Grounding after being triggered AF, and moving towards Freedom

Ground
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This is many things...

Ground is the Earth we walk on.
Ground is our bodies.
Ground is the energy which connects and flows through every molecule.
Ground is Source.
Ground is what we believe in.
Ground is something that helps us feel stable. 

For some, the sky, stars or space may be more Grounding, more stabilizing.

At one point in my life, imagining the space within my spine was very centering and stabilizing. When I was triggered in a coaching class, no one knew this was a resource for me.

Some intuitives and empaths know exactly what’s needed when someone is triggered. Sometimes they’re also clueless. Sometimes you’re the only one who can know what’s supportive to you.

Last night I had THE MOST triggering experience in Circling (an authentic relating practice) that I’ve ever had, and I’ve had a few of them over the years. Grateful for years of experience in trauma healing and knowing my system well, it was clear to me that I needed some time alone, and I was able to shake it out after a few hours. Today I’m still moving through the discomfort.

What is my Ground now, that which holds me when I feel most unstable? When triggered, I felt confused, unsafe, scared, shaky. I didn’t trust ANYONE, and I realized in the middle of the night at 2:00 AM that if I didn’t shake off the trauma, I could develop an auto-immune health issue. I wasn’t shaking naturally, I was frozen. Nervous system overload. 

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Pause for a Nervous System Lesson:

There is more to the Autonomic Nervous System (ANS) than Sympathetic fight or flight and Parasympathetic rest and digest. That’s the Sympathetic system under stress and the Parasympathetic in optimal health. When stressed TOO much with insufficient support, one can go into the Parasympathetic stress response of freeze, dissociation and collapse. To the extreme, one can die. So a Parasympathetic nervous system response isn’t always rest and digest healing time. A calm demeanor isn’t always a healthy, resourced state of calm. Click here for more information on the ANS.

Now back to my freeze state...

(cheers, “Yay! Freeze state, weeee!!!”) 

It’s common for me to experience this in extreme stress. Thanks to years of amazing teaching and healing, I had the mindfulness to at least start experimenting with some internal resourcing. I found MY Ground that was supportive in that moment. 

In this case, it asked my Spirit guides to support me, then the shaking started with ease. Though I consider myself to be a relatively embodied person, I wasn’t able to settle enough or access the shake on my own. Though I consider myself to be a Spiritual person, I was still skeptical until recently about actually connecting to “guides.” SO, after YEARS of teachers suggesting I connect to and request help from my Spirit guides, I can finally say that I did, and it actually helped. Wow. And I still feel nervous to name all of this publicly.

To name that I’m not as embodied as I would like to be. That I was triggered to the point of an hours-long trauma response at a f***ing Circling event. That I’m still processing it and overeating today. That I connect to Spirit guides. 

My point is, we all have wildly different experiences, and different ways to Ground and resource.

What you know may be different than what I know, and vice versa. Last night at Circling I experienced projections, assumptions and judgements that ranged from irritating to highly activating, and it served a purpose that I believe is serving me and others, but I do not wish anyone to experience that level of activation at an authentic relating event who doesn’t have the level of resources and support I do. That sounds cocky to me, but also true. My wish is that we make space for our own and other's experiences, space to express ourselves authentically without co-dependent tendencies of needing to fix or change others, and space to be curious about what's really happening. I believe this will bring us more Freedom.
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If you want help finding your Ground and accessing more Freedom, reach out to me. I’m available for online and in-person coaching, energy healing and intuitive bodywork in Asheville, NC and occasionally Boulder or elsewhere.

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