Tclassify Take a few breaths,
Go ahead and get settled wherever you are.
And just relax,
Allow the body to soften.
Whatever effort you're putting into practice in this moment,
See if you can reduce effort by 10%.
Let things be even easier.
Just trusting that you don't have to force it.
We will continueality.
Good.
We're gonna do something a little counter-instinctual here.
We're gonna take the first step towards starting a massive forest fire,
But don't worry,
It's a controlled blaze.
In this relaxed and open state,
I want you to call up in your memory,
In your experience,
The last time you were really upset.
Just remember the last time you really lost your cool.
Where were you?
Who were you with?
Notice what happened,
Although we're not gonna pay a lot of attention to why you lost your cool.
We more just want to set off these fireworks in the body.
If you can,
Go to the very first moment you recognized that there was a storm in the body.
You were fireworks starting to go off.
And these fireworks,
These intense sensations,
They're often so intense and so uncomfortable to us that we'll do anything not to fill them.
We don't want to fill them.
We organize our whole lives around not feeling them.
And one reliable way to blunt the sensation is to escape into our minds,
Is to flare up in emotion.
Sometimes we erupt in anger,
Sometimes we collapse into a self-loathing sadness.
Oftentimes we reach out and blame.
It's someone else's fault I feel this way.
Just notice whatever intense sensation you can conjure up in your memory.
It might be as intense as it was the first time you experienced it.
It might be much dimmer.
If it's too intense,
I'd just invite you to open your eyes,
Stand up and walk around.
You don't have to jump too deep into this all at once.
But if you're able to feel any of the intensity associated with the last time you really lost it,
I want you to just notice really specifically in the body where it comes up.
Not emotionally,
But at the level of sensation.
So for me right now,
I'm noticing that I felt a disturbance that quickly turned into anger and aggression.
But before my interpretation that spun it into anger and aggression,
I'm aware of simply a pressure in my chest.
That's where I want you to work for a minute with just the raw spark,
Just the sensation.
Find it in the body,
Feel its intensity,
And even describe it to yourself simply as I just did.
It could be a closing feeling in the throat,
Pressure in the chest,
Heat,
And a sense of being flushed throughout the body.
Whatever it is for you,
Just notice the raw sensation,
The spark,
And see clearly that you're able to stay present to the sensation.
Ask yourself if these raw sensations could actually damage you.
And most often when we ask this question,
We realize sensations can't objectively harm me.
I don't like to feel them,
Maybe even I hate feeling them,
But they won't harm me.
So you can take that invitation to go deeper,
To really just envelop and permeate the sensation with awareness,
To hold it with equanimity,
Acceptance,
Even unconditional kindness.
Note,
As you do this,
That these sensations are likely very familiar to you.
Sometimes the most disturbing sensations that we have in life go way back to early childhood.
They represent sensations that signal to us that our very lives might be in danger.
Because when we're kids,
In an emotionally saturated environment in the family,
These disturbances can feel life threatening.
We grow into adulthood and realize we have adult capacities to just hold these disturbances.
Like infants in our arms,
We can hold these disturbances.
Even when an infant is wailing and crying and screaming,
We can still unconditionally love that infant.
So whatever you're feeling in this moment,
Just hold yourself.
Whatever disturbances,
Whatever sparks.
See if you can just stay present to the intensity of the sensation without getting into emotional interpretations,
Narratives,
Stories about whose fault it is that you feel this way in this moment,
Without making judgments about yourself or feeling this way.
It just is.
There's nothing to do but just be in the intensity for the moment.
Let the fireworks spark,
Blaze.
Eventually they'll die out.
If you get pulled into thinking,
If you get tangled up in emotion,
Notice this.
And remove the tinder from the fireworks.
Don't let the fireworks make contact with any fuel.
Don't let the raw,
Intense sensation in the body connect with emotion or story.
Keep breathing.
Let it saw.
When you work this way,
Not only do the fireworks not cause a forest fire,
But they actually strengthen your capacity to stay present.
Every time you feel intense sensation and disturbance in life,
It's a cue to commit to yourself,
To stay present,
To investigate the sensation without judgment,
Without story,
Just feeling the raw aliveness of this moment.
Ready?
Thank you.
