What if your deep inner work causes everything to shut down? Read on…
Pranya writes:
In a recent Focusing session I was experiencing a lot of vulnerable emotion, really getting a sense of a young place in me. I also could feel something around my heart that felt like it had its finger hovering over a big red button, ready to close everything down if things got too dangerous.
Towards the end it did start closing it down, and I recognized a kind of dissociative panic, when something feels like it is being pushed passed without permission.
It gets me wondering to what extent I am often merged with something in me that wants to push past all defenses.
Dear Pranya:
Yes, that’s quite possible. People who are dedicated to inner healing and life change can get merged with a part of them that wants to break down their inner barriers and “go forward” as fast as possible.
At that, of course, rouses up a part that is there guarding against “too much, too fast, too deep.”
In most cases, when there are two parts we say, “Be with both, listen to each one, give them equal value.”
But in the case of these “safety guardians” we make an exception. The part that is guarding your safety gets priority. It gets to have its foot on the brake and say how fast we go.
Perhaps you’ve heard the maxim: “You can never go faster than your slowest part.” This is why. Because the part that’s concerned about safety can shut everything down if it gets too concerned, and that need for safety is important.
So tell the part of you with its finger over the big red button that you will not go faster than it is ready for. Let it have the job of watching if things start to go too fast and too deep.
What I think you’ll discover is that this new collaborative relationship with the “safety guardian” will allow you to go to all the deep places you need to go, just a bit more slowly, and with a lot more inner respect and listening.
