Vachon Imagined

This morning my son was working with his tutor when he suddenly shifted into what I can only describe as a full-body “I’ve been metaphorically shot in the arm with a dose of I don’t care.” Not medicinal, but certainly effective.

Just like that—he was gone.

Not physically, but attentively. His body was there, but his mind had checked out and probably opened a portal to literally anywhere else that did not involve reading comprehension.

He was not present with what he was doing. He was off fantasizing.

Which, if I’m being honest, he may have inherited.

Because I, too, have spent time perfectly aligned in what I like to call the “summertime peach”—soft, pleasant, slightly glazed, and entirely uninterested in urgency.

So we recognize each other.

It runs in the family.

And yet this is where something interesting begins.

Alignment is often spoken about as something between two people. Marriage, for example, is interpreted as alignment—two individuals entering a legal agreement, ideally with love, hope, and a shared belief that they have read the same invisible instruction manual.

And then, as many discover, bliss sometimes goes to hell in a handbasket without anyone actually locating the manual.

Marriage is often described as the holiest form of togetherness. And in some sense, it is. But not always in the way it is culturally described.

True alignment does not begin between two people.

It begins in one.

Integration happens internally first.

A person who is “bored” or disengaged is not simply avoiding a task—they are often splitting internally. One part is physically present, the other has left the building and is currently unavailable for comment.

In my son’s case, I assume that part has gone somewhere highly entertaining and completely unproductive.

In my own case, I assure you it is always something very important and philosophical, like thinking about coffee or the meaning of alignment while not doing what I am supposed to be doing.

But that same energy can be met differently.

The part that wants to leave does not have to be exiled. It can be recognized. Even lightly negotiated with. It is not a “problem child,” it is more like a very convincing lobbyist for distraction.

And once you see it that way, everything changes slightly.

This is where alignment actually begins.

Not by eliminating one state in favor of another, but by learning to hold both—attention and distraction, discipline and escape, presence and avoidance—without letting either one become the whole identity.

They can exist in parallel.

And then a choice can be made.

Again and again.

That is the practice.

Not perfection.

Not constant presence.

But the willingness to return.

And honestly, none of us are doing this flawlessly. We are all just taking turns drifting off and then remembering we were trying to be present in the first place.

So good luck with the practice.

Best wishes with the elevating.

And if you forget and drift off again, don’t worry—so will the rest of us. We’ll meet you back here shortly.