Freeze Response Quotes

The muscles used to make a smile actually send a biochemical message to our nervous system that it is safe to relax the flight of freeze response.

In response to threat and injury, animals, including humans, execute biologically based, non-conscious action patterns that prepare them to meet the threat and defend themselves. The very structure of trauma, including activation, dissociation and freezing are based on the evolution of survival behaviors. When threatened or injured, all animals draw from a "library" of possible responses. We orient, dodge, duck, stiffen, brace, retract, fight, flee, freeze, collapse, etc. All of these coordinated responses are somatically based- they are things that the body does to protect and defend itself. It is when these orienting and defending responses are overwhelmed that we see trauma. The bodies of traumatized people portray "snapshots" of their unsuccessful attempts to defend themselves in the face of threat and injury. Trauma is a highly activated incomplete biological response to threat, frozen in time. For example, when we prepare to fight or to flee, muscles throughout our entire body are tensed in specific patterns of high energy readiness. When we are unable to complete the appropriate actions, we fail to discharge the tremendous energy generated by our survival preparations. This energy becomes fixed in specific patterns of neuromuscular readiness. The person then stays in a state of acute and then chronic arousal and dysfunction in the central nervous system. Traumatized people are not suffering from a disease in the normal sense of the word- they have become stuck in an aroused state. It is difficult if not impossible to function normally under these circumstances.

...a freeze response (dissociation, collapse, numbing, paralysis, deadness) during the incident that threatened your life or limb. Sometimes it's difficult for people to understand that this is really survival response...

If you are a parent, teacher, camp counselor, or school resource officer and you see children severely change or restrain their arm behavior around their parents or other adults, at a minimum it should arouse your interest and promote further observation. Cessation of arm movement is part of the limbic system’s freeze response. To the abused child, this adaptive behavior can mean survival.

To people who are reliving a trauma, nothing makes sense; they are trapped in a life-or-death situation, a state of paralyzing fear or blind rage. Mind and body are constantly aroused, as if they are in imminent danger. They startle in response to the slightest noises and are frustrated by small irritations. Their sleep is chronically disturbed, and food often loses its sensual pleasures. This in turn can trigger desperate attempts to shut those feelings down by freezing and dissociation.11

Many freeze types unconsciously believe that people and danger are synonymous, and that safety lies in solitude. Outside of fantasy, many give up entirely on the possibility of love. The freeze response, also known as the camouflage response, often triggers the individual into hiding, isolating and eschewing human contact as much as possible. This type can be so frozen in retreat mode that it seems as if their starter button is stuck in the ‘off’ position. It is usually the most profoundly abandoned child - ‘the lost child’ - who is forced to ‘choose’ and habituate to the freeze response… Unable to successfully employ fight, flight or fawn responses, the freeze type’s defenses develop around classical dissociation.

The detection of a person as safe or dangerous triggers neurobiologically determined pro-social or defensive behaviors. Even though we may not always be aware of danger on a cognitive level, on a neurophysiological level, our body has already started a sequence of neural processes that would facilitate adaptive defense behaviors such as fight, flight or freeze. 

Thich Nhat Hanh calls his practice of yes “smile yoga.” He suggests bringing a slight but real smile to our lips many times throughout the day, whether we are meditating or simply stopping for a red light. “A tiny bud of a smile on your lips,” writes Thich Nhat Hanh, “nourishes awareness and calms you miraculously … your smile will bring happiness to you and to those around you.” The power of a smile to open and relax us is confirmed by modern science. The muscles used to make a smile actually send a biochemical message to our nervous system that it is safe to relax the flight, fight or freeze response. A smile is the yes of unconditional friendliness that welcomes experience without fear.

Dr. Peter Levine, who has worked with trauma survivors for twenty-five years, says the single most important factor he has learned in uncovering the mystery of human trauma is what happens during and after the freezing response. He describes an impala being chased by a cheetah. The second the cheetah pounces on the young impala, the animal goes limp. The impala isn’t playing dead, she has “instinctively entered an altered state of consciousness, shared by all mammals when death appears imminent.” (Levine and Frederick, Waking the Tiger, p. 16) The impala becomes instantly immobile. However, if the impala escapes, what she does immediately thereafter is vitally important. She shakes and quivers every part of her body, clearing the traumatic energy she has accumulated.

In the interests of truth, however, I want to make it clear that Norman Bowker was in no way responsible for what happened to Kiowa. Norman did not experience a failure of nerve that night. He did not freeze up or lose the Silver Star for valor. That part of the story is my own.

The deadliest manifestation of white fragility is its reflexive confusion of fear with danger and comfort with safety. When a white body feels frightened by the presence of a Black one—whether or not an actual threat exists—it may lash out at the Black body in what it senses as necessary self-protection. Often this is a fight, flee, or freeze response triggered by the activation of the ancient trauma that began as white-on-white violence in Europe centuries ago.

Experts now know that when faced with extreme danger from which we can see no way out, humans freeze. Just like lizards freeze in the hope their camouflage will protect them from a predator. That’s why it’s now called the fight, flight, or freeze response.

