I’ve had numerous middle-of-the-night scares recently, some sparked by medical type issues and symptoms, and some not. Between the physical experiences and my mental/emotional reactions to them, I felt like both a building being shaken by an earthquake and the earthquake itself – a system on overload. And though doctors have been employed and tests run, this story is not so much about medical conditions, it’s about the mental and emotional climate that can bring a person to her knees – but for a good reason.

When I awaken in the middle of the night, distressed to any degree, it’s a result of having left myself during the day. I may have abandoned myself to diagnoses, car problems, a work project, or a lost loved one, object, or position. Essentially, I may have been consumed by thoughts of vulnerability, victimhood, or loss. My energy and attention became absorbed in my reaction to something - even perhaps to a concept I hold of myself that is also not me. And being lost to myself feels unsafe, which wakes me just as an alarm would.

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The other day I was in the grocery store, and when the cashier finished scanning my groceries, I handed him my store “rewards” card – which provides discounts and other benefits – and he scanned it. Not a minute later, when I presented my coupons, he asked if I had a card. Offhandedly, I said, “I just showed it to you. Don’t you remember?” He didn’t say anything and we continued, but by the time we were done, the dynamic was cool despite me trying to make it friendly. As I was leaving, what I’d said came back to me.

The best time to apologize had passed, and I wasn’t sure how to make the situation better; he was busy and onto the next customer. I perseverated over this on the way home, and concluded I didn’t know how to fix it. My cashier’s name was Edgar, and later, while getting ready to work, I took a blank index card and wrote EDGAR on it and laid it on my desk. I didn’t know why.

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There is a video depicting a twelve-year-old girl suffering from a “Habit Cough” – a chronic condition in which the patient has an illness that involves coughing, but once the illness goes away the cough persists. For this young girl, her coughing was so constant she had to stop going to school. The video shows her working with a doctor using Suggestion Therapy. He explains there is no physiological reason for the cough – it’s more of an automatic response or reaction. He teaches her how to take control of the cough by showing her she can resist it for a few minutes at first, and then walking her through adding a minute at a time. She is to take deep, slow breaths and sip water when the impulse to cough comes. He tells her she has to concentrate; it’s the only way for her to gain control.

The girl inadvertently created a problem by habitually reacting to a feeling (in her throat). In our day-to-day lives, our reactions to things can create the same kind of effect and the same similar oppressive patterns that keep us feeling stuck. The areas in which we feel out of control have to do with us habitually reacting to our feelings, which is not the same as allowing ourselves to feel them.

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When my son was about two-and-a-half, I was sitting on the couch reading a Winnie the Pooh board book to him when he fell down on the floor and made a number of peculiar movements. I didn’t know what was happening. He was late to talking, so wasn’t able to communicate all that clearly yet. Within moments, I realized he was just acting out the story. But until I connected those dots, I couldn’t understand what was happening and his behavior seemed weird and worrisome. That behavior was completely appropriate, but I didn’t see it that way until I understood the premise from which he was acting.

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When I worked at a daycare years ago, there was a five-year-old boy there named Phil. Slender and taller, with light blond hair and white, somewhat pasty skin, he often looked as though he’d been torn from bed only moments before arriving. Even while we were talking, I felt like I should be careful not to wake him. Phil seemed exhausted – if not by lack of sleep, then by lack of interest and the intrusion of the unwanted, bustling outer world. He often arrived in a worn t-shirt, pajama bottoms, and tall, black rubber boots, and would soon disappear into one of the play structures and remain there for, it seemed, as long as possible.

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