When things aren’t working, even the tiniest time-out = magic.
Yesterday things were very much not working, so I ended up making a list of the various ways available to me when I need to push the reset button.
Here it is.
Reset! Let’s see. You could…
- Take a shower.
- Go outside.
- Go for a walk.
- Walk backwards!
- Do something widdershins!
- Smell a flower…
- Take a nap.
- Hide under the blankets.
- Turn your closet into a temporary refueling station.
- Sing a song. Louder!
- Ask: how much of this fear/discomfort/pain belongs to me?
- Ask: how much of this fear/discomfort/pain is from now?
- Use a magical spray.
- Do a mudra.
- Use an acupressure technique (like EFT or TAT or any use of pressure points).
- Hum.
- Chant.
- Sing sea shanties and pretend you’re on a voyage.
- Roll on the floor hugging your knees.
- Yawn and yawn and yawns until you cry.
- Do an old Turkish lady stretch.
- Listen to one of your Emergency Calming The Hell Down recordings.
- Consult the Book of You.
- Talk to the monsters who say that you can’t stop.
- Let a negotiator talk to the fear that says things are never going to get better.
- Scribble with crayons or magic markers.
- Color with the monster coloring book (extra sneaky!).
- Ask slightly future you how she resolved this one.
- Use any of the grounding and centering techniques from Hiro‘s amazing Healing Internet Hangover course.
- Count backwards from 25.
- Strengthen your force field. Whoosh!
- Do simple Shiva Nata spirals.
- Run any Shiva Nata pattern or algorithm through your head. 3-2, 4-3, 1-4, 2-1!
- Find out why now is different from then.
- Use the alignment technique.
- Find out what is useful about being stuck right now.
- Invoke your superpowers — like Joseph.
- Write a Dr. Seuss rhyme about how much everything sucks.
- Yell TIME OUT!
- Take ten long deep breaths.
- Sama vritti pranayama is when the inhale and exhale are equal. Do that.
- Do ten silent screams (it helps to stop and take a breath or two between each one).
- Do the puppy paws. Pause. Paws!
- Be upside down.
- Find out what you’d tell the person you loved most if she/he was in your situation.
- Ask what brilliant support you’d give to a client who needed a reset button.
- Listen to a yoga nidra recording.
- Have a good cry for 15 minutes.
- Build a safe room in your mind.
- Build a safe room in your past.
- Run away! Just for now.
- Turn up the music and dance dance dance.
- Decide on a theme song.
- What Would Someone Fabulous Do?
- What Would The Wise And Compassionate Version Of You Do?
- Touch the floor.
- Do some stone skipping.
- Declare silent retreat!
- Take notes on what got you here so that you can change the pattern next time.
- Do something sweet for someone else.
- Blow bubbles!
- Whisper a secret to a tree.
- Make a gwish!
- Rub circles on the soles of your feet.
- Write magic words on the palms of your hands.
- Give yourself permission to be in the hard and in the stuck. Or to not want to be there.
- Put on a costume.
- Strike a pose.
- Talk about how much everything sucks but in a Groucho Marx voice. Or with your best Australian accent. Unless you’re Australian.
- Hop on one foot and be a bad-tempered one-legged pirate.
- One hand on your heart.
- Look for ten things that are blue.
- Name everything you see.
- Say I am here now.
Notes. And comment zen for today
As always, we invoke the “people vary” principle. This is my list of what might work for me.
Whatever doesn’t work for you can be ignored. Whatever *does* work for you can go straight into the Book of You.
It often helps to have your top three or four in mind (top of the toolbag!)
We all have our stuff. We’re all working on our stuff. We make room for people to have their own experience and that’s why we don’t tell each other what to do.
If you want to add other things that go on your personal list of ways to press the reset button, go for it.
Love to the commenter mice, the Beloved Lurkers and everyone who reads.
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A few times in my life, when I was dealing with Really Awful Crap, I got through it using this mantra:
I’m going to have a nervous breakdown, just not right now. Let’s see, this is going to take two days/two weeks/two years, so that means on (insert date) I get to have a nervous breakdown. A big one, where they let me sleep in a nice white room and bring my food on a tray with no sharp instruments. But not today.
It was a way for me to acknowledge that (a) things really were bad, so I deserved all the feelings I was having; and that (b) I had to keep dealing with the crap.
What a great list ! I have had a couple of yucky stuck days and my usual tricks were failing me – will definitely choose a couple from here next time the stuck monster strikes !
Thank you, thank you, thank you. This is wonderful.
I think my top fourish are…
~ shower
~ nap
~ orgasm (snapz, I’m blunt)
~ change my physical environment
In no particular order. 😀
These are so marvelous! Here are a few of mine:
–Swim.
–Travel a route I haven’t tried before.
–Type furiously.
–Rub the palms of my hands against something. Even if it’s just each other.
–Improvise a silly song. (Especially good for when I need to reset while my daughter is with me, especially especially if I’m driving her somewhere and something stressful starts happening.)
–Say words with oo in them: cool, soothing, noodle soup, sushi, you… Or just start chanting oooooo.
–Press a cool, wet cloth (or sometimes warm, but more often cool) against the back of my neck, or across my forehead and over my eyes.
Some of these things, I haven’t tried in a while. It’s good to remember them. Thank you!
I love #38, and #7 worked today, I literally could feel the stuck shift. 🙂
Wheeeeeeeee!
Telling myself that I don’t have to think about this right now has proved intensely and surprisingly powerful for me in creating the reset…
Oh goodness! You also use EFT! *bouncebounceheartsorespotlove*
I can’t usually do it when things aren’t working at work, but I’ve done #49 and #45 is just now becoming something that makes sense to me.
My “OMG I’m in public and I need the mental degauss” tricks:
– touch my pulse and imagine it getting both stronger and slower, or imagining it going backwards
– deep breathing/breath counting exercises
– take a post-it and doodle the cat or dog ear headband I’d want to be wearing right then. (The maned wolf [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maned_Wolf] is a favorite.)
– take a moment to play a few seconds of Zombie Farm
– replay memories of visiting Prague alone
– reread some of the cute texts I recently received from my love
I’m loving what other people are posting as well. Thanks, everyone! This is terrific.
You are a goddess. How did you know I’d be having a meltdown today?
*currently using too many to remember – lost count after TEN* ^_^
This is amazing – I’m in serious need of multiple reset buttons at the moment so this really hits the spot, thank you!
Oh my gosh! This is fabulous. I especially like #44, 69 and 70.
One that I’ve been using today is to walk over to the window and look out at nature for a few minutes while taking a few breaths. I’m trying to remember to do it in between all my tasks for the day, as a chance to stop and check in and make sure I’m doing the most important thing I can be doing at the moment.
Another thing I’ve been doing which is probably a bit weird (which is why it’s fun) is playing with an old deck of D&D treasure cards. When I need a new way to approach what I’m doing I pick a card and see how I can use the “treasure” I’ve just been given. This morning I got the Axe of Power and I used it to do “powerful” (in terms of impact) things, like getting a guest post finished and submitted.
Thank you for the reminder of the yoga nidra recording. I have been falling into a serious depression again and some of it is old pain and with depression comes negative thoughts and more depression. Yoga nidra is like mental floss. And I need to get back to my Ashtanga yoga practice too.