Although we rarely die, humans suffer when we are unable to discharge the energy that is locked in by the freezing response. The traumatized veteran, the rape survivor, the abused child, the impala, and the bird all have been confronted by overwhelming situations. If they are unable to orient and choose between fight or flight, they will freeze or collapse. Those who are able to discharge that energy will be restored. Rather than moving through the freezing response, as animals do routinely, humans often begin a downward spiral characterized by an increasingly debilitating constellation of symptoms.

Overaroused HSPs tend to substitute “freeze” for the “fight or flight” response.

I am as if paralysed: over there in the chamber the gas people and we are supposed to sing!

When we experience shame, our first layer of defense often occurs involuntarily. It goes back to our primal flight, fight and freeze responses.

By listening to the “unspoken voice” of my body and allowing it to do what it needed to do; by not stopping the shaking, by “tracking” my inner sensations, while also allowing the completion of the defensive and orienting responses; and by feeling the “survival emotions” of rage and terror without becoming overwhelmed, I came through mercifully unscathed, both physically and emotionally. I was not only thankful; I was humbled and grateful to find that I could use my method for my own salvation. While some people are able to recover from such trauma on their own, many individuals do not. Tens of thousands of soldiers are experiencing the extreme stress and horror of war. Then too, there are the devastating occurrences of rape, sexual abuse and assault. Many of us, however, have been overwhelmed by much more “ordinary” events such as surgeries or invasive medical procedures. Orthopedic patients in a recent study, for example, showed a 52% occurrence of being diagnosed with full-on PTSD following surgery. Other traumas include falls, serious illnesses, abandonment, receiving shocking or tragic news, witnessing violence and getting into an auto accident; all can lead to PTSD. These and many other fairly common experiences are all potentially traumatizing. The inability to rebound from such events, or to be helped adequately to recover by professionals, can subject us to PTSD—along with a myriad of physical and emotional symptoms.

As a result, you will lose your cool less often, and stressful situations will be less likely to trigger a fight, flee, or freeze response. In turn, you may develop stronger and more respectful relationships with your fellow commuters, your boss, and your child.

I hate you.” I scrambled to fold myself back into my blanket cocoon. “See, that’s the problem. You don’t hate me.” I had no response to that. “You know what I think?” “No. And I don’t want to know.” He ignored that. “You like me.” My brows knitted together as I stared out over the small clearing. “Enough to be wildly inappropriate with me.” A pause. “On multiple occasions.” “Good gods, I’d rather freeze to death at this point.” “Oh, right. We’re pretending none of that happened. I keep forgetting.” “Just because I don’t bring it up every five minutes doesn’t mean I’m pretending it didn’t happen.” “But bringing it up every five minutes is so much fun.

A child's (or an adult's) nervous system may detect danger or a threat to life when the child enters a new environment or meets a strange person. Cognitively, there is no reason for them to be frightened. But often, even if they understand this, their bodies betray them. Sometimes this betrayal is private; only they are aware that their hearts are beating fast and contracting with such force that they start to sway. For others, the responses are more overt. They may tremble. Their faces may flush, or perspiration may pour from their hands and forehead. Still others may become pale and dizzy and feel precipitously faint.

When this stuck energy is restored to the whole organism, we can begin to live more fully—to create, accomplish, communicate, collaborate, and share. Instead of being engaged merely in survival, we can then come back to our balanced place, where we’re basically social animals. The fear and paralysis and dread drop away, and we come back into the present, because we have access to all of the energy previously bound up in our freezing and immobility, in our incomplete fight and flight responses.

For any given provocation, we are egged on by our instant, omnipresent media to unleash our basest instincts—we might think of them as cultural “fight-flight-freeze” responses—rather than committing ourselves to the slower process of seeking truth.[15] (One genuinely new thing is the virtual mob, which can be just as inhumane and culturally damaging as any physical mob.)   This self-debasement of our humanity in desperate and irrational fear of the “other” is a result of poor cultural stewardship.

I mean, there's hell freezing over, pigs flying, and then there's me and responsibility.

Well-being comes from meeting our needs, not denying them. When we experience that our needs are sufficiently met, the body and mind enter the “green zone” Responsive mode, and there is a sense of peace, contentment, and love. When needs feel unmet, we’re disturbed into the fight-flight-freeze “red zone” Reactive mode, and there is a sense of fear, frustration, and hurt.

Freeze happens when the brain assesses the threat and decides you’re too slow to run and too small to fight, and so your best hope for survival is to “play dead” until the threat goes away or someone comes along to help you. Freeze is your last-ditch stress response, reserved for threats that the brain perceives as life-threatening, when fight or flight don’t stand a chance.

The AVP often has intestinal issues. The intestines are indeed a second brain and need a significant amount of support. It may be interesting to note the polyvagal theory of Steven Porges (2011), who wrote about the tenth cranial nerve, which runs from the brain to the gut. Negative responses in the gut can occur when flight/fight/freeze responses are automatically activated.

There is no Black person here who can afford to wait to be led into positive action for survival. Each one of us must look clearly and closely at the genuine particulars (conditions) of his or her life and decide where action and energy is needed and where it can be effective. Change is the immediate responsibility of each of us, wherever and however we are standing, in whatever arena we choose. For while we wait for another Malcolm, another Martin, another charismatic Black leader to validate our struggles, old Black people are freezing to death in tenements, Black children are being brutalized and slaughtered in the streets, or lobotomized by television, and the percentage of Black families living below the poverty line is higher today than in 1963.

