The Facts Are Neutral (Even When the Pond Is Low)
INTRO
Hey friend.
Welcome back to Running to Myself.
I’m your host, Trisha Stanton.
Today I want to tell you a simple story.
A very ordinary story.
One that happens right down the road from my house.
And like most of the stories that end up teaching me the most, it didn’t start as a lesson.
It started as a thought I kept repeating…
and a feeling I kept practicing.
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THE POND STORY
There’s a pond down the road from us.
I pass it every single time I leave my neighborhood.
And every single time I pass it—especially over the last couple of years—I say the same thing out loud.
“Look how low the water is.”
“I feel so bad for the ducks.”
“We need rain so badly.”
If someone is in the car with me, they hear this commentary.
If I’m alone, I still say it—to myself.
We’ve been in a drought for a few years now.
And the pond… it looks different than it used to.
The waterline has pulled back.
The edges are exposed.
It doesn’t look like the full, lush pond I remember.
And every time I noticed it, I felt this wave of sadness.
Sad for the ducks.
Sad for the geese.
Sad for the wildlife that “had” to live there.
And I didn’t realize it at the time, but I was rehearsing that sadness.
Over and over again.
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THE FEELING LOOP
Here’s what was happening:
I’d see the pond.
I’d think: “This is bad. This isn’t enough. They’re struggling.”
And then I’d feel sad.
And because I felt sad, I assumed the thought must be true.
That’s important.
We often believe a thought simply because it produces a feeling.
As if emotion is evidence.
But emotion is just information about what we’re thinking.
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THE INTERRUPTING THOUGHT
One day, I was alone in the car.
Same drive.
Same pond.
Same low water.
But this time, a different thought floated in.
“They have wings.”
I actually laughed a little.
They don’t have to stay here.
They aren’t stuck.
They’re not trapped in this pond the way I had imagined.
And then another thought followed.
They don’t actually need very much water to swim.
You’ve probably seen this too—
birds bathing in puddles.
Standing water in a driveway.
Temporary little pools that appear after a rain.
Just because I measure fullness one way…
doesn’t mean it’s unusable to them.
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SEEING IT DIFFERENTLY
Then, a few days later, I walked past the pond.
And I noticed something I hadn’t noticed before.
All the ducks were gathered in one area.
They were happily swimming, moving around, doing duck things.
And beyond them?
There was plenty of water left.
Water they weren’t even using.
The pond wasn’t empty.
It wasn’t barren.
It just didn’t look the way I thought it should look.
And suddenly, the sadness disappeared.
Not because the pond changed.
Not because the drought ended.
But because the story changed.
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THE REALIZATION
And that’s when it hit me.
All of that sadness I had been feeling…
was never about the ducks.
It was about the story I was telling about the ducks.
I had projected my interpretation onto them.
I had decided what “low” meant.
I had decided what “enough” looked like.
And the ducks never agreed to that story.
Isn’t that interesting?
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THE COACHING TURN
I started asking myself a new question.
Where else am I doing this in my life?
Where else am I feeling sad, discouraged, frustrated, or stuck…
not because of facts…
but because of the story I’m telling about the facts?
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THOUGHTS VS FACTS
Here’s where I want to slow us down.
Because this is one of the most powerful mindset tools I know.
Thoughts are sentences in your brain.
They feel real.
They sound convincing.
But they are not automatically true.
Facts are neutral.
They can be proven.
They would hold up in a court of law.
“The pond water level is lower than it was three years ago.”
That’s a fact.
“The ducks are suffering.”
That’s a thought.
And once I could see that difference, everything shifted.
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WHY THIS MATTERS
We don’t suffer because of facts.
We suffer because of the meaning we assign to them.
We suffer because of the conclusions we draw.
The assumptions we make.
The stories we repeat.
And the more we repeat a story, the more real it feels.
Just like I practiced sadness every time I drove past that pond.
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COMMON PLACES WE DO THIS
Let me offer a few places you might recognize this.
You see someone pull away.
You think: “I’m too much.”
That’s a thought.
You’re not invited.
You think: “I don’t belong.”
That’s a story.
Progress feels slow.
You think: “I’m behind.”
That’s an interpretation.
Energy is low.
You think: “Something is wrong with me.”
That’s not a fact.
These thoughts feel true because they hurt.
But hurt does not equal truth.
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THE SUPERPOWER
Being able to separate thoughts from facts
is a superpower.
Not because it makes life easy.
Not because it removes pain.
But because it gives you choice.
Choice to pause.
Choice to question.
Choice to soften the story.
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A GENTLE PRACTICE
Here’s something you can try this week.
When you notice a heavy feeling—sadness, frustration, discouragement—
ask yourself:
What am I thinking right now?
Then ask:
Is this a fact…
or is this a story?
You don’t have to change it.
You don’t have to replace it with a positive thought.
Just notice.
Sometimes awareness alone loosens the grip.
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BACK TO THE POND
The pond is still low.
The drought hasn’t magically ended.
But I no longer feel sad for the ducks.
Because I see them differently now.
And that reminds me—
life might not look full by your old measurements…
but that doesn’t mean it’s empty.
It doesn’t mean it’s failing.
And it doesn’t mean you’re stuck.
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CLOSING
Your mind is powerful.
And the stories you tell yourself shape how you feel.
So the next time you catch yourself feeling heavy,
pause and ask—
Is this a fact…
or is this just a story I’ve been practicing?
Thanks for being here, friend.
I’ll talk to you next time.
