8 tweets · August 2020 · 26 likes · 0 retweets · read on Twitter
SQUAD GOALS
Important caveat:
I'll note that there are 2 elements to this. One is learning not to fear feeling whatever you're feeling. Bruce Tift speaks brilliantly to this, in eg this excerpt: (a substantial chunk of the dharma seems to be learning how to not need feelings go away)
The other element, which is probably in some sense more what @emmalsalinas is referring to, is untangling whatever has your current system organized to produce panicked responses in relation to certain situations.
Inasmuch as each emotion has a *purpose*, and panic (unlike straight up fear→run) seems to mostly make us helplessly freak out, it seems to me that panic's purpose is probably purely infantile: get comforted by parents, including found if lost.
If you're feeling panic, and you're an adult, ask yourself if you feel small. Your system may be having an emotional flashback to a time when you were very young.
If you're reading this and think you don't have childhood trauma, well... I don't know you! I do know that 4 years ago I didn't think I did and that is clearly false, and I also know that our society is built up to systematically traumatize people.
Important caveat: having childhood experiences that got stuck in tangles and now generate adult flashbacks does NOT mean anyone did something wrong. It just means you faced situations that you didn't know how to metabolize at the time.