If we ignore our abuse and trauma, it will continue to reveal itself to us. It may be subtle or it may be intense. Trauma can show up in our sleep. We may battle insomnia and nightmares. We can experience physical pain and emotional distress. We may struggle with anxiety and depression. Or we may suffer hypervigilance, dissociation, and Complex PTSD/PTSD. We may have flashbacks. We may battle triggers. Or we can suddenly be slammed with fight, flight, freeze, or fawn mode. Each of these signs are a normal trauma response. Even if we are unaware that it’s linked to our emotional trauma.

People spoke to foreigners with an averted gaze, and everybody seemed to know somebody who had just vanished. The rumors of what had happened to them were fantastic and bizarre though, as it turned out, they were only an understatement of the real thing. Before going to see General Videla […], I went to […] check in with Los Madres: the black-draped mothers who paraded, every week, with pictures of their missing loved ones in the Plaza Mayo. (‘Todo mi familia!’ as one elderly lady kept telling me imploringly, as she flourished their photographs. ‘Todo mi familia!’) From these and from other relatives and friends I got a line of questioning to put to the general. I would be told by him, they forewarned me, that people ‘disappeared’ all the time, either because of traffic accidents and family quarrels or, in the dire civil-war circumstances of Argentina, because of the wish to drop out of a gang and the need to avoid one’s former associates. But this was a cover story. Most of those who disappeared were openly taken away in the unmarked Ford Falcon cars of the Buenos Aires military police. I should inquire of the general what precisely had happened to Claudia Inez Grumberg, a paraplegic who was unable to move on her own but who had last been seen in the hands of his ever-vigilant armed forces [….] I possess a picture of the encounter that still makes me want to spew: there stands the killer and torturer and rape-profiteer, as if to illustrate some seminar on the banality of evil. Bony-thin and mediocre in appearance, with a scrubby moustache, he looks for all the world like a cretin impersonating a toothbrush. I am gripping his hand in a much too unctuous manner and smiling as if genuinely delighted at the introduction. Aching to expunge this humiliation, I waited while he went almost pedantically through the predicted script, waving away the rumored but doubtless regrettable dematerializations that were said to be afflicting his fellow Argentines. And then I asked him about Senorita Grumberg. He replied that if what I had said was true, then I should remember that ‘terrorism is not just killing with a bomb, but activating ideas. Maybe that’s why she’s detained.’ I expressed astonishment at this reply and, evidently thinking that I hadn’t understood him the first time, Videla enlarged on the theme. ‘We consider it a great crime to work against the Western and Christian style of life: it is not just the bomber but the ideologist who is the danger.’ Behind him, I could see one or two of his brighter staff officers looking at me with stark hostility as they realized that the general—El Presidente—had made a mistake by speaking so candidly. […] In response to a follow-up question, Videla crassly denied—‘rotondamente’: ‘roundly’ denied—holding Jacobo Timerman ‘as either a journalist or a Jew.’ While we were having this surreal exchange, here is what Timerman was being told by his taunting tormentors: Argentina has three main enemies: Karl Marx, because he tried to destroy the Christian concept of society; Sigmund Freud, because he tried to destroy the Christian concept of the family; and Albert Einstein, because he tried to destroy the Christian concept of time and space. […] We later discovered what happened to the majority of those who had been held and tortured in the secret prisons of the regime. According to a Navy captain named Adolfo Scilingo, who published a book of confessions, these broken victims were often destroyed as ‘evidence’ by being flown out way over the wastes of the South Atlantic and flung from airplanes into the freezing water below. Imagine the fun element when there’s the surprise bonus of a Jewish female prisoner in a wheelchair to be disposed of… we slide open the door and get ready to roll her and then it’s one, two, three… go!

When functioning correctly, the amygdala scans the environment and decides whether to trigger a threat response (fight, flight, or freeze) or give the all-clear signal to the brain to “Move along, nothing to see here!

When children experience trauma, they are faced with something so terrible or extreme that it overwhelms their ability to cope. The traumatic event activates a fight, flight, or freeze response, which can affect children’s bodies, brains, emotions, and behavior. (Researchers have recently noted a possible fourth response to trauma called the fawn response, where victims respond to trauma by trying to appease or please the threatening person.3)

