How can you stop unconscious reactions?
The past holds the key to present day patterns and cycles. When you bring awareness you can transform your life. To stop reacting and be able to respond rather than be enslaved to those behaviours.
The ceilings and walls were stained yellow and there was a low hum of a fan. The smoke sat like a floating cloud in the smoking room in the building I worked in. Standing in this smokey room, drinking cheap rocket-fuel coffee, engaged in incessant banter, my nervous system was wired.
We would be sharing our drunken stories from the weekend like they were highlights of our lives, imagining what the next would be like. A high cortisol experience. I was drawn to this place and this ritual because of the smell of the smoke.
I now know that I had a subconscious connection between smoke and the lack of paternal love from an absent father. The stress was comforting to my system, and the banter masked the deeper feelings within my being.
After each frequent ritual, it was back to the goldfish bowl. A large round room surrounded by windows, full of the buzz of constant telephone calls, looking out onto Guildford Canal. In the background a constant busy throng of people to-ing and fro-ing.
Back then, my nervous system was on fire. I used to consume the things that would support my body to remain in a state of hypervigilance. I thought it felt great when I was absorbed in it. But I was disillusioned, distracted and suffering with anxiety and sadness; masking it with food, alcohol, stimulants and bravado.
If you’re living in a reactionary reality, when you receive certain sensory information, it is followed by an automatic pattern that takes over. Have you ever been in a situation where something’s happened and then you feel really bad afterwards, you look back and think “what the hell was I doing?”.
I lived for decades of my life trapped in unconscious reactions. The feeling of heightened vigilance in the body is kind of like a nervous sizzle in your nervous system, it is common for one to become addicted to, or certainly accustomed to, this buzzy feeling.
Your body is used to feeling this way because of something that happened when you were younger. It might have been an environment with stressed and arguing parents or suchlike. It doesn’t need to be all the time, once can be enough, or often enough that it imprints on your system and you find ways to adjust or cope.
Then, the patterns persist into adulthood.
Two people in reactive states is suffering for all.
Reactionary living is created when you experience cycles of unconscious responses from the mind and body to certain sensory information.
We receive sensory information constantly. As human beings we are sensitive to vibration which includes sight, smell, taste, and touch. Reactionary living is when sensory information catalyses automatic behaviours, patterns and cycles.
There is no pause to feel. No pause to be.
The thing is, if you have a reaction, afterwards it can feel like you weren’t really ‘yourself’. You were pulled off centre. This hindsight can cause feelings of shame or regret about the actions that you’ve taken, especially if it’s because you’ve hurt someone that you love or care about.
Then the self-soothing kicks in. Cue sitting eating takeaways in front of the TV and “just a couple of glasses” of wine.
So the first step of being able to change our lives is to be able to feel in our bodies the expression of an emotion. To receive sensory information, notice the feeling in the body, and interrupt the automatic patterns.
Below you’re going to find a short practice that’s going to guide you with that immediately.
Internal patterns of reactions are just as if not more painful than external explosions.
Unconscious Reactions
Introspective and transformational practice
An Unconscious Reaction is triggered when you receive sensory information which results in an automatic pattern or cycle of behaviour.
The sensory information triggers a remembering within your being. This can be a physical remembering or a thought. These are memories held by your physical or cognitive self.
These memories then create responses from the physical body or the emotional body.
You may experience your physical state change: raised heart rate, shallow breath, pain in the stomach, urge to escape, increase of alertness or eye movements. The other reaction from you may be experienced as a remembered thought. For example, a scenario, image or words.
The pattern and cycle can then lead to an unwanted unconscious reaction, maybe a strong negative feeling in the body that results in emotion such as:
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Anxiety
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Anger
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Fear
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Stress
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Grief
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Sadness
Unconscious reactions trigger patterns. A “trigger” is exactly what it sounds like. In this context, the trigger causes a reaction. There is an applied force or exerted energy which causes a far exceeding “equal and opposite action”.
Newtons Third Law:
‘For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction’
Internal Triggers of Unconscious Reactions
You may have experienced internal triggers which cause certain patterns or cycles. These internal triggers relate to an imprint of a past experience in the mind, body, or spirit within oneself.
Often, a series of unconscious reactions can begin from simply a memory or a thought. As you carry out certain activities (For example, exercise) you may become hot or feel your heart beginning to race. That sensory experience can cause other sensations to be triggered within the body, your body can believe it is back in a certain past situation.
This itself can trigger other feelings to arise within the body and then emotions to be experienced.
By passing through certain magnetic or environmentally energetic spaces, extremely slight in nature, this may create a sensation in the body which results in a feeling and then a cascading effect of physical sensations.
External triggers of Unconscious Reactions
This is anything which happens outside of you which triggers a reaction. For example; what someone else does, something that happens, a specific series of events, or an environment.
The reaction and the triggering process are not entirely straight forward. There can be interaction between internal and external reactions which results in a more complex experience. Typically, the result of being triggered, if it has not been integrated in the body or addressed through practice, will result in the experience lasting longer than the time taken for a feeling or an emotion to move through your body.
An event that results in an experience of suffering longer than the time for an emotion to be felt. Any experience of an emotion which leaves you going into thoughts and prolonging emotional pain for over the 60-90 seconds for an initial emotion to move through you is a process which is fodder for transformation.
Practice One – Unpicking One Part
- When did you last have a reaction?
- Where?
- Who?
- What?
Write this out like a story which took place. Note what you thought and what happened in reality. Notice if you have internal conversations or expectations of how an event should or did take place.
Now that you have deepened your connection to the “event” you can begin to unpick the pattern and ultimately invite a pattern breaker. The pattern breaker below is simply to invite calming breaths the next time you find yourself in a similar interaction or environment.
Practice Two – Inviting in a Pattern Breaker
This short form practice uses the calming breaths technique. Inhales through the nose with slow exhales through the mouth.
- Imagine yourself in the situation that creates the unconscious reactions.
- Practice the calming breaths while re-imagining the scenario
- Commit and promise to yourself when you next find yourself in that position that you will stop and breathe.
When a trigger happens, allow the initial physical and feelings to be felt.
Consider if you had any outward reaction. Breathe. Later in the day write down or reconsider all the elements of the trigger and the reactionary process.
Ask yourself, “How can I respond differently?”.
If there was someone else involved, bring compassion to the process. Put yourself in their shoes for a moment. How did they feel? This begins the process of forgiving them.
Ultimately triggers allow us to move
From:
Automatic reactions, shame, blame, catastrophising, anger, rage, sadness, suffering
To:
Consciousness, response, compassion, empathy, forgiveness, connection, love and joy, peace of mind
This is a short-form practice from Holistic Shadow Work. If you want to work closely with me, we can get to the bottom of your unconscious reactions and begin to break the patterns together.
