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When your mind is too loud for anything else. When you are flooded, braced, or far from the room you are actually in.
Trickster tells you that breathing is too small, too simple, too pointless to matter. It says you should be solving the problem, not sitting with your feet on the floor. It keeps you in your head, where the storm is loudest.
Your body is the ground. When the mind is too fast for teaching, the body is still here. You do not need an insight. You need to let your nervous system know you are not in danger right now.
- Feel your feet on the floor. Press them down.
- Take one slow breath in through your nose.
- Let one slow breath out through your mouth.
- Notice one sound in the room.
- Notice one thing you can see.
- Say quietly: "I am still here."
The next time you feel flooded, do not try to solve anything. Just find your feet. One breath. One sound. That is the whole practice.
Sometimes the body is too far into alarm for one breath to reach. That is not failure. Step outside. Drink cold water. Put your hands on something solid — a wall, a table, the ground. If the alarm does not settle, get support.
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Frog. Tree. Eagle. Buffalo.
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If this practice gave you a little more ground beneath your feet, you may want to keep a few more nearby.
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