With the best of intentions, the generation before mine worked diligently to prepare their children to make an intelligent case for Christianity. We were constantly reminded of the superiority of our own worldview and the shortcomings of all others. We learned that as Christians, we alone had access to absolute truth and could win any argument. The appropriate Bible verses were picked out for us, the opposing positions summarized for us, and the best responses articulated for us, so that we wouldn’t have to struggle through two thousand years of theological deliberations and debates but could get right to the bottom line on the important stuff: the deity of Christ, the nature of the Trinity, the role and interpretation of Scripture, and the fundamentals of Christianity. As a result, many of us entered the world with both an unparalleled level of conviction and a crippling lack of curiosity. So ready with the answers, we didn’t know what the questions were anymore. So prepared to defend the faith, we missed the thrill of discovering it for ourselves. So convinced we had God right, it never occurred to us that we might be wrong. In short, we never learned to doubt. Doubt is a difficult animal to master because it requires that we learn the difference between doubting God and doubting what we believe about God. The former has the potential to destroy faith; the latter has the power to enrich and refine it. The former is a vice; the latter a virtue. Where would we be if the apostle Peter had not doubted the necessity of food laws, or if Martin Luther had not doubted the notion that salvation can be purchased? What if Galileo had simply accepted church-instituted cosmology paradigms, or William Wilberforce the condition of slavery? We do an injustice to the intricacies and shadings of Christian history when we gloss over the struggles, when we read Paul’s epistles or Saint Augustine’s Confessions without acknowledging the difficult questions that these believers asked and the agony with which they often asked them. If I’ve learned anything over the past five years, it’s that doubt is the mechanism by which faith evolves. It helps us cast off false fundamentals so that we can recover what has been lost or embrace what is new. It is a refining fire, a hot flame that keeps our faith alive and moving and bubbling about, where certainty would only freeze it on the spot. I would argue that healthy doubt (questioning one’s beliefs) is perhaps the best defense against unhealthy doubt (questioning God). When we know how to make a distinction between our ideas about God and God himself, our faith remains safe when one of those ideas is seriously challenged. When we recognize that our theology is not the moon but rather a finger pointing at the moon, we enjoy the freedom of questioning it from time to time. We can say, as Tennyson said, Our little systems have their day; They have their day and cease to be; They are but broken lights of thee, And thou, O Lord, art more than they.15 I sometimes wonder if I might have spent fewer nights in angry, resentful prayer if only I’d known that my little systems — my theology, my presuppositions, my beliefs, even my fundamentals — were but broken lights of a holy, transcendent God. I wish I had known to question them, not him. What my generation is learning the hard way is that faith is not about defending conquered ground but about discovering new territory. Faith isn’t about being right, or settling down, or refusing to change. Faith is a journey, and every generation contributes its own sketches to the map. I’ve got miles and miles to go on this journey, but I think I can see Jesus up ahead.

When we’re in a situation or engaging in an interaction and a look, words, or an action trigger one of our core beliefs, our memories get activated, and that releases a powerful dose of negative emotions that fuels our fight, flight, or freeze response. This system that’s hardwired in us is actually creating relationship problems: we’re behaving as if there is a threat of death when it’s really emotional harm—sure, it makes us feel bad, but it’s not going to kill us.

Now, tell me again why I’m freezing my ass off in the middle of the woods?” Legna chuckled. “Because it is tradition. Your mate must find you and then carry you to the altar. Seeking you out is symbolic of his desire to let nothing come between you. Bringing you to the altar is a reflection of how it is his duty to help you over obstacles so that you may reach moments of joy together.” “It’s very romantic,” Isabella said, “if a little chauvinistic.” “Not in the least. The sharing of responsibility within a joining is symbolized just as strongly. The bride must tie the handfasting ribbon around her mate’s wrist. The white ribbon symbolizes honesty and love and fidelity, and by allowing himself to be so tied means the groom must provide for her at all times, as she will provide for him. The black is a promise that they will forever do all in their power to protect their union, their children, and the perpetuation of the essentials of our culture.” “But you’ve tied a red ribbon to the end of the black, Legna. What does thatmean?” “Actually”—the Demon woman smiled—“there is no precedent for the red ribbon. However, I felt it only fair to have a physical reminder that you have a culture of your own and will have just as much right to perpetuate that within your children as Jacob does.” “Legna,” Isabella giggled, giving her an admonishing look, “that is positively rebellious and feminist of you.” “I never claimed to be an old-fashioned girl,” Legna confided with a wink.

As in other animals, the nerves and chemicals that make up our basic brain structure have a direct connection with our body. When the old brain takes over, it partially shuts down the higher brain, our conscious mind, and propels the body to run, hide, fight, or, on occasion, freeze. By the time we are fully aware of our situation, our body may already be on the move. If the fight/flight/freeze response is successful and we escape the danger, we recover our internal equilibrium and gradually “regain our senses.

There is no evidence that time heals all wounds, or even most wounds; instead, it freezes unnecessary enmity and makes it harder to overcome. (...) As Bertolt Brecht said, "As crimes pile up, they become invisible." And so I don't believe in an ideology of non-response.

When the attachment figure is also a threat to the child, two systems with conflicting goals are activated simultaneously or sequentially: the attachment system, whose goal is to seek proximity, and the defense systems, whose goal is to protect. In these contexts, the social engagement system is profoundly compromised and its development interrupted by threatening conditions. This intolerable conflict between the need for attachment and the need for defense with the same caregiver results in the disorganized–disoriented attachment pattern (Main & Solomon, 1986). A contradictory set of behaviors ensues to support the different goals of the animal defense systems and of the attachment system (Lyons-Ruth & Jacobvitz, 1999; Main & Morgan, 1996; Steele, van der Hart, & Nijenhuis, 2001; van der Hart, Nijenhuis, & Steele, 2006). When the attachment system is stimulated by hunger, discomfort, or threat, the child instinctively seeks proximity to attachment figures. But during proximity with a person who is threatening, the defensive subsystems of flight, fight, freeze, or feigned death/shut down behaviors are mobilized. The cry for help is truncated because the person whom the child would turn to is the threat. Children who suffer attachment trauma fall into the dissociative–disorganized category and are generally unable to effectively auto- or interactively regulate, having experienced extremes of low arousal (as in neglect) and high arousal (as in abuse) that tend to endure over time (Schore, 2009b). In the context of chronic danger, patterns of high sympathetic dominance are apt to become established, along with elevated heart rate, higher cortisol levels, and easily activated alarm responses. Children must be hypervigilantly prepared and on guard to avoid danger yet primed to quickly activate a dorsal vagal feigned death state in the face of inescapable threat. In the context of neglect, instead of increased sympathetic nervous system tone, increased dorsal vagal tone, decreased heart rate, and shutdown (Schore, 2001a) may become chronic, reflecting both the lack of stimulation in the environment and the need to be unobtrusive.

