Have You Ever Froze?

Ever felt like your 'freeze' response never gets the spotlight it deserves? This track dives deep into the lesser-known parts of our fight-or-flight instincts, offering a comforting voice for those navigating stress and uncertainty. It’s like finally getting that airtime you wished for as a kid. This is your invitation to thaw out, breathe deeply, and sail into a day filled with blessings, love, and hope.

Transcript

This story is about the freeze response,

The parts of the fight or flight that never really get that show of day.

And so for those of us who have that response when it comes to stress,

Sticky situations,

And it's our initial trauma response,

This is that little airtime that we wish we were given when we were younger.

I remember learning about fight or flight growing up.

No one ever spoke about freeze or fawn,

And I fell into the other category,

The freeze and or fawn.

I so wish someone had discussed it because like many things in my life,

I found myself struggling to articulate what happened.

Can I just say that the power of language is unreal.

I honestly believe I was pulled into the communications industry because I didn't know how to articulate anything happening inside of my mind,

Body,

And heart.

I now believe I am in the process of creating a language from my heart that can beautifully alchemize into a personal language for every person's heart.

Because we all receive messages differently.

It's how our brains and heart work.

And the beautiful thing is if the words have already been articulated,

And when it is the right time,

Those words echo again into your heart,

Mind,

And body.

It's crazy and scary just how long words stay with you.

The first time I remembered freezing was in 2015.

I still remember how cold the floor of my small apartment felt.

I didn't know what to do.

My hands gripped my cell phone tightly as I listened closely to what my ex at the time told me.

I remember my eyes growing bigger as minutes passed,

My mouth trying to mutter something and nothing coming out.

My cousin happened to be visiting that weekend.

And if it weren't for her,

I don't know what would have happened.

She quickly grabbed the phone from my hand and started speaking to my ex.

I couldn't move.

It was just like my whole body had just turned to ice.

It slowly thawed out into a vicious shake as I sobbed uncontrollably.

My ex had told my cousin a completely different story,

And I was too ashamed to tell her the truth.

It would be years before I would tell her what exactly happened that day.

At that point in my life,

I'd gotten so adept at pushing things aside and focusing on the next.

I wasn't allowed to fail.

I'd put too many things on the line.

I had told my parents that if I failed to fulfill certain things,

Like affording my lifestyle in New York and getting straight A's in grad school,

I would enroll in med school and get married.

I had grown hyper-independent.

There wasn't anything I couldn't do or couldn't get past.

I had to just keep moving.

I had to just stay busy.

What I didn't know was that the freeze response is also working without eating,

Drinking,

Or taking breaks.

It's feeling numb,

Zoned out,

And disconnected from life.

It's getting everything done,

But not remembering it.

It's perfectionism,

Being hard on myself.

It's procrastinating and loss of motivation.

I had been operating in freeze for a lot longer than I thought,

And I hadn't even realized it.

I only noticed the big,

Dramatic moments when I literally just froze.

I thought I would be in a fight in those situations,

And I wasn't.

I would judge myself harshly for it,

And sometimes people who happened to be around would chew me out for freezing.

Now,

Almost a decade later,

I'd begun to fall back into that response pattern.

The sink back into the survival phase happens so quickly that you don't even catch it.

Because to you,

There is no perceived threat,

And to your body,

And consequently in your mind,

There is.

This is why regulating your nervous system is key.

Stress puts you back into an old operation,

An old operating system,

And sometimes you are completely unaware of the actual programming of that operating system.

That's why you spend time building a communication bridge between your conscious and your unconscious.

Awareness is simply bringing things to your consciousness.

There are many ways to regulate your nervous system.

My favorite is five deep belly breaths with one hand on my heart and another on my chest.

Whatever method can bring you back to the present and allow you to breathe fully.

I came back home to unapologetically be myself.

Even in situations and places where I normally would cower in,

I told myself I was no longer asking for permission.

I was going to take up space.

I already gave myself the permission I needed.

And here I was,

Standing in front of an uncle who would tell me what I should be doing with my life.

An uncle,

I might add,

That was always supportive.

And in that moment,

I froze.

I could feel my shoulders and sides of my neck grow tense.

Ever since I've come back,

I've been more aware of the sensations in my body.

Sometimes they can be so crippling.

And in that moment,

I have to create time and space for a quick body scan.

