STOP – DROP – ROLL: THOSE FIRST FEW SECONDS!

© 2010 Howard McQueen

Stop – Drop – Roll!

The emergency procedure,

should you find yourself,

or someone else,

on fire.

Starve the flame,

lest it consume you.

When we become inflamed with anxiety,

When our pain body is activated,

We are emotionally on fire.

Stop – Drop – Turn it around!

The pain body arises and seats itself

in such subtle ways.

First signs can be:

-a slight discomfort

-a small judgment

-a buying into some dissatisfaction with our present
moment experience

Once activated,

once handed over our controls,

good ol' pain body is free,

to access old pain patterns,

engage our reptilian

flight-fight

do or die

survival programming.

As the pain body takes over our reins,

our inner sense of time becomes distorted

and many other mental-emotional reserves are rechanneled.

In as little as three seconds,

our pain body has loaded up,

and is running its own

manufactured matrix,

a complex fiction,

a virtual reality,

stimulated now by our own blood chemistry cocktail.

And, we are living,

breathing,

believing

caught up in acting out

the pain body’s contrived

drama and fiction.

Those first few seconds

We literally have but those first few seconds

to bring our awareness to bear,

lest we become completely ensnared.

At the very first signs of resisting what is

-Stop

-Drop

-Turn it Around

Stop

Literally, stop everything.

Stop talking, stop walking, stop thinking.

Breathe deeply.

Drop

I literally immediately sit on the ground.

I want connection to mother earth, to be grounded

This constraining is meant to assist me with containment,

So that I can observe and be witness to the pain body.

Turn It Around

Become aware of what is arising within you. If you are with a friend or partner, have them already clued into knowing that you are purposefully constraining yourself and what your goals are.

Feel into the belly of the anxiety.

The Sufis call this eating your demons.

I would suggest you gently become acquainted with these demons, over a series of meetings. Consider taking the approach that you will leave bread crumbs back to this inner place of anxiety. Imagine lighting a candle and making the pledge that you will return, frequently, to check on the candle and re-light it.

In my own journey navigating through the inner quantum disturbances authored by my pain body, my focus has turned to bringing awareness to the earliest signs that the pain body is preparing to bloom. What I am just beginning to experiment with is the art of becoming responsive to “first contact”, else the pain body has already unfolded its sails and I find myself recovering at the end of its journey – and having to bring forgiveness and compassion to cleanup the suffering left from its wake.

Always pleased to hear from others and their experiences – Howard@mcq.com