Traumatized children often over-gravitate to one of these response patterns to survive, and as time passes these four modes become elaborated into entrenched defensive structures that are similar to narcissistic [fight], obsessive/compulsive [flight], dissociative [freeze] or codependent [fawn] defenses.

Much of what it takes to succeed in school, at work, and in one’s community consists of cultural habits acquired by adaptation to the social environment. Such cultural adaptations are known as “cultural capital.” Segregation leads social groups to form different codes of conduct and communication. Some habits that help individuals in intensely segregated, disadvantaged environments undermine their ability to succeed in integrated, more advantaged environments. At Strive, a job training organization, Gyasi Headen teaches young black and Latino men how to drop their “game face” at work. The “game face” is the angry, menacing demeanor these men adopt to ward off attacks in their crime-ridden, segregated neighborhoods. As one trainee described it, it is the face you wear “at 12 o’clock at night, you’re in the ‘hood and they’re going to try to get you.”102 But the habit may freeze it into place, frightening people from outside the ghetto, who mistake the defensive posture for an aggressive one. It may be so entrenched that black men may be unaware that they are glowering at others. This reduces their chance of getting hired. The “game face” is a form of cultural capital that circulates in segregated underclass communities, helping its members survive. Outside these communities, it burdens its possessors with severe disadvantages. Urban ethnographer Elijah Anderson highlights the cruel dilemma this poses for ghetto residents who aspire to mainstream values and seek responsible positions in mainstream society.103 If they manifest their “decent” values in their neighborhoods, they become targets for merciless harassment by those committed to “street” values, who win esteem from their peers by demonstrating their ability and willingness to insult and physically intimidate others with impunity. To protect themselves against their tormentors, and to gain esteem among their peers, they adopt the game face, wear “gangster” clothing, and engage in the posturing style that signals that they are “bad.” This survival strategy makes them pariahs in the wider community. Police target them for questioning, searches, and arrests.104 Store owners refuse to serve them, or serve them brusquely, while shadowing them to make sure they are not shoplifting. Employers refuse to employ them.105 Or they employ them in inferior, segregated jobs. A restaurant owner may hire blacks as dishwashers, but not as wait staff, where they could earn tips.

On 22 July 1941 it moved further south in Indochina, even though it realised this would probably provoke a reaction from the US. The official American response was to freeze Japanese assets in America and impose a comprehensive export embargo on American goods to Japan. These goods included the vital commodity oil. Japan depended on imports for than 90% of its oil and more than 3/4 of this imported oil came from the US.

Hyper-aroused youth can look hyperactive or inattentive because what they are attending to is the teacher’s tone of voice or the other children’s body language, not the content of their lessons. The aggression and impulsivity that the fight or flight response provokes can also appear as defiance or opposition, when in fact it is the remnants of a response to some prior traumatic situation that the child has somehow been prompted to recall. The “freezing” response that the body makes when stressed—sudden immobility, like a deer caught in the headlights—is also often misinterpreted as defiant refusal by teachers because, when it occurs, the child literally cannot respond to commands. While not all ADD, hyperactivity and oppositional-defiant disorder are trauma-related, it is likely that the symptoms that lead to these diagnoses are trauma-related more often than anyone has begun to suspect.

I look at it this way: the instinctive response to danger—the stress response—consists of fight, flight, or freeze. These three strategies help us survive physically, but when they’re applied to our mental and emotional functioning, we get into trouble. When there’s no enemy to defend against, we turn on ourselves. “Fight” becomes self-criticism, “flight” becomes self-isolation, and “freeze” becomes self-absorption, getting locked into our own thoughts.

Understanding the limbic system and its core freeze, flight, or fight responses is the first phase in detecting a threat. It’s important to remember that the enemy stalking a Marine on patrol or a seemingly helpless woman on her way home is under duress. This stress manifests itself in physical actions. If we look for these particular physical actions when our limbic system gives us the “heads up, something’s not right” signal, we’ll be able to operate effectively “left of bang.

Trauma isn’t always caused by one specific incident. It can also emerge in response to persistent distress or ongoing abuse, like a relationship where sex is unwanted, though it may be technically “consensual” because the targeted person says yes in order to avoid being hurt or feels trapped in the relationship or is otherwise coerced. In that context, a survivor’s body gradually learns that it can’t escape and it can’t fight; freeze becomes the default stress response because of the learned pattern of shutdown as the best way to guarantee survival.

He had always been prepared to accept the responsibility for his actions, and he had always been half aware too, from the time he made his terrible private vow that she should be happy, how far this action might carry him. Despair is the price one pays for setting oneself an impossible aim. It is, one is told, the unforgivable sin, but it is a sin the corrupt or evil man never practises. He always has hope. He never reaches the freezing-point of knowing absolute failure. Only the man of goodwill carries always in his heart this capacity for damnation.

