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Areas › Low mood and hard feelings › Calm the body
A jolt of cold gives the racing body something concrete to settle around. Simple, and it works.
He sent down water from the sky to cleanse you and make your hearts strong and your feet firm (Quran 8:11). Even water is named among the things He calms us with.
الأنفال
إِذۡ يُغَشِّيكُمُ ٱلنُّعَاسَ أَمَنَةࣰ مِّنۡهُ وَيُنَزِّلُ عَلَيۡكُم مِّنَ ٱلسَّمَآءِ مَآءࣰ لِّيُطَهِّرَكُم بِهِۦ وَيُذۡهِبَ عَنكُمۡ رِجۡزَ ٱلشَّيۡطَٰنِ وَلِيَرۡبِطَ عَلَىٰ قُلُوبِكُمۡ وَيُثَبِّتَ بِهِ ٱلۡأَقۡدَامَ
Remember when He gave you sleep as a reassurance from Him, and sent down water from the sky to cleanse you, to remove Satan’s pollution from you, to make your hearts strong and your feet firm
Qur’an 8:11read it in the library
Translation: M.A.S. Abdel Haleem, The Qur'an, Oxford University Press, 2004.
A cold splash or cold hold activates a built-in slowing reflex that brings a spike of emotion down within moments; the body has a brake, and this presses it.
Porges, S. W. (2007). The polyvagal perspective. Biological Psychology doi
The nervous system shifts between states of safety and defence; cues of safety and calming the body restore the capacity to think and connect.
Strength of evidence: one line of research. A single study, or a theoretical account.
Cold on the face triggers a calming reflex that slows the heart and lowers the surge quickly.
Where this sits: DBT Distress Tolerance, TIP skills; physiological down-regulation.
Scan your body, unclench the jaw, drop the shoulders, soften the hands. Let the tension out on each breath.
Overwhelmed? Take two minutes: breathe out slowly, longer than you breathe in, and let the body lead.
Often nothing is buried. The pieces are all there, they have simply never been put next to each other.