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Empowerment Through Crisis
Sandra Zahn
President
Dragonfly Services
In these days of great change, many of us feel lost in the maze of our responsibilities. Our best laid plans are constantly interrupted by moment-to-moment crises, time seems to be speeding up, and our workload is increasing. Daily life requires more of our physical and emotional energy, both at work and at home, than ever before.
As momentary crisis or disruption occurs during our day, our situational anxiety releases the stress hormones, cortisol and norepinephrine, affecting our thoughts, feelings, and actions. Our left brain, which is focused on logical thinking, analysis, and accuracy, begins racing with thoughts. In other words, we too often respond by becoming more overwhelmed and stressed.
According to Gregg Braden, author of Awakening to Zero Point: The Collective Initiation, due to the weakening magnetic field now surrounding the earth and the increased speed of the base resonant frequency (vibration of the earth), the electromagnetic energy of our emotions, thoughts, words, and actions is returning to us very quickly. Simply put, what goes around is coming around back to us very quickly.
In the midst of this chaos, we may ask ourselves, “Where has my life gone?” Yet, we are not victims of uncontrollable disorder. Rather, we have the power to determine our response to any momentary crisis and change the scenario if we release our attachment to its outcome.
In these moments, there are several steps we all can take immediately to silence our left brain’s chatter and respond more effectively. By following these steps, we relax and activate our right brain hemisphere which is more spacious and intuitive.
These steps may seem easier said than done, but they become more natural with practice—and you might be surprised by their efficiency.
- First, take three or four deep, full breaths. Focus entirely in the now. In doing this, we dissolve our fear, urgency, and other negative emotions.
- Visualize and focus on what we want.
- Verbally affirm what we want right now. For example, “I now finish all that needs to be done in this next hour,” “The traffic jam now clears and I arrive at my destination at the perfect moment,” “The check now arrives in the mail,” or “People now show up at the perfect time.”
- Surrender our energetic attachment to the outcome as much as we can.
- Open up intuitively, asking ourselves for the best next manageable action to take.
- We then act out the solution we’ve identified.
By using our breathing as a tool for smoothing out our energy field and dissolving our situational anxiety, we can then make clear and calm decisions again and again in each moment of now. That is, in the midst of our “overwhelm,” we are able to stretch time and become empowered from within.
When we let go of our ego’s energetic hold on us during a crisis, the result is powerful. As Eckhart Tolle says in his book, A New Earth, “Life then becomes friendly toward you, people become helpful, circumstances cooperative.”
Tolle’s book, which you may have heard of thanks to its being named to Oprah’s Book Club, presents an alternative to our chaotic mentality that traps us in identification with physical crisis. By learning to live and breathe freely, he says we will come to experience who we truly are.
We can embark on this dramatic inner leap in small ways, such as by following the steps outlined above during our next momentary crisis. Choose to respond with full, life-affirming breath and consciously direct it to the places in our body where we feel fear or tension, until it is gone.
And remember, if a solution or choice we make doesn’t work, we’re always free to try another. Believe that we can get through anything, and we will always prevail.
- View the archive of ECSG Forum columns or the archive for all Alliance for Children & Families Magazine columnists.