We learned about the fight or flight response in Science. Our Lessons left out the third option: freeze. I read about it in an article on women's self-defense. I asked m y mom why no one ever mentioned freezing. She told me to Google it; she was busy with a project for work. Instead, I asked James what she thought. "Probably because people like to think they can survive a dangerous situation. It's a control thing. Like, any choice they might make could lead to the defeat of their attacker," she said. "Plus, it gives dickheads a reason to judge victims.

The encounter with evil may elicit one of four typical responses: fight, flight, freezing, or fragmentation. ... It is the context and dimensions of evil that determine the human response to it. ... [Marie-Louise] von Franz points out that not all evil contains creative, transformative potential. She warns of being contaminated by evil. Archetypal evil has the power to make us fall into a complex-ridden state of possession, in which the ego's strength is overcome. She warns that many dark powers must be kept at a distance, and sometimes the only appropriate response is flight.

When you peer into an abyss, you see a monster. If it is a small abyss, then it is a small monster. But if it is the ultimate abyss, then it is the ultimate monster. That is certainly a dragon—perhaps even the dragon of evil itself. The conceptualization of the monster in the abyss is the eternal predator lurking in the night, ready and able to devour its unsuspecting prey. That is an image that is tens of millions of years old, something coded as deeply in the recesses of our biological structure as anything conceptual can be coded. And it is not just the monsters of nature, but the tyrants of culture and the malevolence of individuals. It is all of that, with the latter dominant, terrible as that is to consider. And it is in the nature of mankind not to cower and freeze as helpless prey animals, nor to become a turncoat and serve evil itself, but to confront the lions in their lairs. That is the nature of our ancestors: immensely courageous hunters, defenders, shepherds, voyagers, inventors, warriors, and founders of cities and states. That is the father you could rescue; the ancestor you could become. And he is to be discovered in the deepest possible place, as that is where you must go if you wish to take full responsibility and become who you could be.

As a consequence of natural analgesic actions or as a result of the administration of drugs that interfere with body signaling (painkillers, anesthetics), the brain receives a distorted view of what the body state really is at the moment. We know that in situations of fear in which the brain chooses the running option rather than freezing, the brain stem disengages the part of the pain-transmission circuitry, a bit like pulling the plug. The periqueductal gray, which controls these responses, can also command the secretion of natural opioids and achieve precisely what taking an analgesic would achieve -- elimination of pain signals. In the strict sense, we are dealing here with a hallucination of the body because what the brain registers in its maps and the conscious mind feels do not correspond to the reality that might be perceived. Whenever we ingest molecules the have the power to modify the transmission or mapping of body signals, we play on this mechanism. Alcohol does it; so do analgesics and anesthetics, as well as countless drugs of abuse. It is patently clear that, other than out of curiousity, humans are drawn to such molecules because of their desire to generate feelings of well-being, feelings in which pain signals are obliterated and pleasure signals induced.

But suppose the stressor is one that your brain determines you can’t survive by escaping and you can’t survive by conquering—you feel the teeth of the lion bite into you from behind. This is when you get the brakes stress response—the parasympathetic nervous system, the “STOP!” activated by the most extreme distress. Your body shuts down; you may even experience “tonic immobility,” where you can’t move, or can move only sluggishly. Animals in the wild freeze and fall to the ground as a last-ditch effort to convince a predator they’re already dead; Stephen Porges has hypothesized that freeze is a stress response that facilitates a painless death.1

Vulnerability: January 8 Some of us may have made a decision that no one was ever going to hurt us again. We may automatically go on “feelings freeze mode” when faced with emotional pain. Or, we may terminate a relationship the first time we feel hurt. Hurt feelings are a part of life, relationships, and recovery. It is understandable that we don’t want to feel any more pain. Many of us have had more than our share. In fact, at some time in our life, we may have been overwhelmed, crushed, or stopped in our tracks by the amount of pain we felt. We may not have had the resources to cope with our pain or take care of ourselves. That was yesterday. Today, we don’t have to be so frightened of pain. It does not have to overwhelm us. We are becoming strong enough to deal with hurt feelings. And we don’t have to become martyrs, claiming that hurt feelings and suffering are all there is to life. We need only allow ourselves to feel vulnerable enough to feel hurt, when that’s appropriate, and take responsibility for our feelings, behaviors, and what we need to do to take care of ourselves. We don’t have to analyze or justify our feelings. We need to feel them, and try not to let them control our behavior. Maybe our pain is showing us we need to set a boundary; maybe it’s showing us we’re going in a wrong direction; maybe it’s triggering a deep healing process. It’s okay to feel hurt; it’s okay to cry; it’s okay to heal; it’s okay to move on to the next feeling, when it’s time. Our willingness and capacity to feel hurt will eventually be matched by our willingness and capacity to feel joy. Being in recovery does not mean immunity from pain; it means learning to take loving care of ourselves when we are in pain. Today, I will not strike out at those who cause me pain. I will feel my emotions and take responsibility for them. I will accept hurt feelings as part of being in relationships. I am willing to surrender to the pain as well as the joy in life.

