“I do manic Focusing — particularly at night when I can’t sleep.”
Miranda writes:
“I’ve been doing less Focusing because if I do it when I’m anxious, particularly at night when I can’t sleep, I do it manically, going from one feeling to the next very quickly. I think there is probably something desperate and very frightened which can’t settle and is afraid to slow down or doesn’t know how to. I get stuck in a kind of ‘thinking’ Focusing because there is too much going on in my body, switching from place to place.
“The thinking sometimes feels like it doesn’t have a container and is afraid of spiraling into strange, mad places. If I do find some relief it’s only brief. I know things can seem worse at night and I do feel saner in the daytime!
“Do you have any suggestions?”
Dear Miranda,
My first suggestion would be, slow down! I do hear that something in you is afraid to slow down, but that doesn’t mean you can’t go slower AND acknowledge the part of you that finds it scary to go slower.
As for how to slow down, I have a number of suggestions:
First:
Speak out loud. This is a huge help when doing any Focusing alone. Speaking out loud will automatically slow down your process to the speed of your speaking voice. (As you know, the mind can go much faster than that, and along half a dozen pathways at once!)
Second:
Use Presence language. “I am sensing something in me feeling…” It may sound odd at first and a bit of a formula, but I predict you’ll find it SO helpful to speak this way. Just try, and I think you’ll feel the benefits immediately.
Third:
Acknowledge especially the parts of you that feel like they are in the way of this process working. Like this: “I’m sensing something in me that can’t settle and is afraid to slow down. I’m saying Hello to that.” Then take time to feel the “Hello” being received. It may also help to put a gentle hand on the place where you are feeling this. Placing the hand is a really nice thing to do because it reminds you to be kind to what you are feeling.
“There’s so much going on in my body…”
It sounds like you are feeling a bit ‘at the mercy’ of your body feelings. That’s one of the most difficult times, when it feels like our emotions and anxieties are bigger than we are.
The solution is to get bigger…and that’s why I developed the five-part process called “Get Bigger Than What’s Bugging You” that includes the saying Hello and the touch of the gentle hand.
It’s free and it comes as a five-day e-course. You’ll get one email a day for five days. Click here to sign up.
The trick is to actually do these things! When you’re lying in bed at night feeling overwhelmed you may have fewer resources than usual. So sit up! The act of intention involved will remind you that YOU are doing something.
Remember: doing Focusing is a deliberate action. Just lying down and letting your body feelings run riot…well, I wouldn’t call that Focusing, would you? When you do Focusing, you’re deliberately pausing, deliberately bringing awareness to how you feel with an open, kind curiosity.
If you do that, I predict you soon will be finding your thoughts slowing down and your breathing getting deeper and calmer, as the feelings and parts inside you begin to trust that you are there.