I remember walking down a set of stairs and telling myself,

Why didn't I say I want to help people of color with their trauma?

I want them to feel confident in who they are and be able to articulate what they want.

This isn't the first time that I've frozen in front of people since I've been back.

I've been freezing every time I feel,

Think,

Believe that the people in front of me want answers.

And usually they don't.

It's my own projection.

I went from being perfectly okay with not having the answers to putting myself in a pressure cooker to discover them.

I pressured myself so much that at one point in my morning meditation,

I noticed a small girl covered in a black cloak of darkness.

She was hunched over in a ball in the corner of this glass box that was slowly descending.

She looked so scared and there was this beautiful,

Lush,

Abundant forest inside.

She felt safer inside than out.

That girl was me.

My first reaction wasn't to console her or listen.

I told her to notice what was outside of her to remind her that I would be fearless to step outside and not fearful and to shatter the glass.

I was so focused on getting outside of getting the answers that I completely neglected what I needed.

I had fallen back into the scared girl I used to be.

I had fallen back into judging where I was expecting myself to be elsewhere.

Realizing my mistake,

I would sit down to meet my inner child there and apologize.

I sat with her for a while and then slowly we began to speak.

I told her I loved her and that she didn't need to carry the pressure I had placed on her,

That we didn't need to have the answers.

I can still picture her asking,

Really?

With those big,

Sad,

Marsupial looking eyes.

The minute she felt reassured,

She threw the dark cloak and it began to melt the glass box.

I started laugh crying because I had been trying to coax her out of this glass box and push past this block for days.

She told me to throw mine.

I said,

I'm carrying some.

She said,

You'd be surprised at how much you are.

One by one,

I would throw the pressures,

The expectations,

The shoulds,

And the box began to melt further.

I still have more to throw.

I may only be scratching the surface.

I know I'm still unearthing some of these unconscious cloaks and I feel pretty damn lucky that I get to.

Lao Tzu wrote,

When the ancient master said,

If you want to become whole,

Then first to let yourself be broken.

They weren't using empty words.

All who do this will be made complete.

And Andrew Daniel eloquently explains this as,

When we do this in daily life,

It appears to the world as if we have changed and we have,

Compared to who we usually show up as.

But internally,

We are simply becoming less,

Which reveals more of who we already are.

All of the things we used to assume were us,

Fall away.

We are going for less distortion,

Not more improving.

We let go of our character in the play and be as the actor himself.

But to stop acting,

One must first realize that they are acting.

To get someone to realize that is a challenge because they have to value being an authentic,

Vulnerable,

Embodied human over living as a safe caricature.

The majority of people don't.

Can you blame them?

The great challenge of life is to be truly you.

Will you allow your true self to emerge?

Will you let go of your characters today?

And with that,

I send you off in your day at whatever time you listen to this with more blessings,

More love,

And more hope for you to allow yourself to exhale into who you are.

Reviews

You sound like an amazing storyteller. Beautiful 🤩

Thank you for sharing your story and for the reminder to be who I truly am. 💛 I resonate with the freeze response more than flight or fight. Only recently have I learned how this response can be ongoing (overworking,perfectionism, and overachieving are my go-tos). Beautiful talk, thank you for your openness and wisdom 🙏

Sarah, many thanks for sharing your knowledge about and your very personal experiences with the freeze (fawn) response. It was an "aha moment" for me, when you described that one can go through life, unknowingly, in a freeze response by over-achieving, over-working, doing in a robotic daze, and more (esp difficult for HSPs and other neurodivergents). This behavior is almost encouraged, if not admired, by Western society despite the stress and imbalance in causes in one's life. This daily freeze response is mostly ignored because it's not a dramatic event/s that is traditionally recognized to cause the response and is viewed as a positive reflection of being a hardworker.

Kudos to you for making this distinction, so we can be more Mindful of doing and move towards a grounded, centered and balanced life of being in awareness. Namaste...🪷😌🪷

This hit home 😭🥹 the weight of generational trauma and conditioning, the weight we carry being a woman, a person of color, and simply being the sensitive soul we are. The weight of the world can often leave us feeling paralyzed, and mindfulness is the antidote to come back home to ourselves. Thank you for sharing your beautiful words and perspective - and I want to share a mantra I often say: I am never too much and more than worthy 💗💓🌸💓💗