So, all on a sudden, against all odds, when that piece of news quite hit him, when his thoughts were surprisingly cast onto a long-neglected land of long-withhold fertility, even the voices of his dead ancestors got stranded in the sands of the deserts, howled rather a sparking response of shocking discomfort back in his brains, as if, with his swirling waves of shock, they were taken out from the stale sands of the desert to the freezing waters of the Ganges without they themselves know of it, quite jarring, quite pandering; such a sudden and subtle transitioning from the hot to cold, from the scorching thorns of cacti to the soothing beds of scums.

I hate you.' I scrambled to fold myself back up into my blanket cocoon. 'See, that's the problem. You don't hate me.' I had no response to that. 'You know what I think?' 'No. And I don't want to know.' He ignored that. 'You like me.' My brows knitted together as I stared out over the small clearing. 'Enough to be wildly inappropriate with me.' A pause. 'On multiple occasions.' 'Good gods, I'd rather freeze to death at this point.' 'Oh, right. We're pretending none of that happened. I keep forgetting.' 'Just because I don't bring it up every five minutes doesn't mean I'm pretending it didn't happen.' 'But bringing it up every five minutes is so much fun.

Damn it, Jacob, I’m freezing my butt off.” “I came as fast as I could, considering I thought it would be wise to walk the last few yards.” Isabella whirled around, her smiling face lighting up the silvery night with more ease than the fullest of moons. She leapt up into his embrace, eagerly drinking in his body heat and affection. “I can see it now. ‘Daddy, tell me about your wedding day.’ ‘Well, son,’” she mocked, deepening her voice to his timbre and reflecting his accent uncannily, “’The first words out of your mother’s mouth were I’m freezing my butt off!’” “Very romantic, don’t you think?” he teased. “So, you think it will be a boy, then? Our first child?” “Well, I’m fifty percent sure.” “Wise odds. Come, little flower, I intend to marry you before the hour is up.” With that, he scooped her off her feet and carried her high against his chest. “Unfortunately, we are going to have to do this hike the hard way.” “As Legna tells it, that’s what you’re supposed to do.” “Yeah, well, I assure you a great many grooms have fudged that a little.” He reached to tuck her chilled face into the warm crook of his neck. “Surely the guests would know. It takes longer to walk than it does to fly . . . or whatever . . . out of the woods.” “This is true, little flower. But passing time in the solitude of the woods is not necessarily a difficult task for a man and woman about to be married.” “Jacob!” she gasped, laughing. “Some traditions are not necessarily publicized,” he teased. “You people are outrageous.” “Mmm, and if I had the ability to turn to dust right now, would you tell me no if I asked to . . . pass time with you?” Isabella shivered, but it was the warmth of his whisper and intent, not the cold, that made her do so. “Have I ever said no to you?” “No, but now would be a good time to start, or we will be late to our own wedding,” he chuckled. “How about no . . . for now?” she asked silkily, pressing her lips to the column on his neck beneath his long, loose hair. His fingers flexed on her flesh, his arms drawing her tighter to himself. He tried to concentrate on where he was putting his feet. “If that is going to be your response, Bella, then I suggest you stop teasing me with that wicked little mouth of yours before I trip and land us both in the dirt.” “Okay,” she agreed, her tongue touching his pulse. “Bella . . .” “Jacob, I want to spend the entire night making love to you,” she murmured. Jacob stopped in his tracks, taking a moment to catch his breath. “Okay, why is it I always thought it was the groom who was supposed to be having lewd thoughts about the wedding night while the bride took the ceremony more seriously?” “You started it,” she reminded him, laughing softly. “I am begging you, Isabella, to allow me to leave these woods with a little of my dignity intact.” He sighed deeply, turning his head to brush his face over her hair. “It does not take much effort from you to turn me inside out and rouse my hunger for you. If there is much more of your wanton taunting, you will be flushed warm and rosy by the time we reach that altar, and our guests will not have to be Mind Demons in order to figure out why.” “I’m sorry, you’re right.” She turned her face away from his neck. Jacob resumed his ritual walk for all of thirty seconds before he stopped again. “Bella . . .” he warned dangerously. “I’m sorry! It just popped into my head!” “What am I getting myself into?” he asked aloud, sighing dramatically as he resumed his pace. “Well, in about an hour, I hope it will be me.

