Saturday night, I had to get out of bed and look out the window.
My mind had gone into overdrive.
Before I’d gone to bed, I’d realised my car key was missing.
I was too tired to be bothered looking for it. My rational brain knew it wouldn’t be far.
Yet, come 4am, my brain convinced my otherwise. That someone had walked into the kitchen and taken the key whilst the teens and dog were in the house alone and was waiting until we were asleep to drive the car away.
Sunday morning – got up – found keys in my dungarees.
The world was good.
I’m sure this is a story you can relate to.
Anyone who is human will have similar stories.
What the mind was doing was ‘protecting me’ from danger.
Yet it didn’t protect me. It scared me.
I’ve been doing this work for a long time. I know what the mind is capable of.
Yet on Saturday, it totally caught me out.
I’m actually slightly mortified that this even happened but I believe strongly in being real and sharing and never presenting that I have it all together.
Because no one has.
This ‘protecting’ was created by my imagination. Imagination is POWERFUL. It is what has enabled the creation of so much.
Electricity, the internet, smart phones, art, stories… literally everything around us.
Yet it’s also this imagination that is SO POWERFUL it wakes you up at 4am to check that no one has stolen the car because you realised at 10pm the car key was missing.
I had to reassure myself in the whole of this ‘imagination’.
After I got back into bed, I had to engage my rational brain – what’s the worst thing that could happen here and then reassure myself.
- If my car IS stolen – I am ok – it’s just admin – it is solvable.
- If my keys ARE missing and my husband loses it – I am ok – it’s just a key and admin – it is solvable.
Because it didn’t feel ok for either of these two scenarios to happen and I had to make it ok.
I had to rationalise the risk and increase my knowing I could cope.
Once I got to grips with that I got back to sleep easily and come the morning I found my keys within minutes.
Sometimes we cannot stop our imagination. I was asleep. I couldn’t do anything to stop it whirring round. I wasn’t even bothered before I went to bed. I was so unbothered I thought I’d look into it the next day.
But once I realised, I managed to reassure myself and engage rational thinking.
That’s what I want for my clients.
You can’t always stop the brain taking over or stress happening.
However, you can always engage rational thinking and calm the body.
I am fully booked at the moment with clients on my Thrive and Emergence programmes until end of August with a waiting list now in place.
If you’d like to start supporting yourself now, Calm Foundations is a great place to start. You can access this course here for £27.
Much love, Tricia xxx
