suppressing them entirely.
3. Learning That Your Needs Come Second (or Last)
- If your needs were frequently set aside for the comfort of others, you might have learned that advocating for yourself is selfish.
- This can make it difficult to set boundaries or prioritize your well-being as an adult.
4. Experiencing Love or Approval as Conditional
- If affection was given only after achievements (“I’m proud of you because you got straight A’s”) or pleasing others (“You’re such a good kid when you listen”), you may have learned that your worth is performance-based.
- This can lead to perfectionism, fear of failure, or over-functioning to earn validation.
5. Being Taught to Avoid Conflict at All Costs
- You may have learned that silence equals safety if you were told, “Be nice” or “Just let it go” when mistreated.
- Now, you might hesitate to speak up for yourself or advocate for others, reinforcing a cycle of passivity.
6. Being Punished for Failure
- If mistakes were met with shame instead of guidance, failure might feel like something to fear rather than a tool for growth.
- As a result, you may avoid challenges and play small instead of taking risks.
7. Living with Uncertainty or Instability
- If you experienced frequent unpredictability (e.g., financial instability, emotional inconsistency from caregivers, frequent moves), survival may have felt more urgent than self-expression.
- Now, taking bold steps toward empowerment may feel unsafe because stability — not growth — has been your primary goal.
8. Being Overprotected or Overcorrected
- If you were constantly rescued from failure or never allowed to make your own decisions, trusting yourself may now feel difficult.
- Over time, you may have learned to defer to others instead of believing in your ability to navigate challenges.
9. Witnessing Adults Play Small
- If you grew up seeing adults avoid conflict, suppress their opinions, or shrink in social settings, you may have internalized the idea that playing small is the safest option.
- As an adult, you may be judgmental or envious of those who take risks.
10. Hearing Subtle Language That Limits Your Potential
- Statements like “That’s just the way things are” or “Dreaming is nice, but be realistic” can quietly reinforce limitation rather than possibility.
- Over time, these phrases shape what you believe is possible for your own life.
Take a moment to reflect on your own experiences. Give yourself one point for each of the ten SEEDs you recognize from childhood. Your score isn’t a measure of limitation. Instead, it’s a guide to transformation. The higher your score, the more intentional you must become in replanting where your SEEDs became personal or professional weeds. Your past does not define you, but your awareness can shape a more empowered future. The question isn’t whether you can change. It’s whether you’re ready to begin.
Reclaiming Your Power
How Early SEEDs Shape Our Empowerment Journey
Subtle disempowerment happens in childhood when children learn that their voices are too loud, their needs are too much, or their worth is conditional. You may have been directly or inadvertently taught to prioritize safety over self-expression, approval over authenticity, or survival over self-trust. Some of the most lasting limitations we carry don’t come from moments of crisis but from quiet, everyday experiences that subtly teach us to shrink, hesitate, or doubt our power.
Seemingly minor moments, such as dismissive remarks, conditional praise, or unintentional neglect, can slowly chip away at children’s sense of agency. Much like the saying “death by a thousand cuts,” these small, often overlooked childhood experiences add up over time, profoundly impacting who we become as adults. The cumulative effect of subtle harms creates a persistent background of disempowerment.
When we start to see our past this way, it helps us understand that adverse experiences are not just a list of apparent mistakes but a series of challenges we can learn from. This new perspective gives us the power to heal, grow, and move forward with strength.
Unlike overt trauma, SEEDs don’t always leave scars. Instead, they take root beneath the surface, reinforcing patterns of self-doubt, hesitation, or invisibility, sometimes despite success. Over time, SEEDs influence your choices, confidence, and willingness to take up space in the world. And just like seeds in nature, they grow unless you recognize them and consciously replant something new.
Reclaiming Empowerment: Your Next Steps
The SEEDs framework provides a working approach to examining how early childhood experiences shape personal development. SEEDs help us recognize what we have carried forward so we can intentionally reshape our narratives to align with our goals and values.
The framework interpretation for the SEEDs scores is as follows:
0–2 Points: Minimal Subtle Disempowerment
- Interpretation:
- Indicates very few disempowering messages were encountered.
- Likely reflects a childhood environment rich in validation, encouragement, and support for independent thinking.
- Implications:
- You probably have a strong sense of self and feel comfortable expressing your thoughts and emotions.
- Fewer internalized messages limit your risk of self-doubt or the fear of challenging norms.
3–5 Points: Moderate Exposure to Disempowerment
- Interpretation:
- Suggests that while supportive experiences were present, there were some subtle disempowering messages.
- Certain areas (e.g., emotional validation or self-advocacy) might have been less consistently reinforced.
- Implications:
- You might notice struggles with self-confidence or hesitancy in voicing your ideas.
- There could be specific areas (such as conflict resolution or expressing emotions) where early messages still influence your behavior.
- Opportunities for targeted growth and self-reflection are likely present.
6–8 Points: Significant Disempowerment Experiences
- Interpretation:
- Reflects a considerable presence of disempowering influences during formative years.
- Multiple areas — such as conditional love, fear of failure, and overprotection — might have contributed to a diminished sense of emotional autonomy.
- Implications:
- There is a higher likelihood of enduring self-doubt, difficulty asserting your needs, and fear of challenging norms.
- Addressing these internalized messages through reflective practices or therapeutic work could be highly beneficial.
- The pattern suggests that while you have strengths, persistent vulnerabilities also impact your emotional empowerment.
9–10 Points: Pervasive and Deeply Ingrained Disempowerment
- Interpretation:
- Indicates a pervasive pattern of subtle emotional disempowerment across most or all areas measured.
- The early environment may have consistently reinforced messages that limit independent thought, emotional expression, and self-advocacy.
- Implications:
- Such a high score suggests that many aspects of your personal and interpersonal functioning might be affected.
- It could be linked with challenges such as chronic self-doubt, a fear of failure, and difficulty trusting your judgment.
- Intensive personal work or professional support may be necessary to help reframe these internalized beliefs and foster a more empowered self-concept.
Critical Considerations
The score ranges are general guidelines. Your experiences and contextual factors (like later positive influences or therapeutic interventions) shifts how these early disempowerment messages affect you today. Moreover, you may benefit from a focus on targeted interventions. This structured way to discuss and understand the developmental origins of emotional disempowerment, make it easier to pinpoint which seeds require attention. This interpretation framework provides a starting point to understand how the accumulation of subtle disempowering experiences might influence emotional well-being and self-empowerment over time. The SEEDs discussion is one of the many empowerment topics addressed in my upcoming book, available at a discount now. Preorder discount for Seven Exits.
