Areas › Your body
Your body
You cannot think your way out of a body that is braced. This area starts there: the breath, the ground under you, moving, eating, resting, and the small physical things that change how the rest of the day lands.
What works for this
Working from the body first
A body that has not slept, eaten or moved has less left over for holding itself steady. Changing the state you are in is often faster than changing the thoughts you are having, and it is more reliable when you are already worn out.
One move, today
A long slow out breath, longer than the in breath, three times. The out breath is the part that does the work.
What matches
89 practicesCold water on your face, particularly at the hairline and around the lips, sets off a reflex that slows the heart. It is one of the few things fast enough to interrupt real panic.
A splash at the sink, a few minutes outside in cold air, or a bowl of cold water if you have one to hand. There is a quieter version for when you…
Coming up out of numbness usually feels worse before it feels better. Restlessness, irritation and a jumpy stomach are often the way up rather than a relapse.
The route out of collapse tends to run through activation instead of around it. That is why a short walk, some tidying or an errand often works…
Reaching for another person when you are wound up is not a distraction from coping. Contact can turn the alarm down at the source.
This is why a short call, a message to someone who knows you, or sitting in the same room as family is worth doing before you get as far as the…
Safety comes in through three doors: your body, the place you are in, and the people around you. If one is shut, try another.
This matters most when you are on your own and the person you would ring is not there. You can still change the room, open a window, go outside, put…
If your usual trouble is a racing heart, a crowded head and never quite coming down, slow paced breathing with a feedback device is the one to try first.
Part of the appeal is that you can watch it work. Five or ten minutes of breathing at the pace the app sets, with the trace on the screen smoothing…
The tools that slow things down mostly use your head: naming what is happening, standing back a little, putting the distress at arm's length for now.
Explaining to yourself what your body is doing. Watching a thought rather than arguing with it. Asking whether the worst reading is the only reading.…
The tools that reach what words cannot are physical: feet on the floor, a long breath out, pushing hard against a wall, deliberately walking away from something.
Some of what happened is held below language, which is why the most articulate account of it can leave you unchanged. Movement that finishes…
When you cannot settle yourself, borrow somebody else's steadiness. Sitting near a calm person, even without talking, is a real thing to try.
Choose by effect rather than by closeness. Some people you love leave you more wound up than you started, and some people you barely know are easy to…
If you mostly run hot and jumpy, start with slow paced breathing. If you mostly go blank and far away, work that reaches you through sound and voice tends to get further.
The idea is to pick the tool that pulls against your usual tilt. Breathing practice puts the brake back on a system that has lost it. Sound and voice…