A great liberal betrayal is afoot. Unfortunately, many “fellow-travelers” of Islamism are on the liberal side of this debate. I call them “regressive leftists”; they are in fact reverse racists. They have a poverty of expectation for minority groups, believing them to be homogenous and inherently opposed to human rights values. They are culturally reductive in how they see “Eastern”—and in my case, Islamic—culture, and they are culturally deterministic in attempting to freeze their ideal of it in order to satisfy their orientalist fetish. While they rightly question every aspect of their “own” Western culture in the name of progress, they censure liberal Muslims who attempt to do so within Islam, and they choose to side instead with every regressive reactionary in the name of “cultural authenticity” and anticolonialism. They claim that their reason for refusing to criticize any policy, foreign or domestic—other than those of what they consider “their own” government—is that they are not responsible for other governments’ actions. However, they leap whenever any (not merely their own) liberal democratic government commits a policy error, while generally ignoring almost every fascist, theocratic, or Muslim-led dictatorial regime and group in the world. It is as if their brains cannot hold two thoughts at the same time. Besides, since when has such isolationism been a trait of liberal internationalists? It is a right-wing trait. They hold what they think of as “native” communities—and I use that word deliberately—to lesser standards than the ones they claim apply to all “their” people, who happen to be mainly white, and that’s why I call it reverse racism. In holding “native” communities to lesser—or more culturally “authentic”—standards, they automatically disempower those communities. They stifle their ambitions. They cut them out of the system entirely, because there’s no aspiration left. These communities end up in self-segregated “Muslim areas” where the only thing their members aspire to is being tin-pot community leaders, like ghetto chieftains. The “fellow-travelers” fetishize these “Muslim” ghettos in the name of “cultural authenticity” and identity politics, and the ghetto chieftains are often the leading errand boys for them. Identity politics and the pseudo-liberal search for cultural authenticity result in nothing but a downward spiral of competing medieval religious or cultural assertions, fights over who are the “real” Muslims, ever increasing misogyny, homophobia, sectarianism, and extremism. This is not liberal. Among the left, this is a remnant of the socialist approach that prioritizes group identity over individual autonomy. Among the right, it is ironically a throwback from the British colonial “divide and rule” approach. Classical liberalism focuses on individual autonomy. I refer here to liberalism as it is understood in the philosophical sense, not as it’s understood in the United States to refer to the Democratic Party—that’s a party-political usage. The great liberal betrayal of this generation is that in the name of liberalism, communal rights have been prioritized over individual autonomy within minority groups. And minorities within minorities really do suffer because of this betrayal. The people I really worry about when we have this conversation are feminist Muslims, gay Muslims, ex-Muslims—all the vulnerable and bullied individuals who are not just stigmatized but in many cases violently assaulted or killed merely for being against the norm.

The same mass media that told us Lee Harvey Oswald killed John F. Kennedy—and that James Earl Ray killed Martin Luther King, Sirhan Sirhan killed Robert F. Kennedy, Arthur Bremer was the lone gunman when George Wallace was shot, and Ted Kennedy was responsible for the death of Mary Jo Kopechne—brainwash this society every single day. The creation of the SLA is only one more propaganda lie. We can’t discuss Patty’s brainwashing without looking at our own. Our sensitivities and emotions were tested over the same period of time as Patty Hearst’s and Donald DeFreeze’s. Patty was taken to a building near the death trap on 54th Street to witness six of her close associates and intimates for the last four months shot and burned to death. We watched the event in living color over Friday’s TV Dinner. All of us took part. The only ones to gain from the maneuvers of the SLA were the military and police agencies. They have already spent between $5 and $10 million “pursuing” the SLA. Ten thousand young adults were stopped, searched or arrested within a three-week period. SWAT police teams are now located in every major city. Police helicopter contracts are escalating. Computerized police information systems will increase. And the CIA will openly take over local police departments, no longer hide behind public relations doors. The creation of the fictitious Symbionese Liberation Army was a cruel hoax perpetrated on the American public.

Mom?” Then again, louder. “Mom?” She turned around so quickly, she knocked the pan off the stove and nearly dropped the gray paper into the open flame there. I saw her reach back and slap her hand against the knobs, twisting a dial until the smell of gas disappeared. “I don’t feel good. Can I stay home today?” No response, not even a blink. Her jaw was working, grinding, but it took me walking over to the table and sitting down for her to find her voice. “How—how did you get in here?” “I have a bad headache and my stomach hurts,” I told her, putting my elbows up on the table. I knew she hated when I whined, but I didn’t think she hated it enough to come over and grab me by the arm again. “I asked you how you got in here, young lady. What’s your name?” Her voice sounded strange. “Where do you live?” Her grip on my skin only tightened the longer I waited to answer. It had to have been a joke, right? Was she sick, too? Sometimes cold medicine did funny things to her. Funny things, though. Not scary things. “Can you tell me your name?” she repeated. “Ouch!” I yelped, trying to pull my arm away. “Mom, what’s wrong?” She yanked me up from the table, forcing me onto my feet. “Where are your parents? How did you get in this house?” Something tightened in my chest to the point of snapping. “Mom, Mommy, why—” “Stop it,” she hissed, “stop calling me that!” “What are you—?” I think I must have tried to say something else, but she dragged me over to the door that led out into the garage. My feet slid against the wood, skin burning. “Wh-what’s wrong with you?” I cried. I tried twisting out of her grasp, but she wouldn’t even look at me. Not until we were at the door to the garage and she pushed my back up against it. “We can do this the easy way or the hard way. I know you’re confused, but I promise that I’m not your mother. I don’t know how you got into this house, and, frankly, I’m not sure I want to know—” “I live here!” I told her. “I live here! I’m Ruby!” When she looked at me again, I saw none of the things that made Mom my mother. The lines that formed around her eyes when she smiled were smoothed out, and her jaw was clenched around whatever she wanted to say next. When she looked at me, she didn’t see me. I wasn’t invisible, but I wasn’t Ruby. “Mom.” I started to cry. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to be bad. I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry! Please, I promise I’ll be good—I’ll go to school today and won’t be sick, and I’ll pick up my room. I’m sorry. Please remember. Please!” She put one hand on my shoulder and the other on the door handle. “My husband is a police officer. He’ll be able to help you get home. Wait in here—and don’t touch anything.” The door opened and I was pushed into a wall of freezing January air. I stumbled down onto the dirty, oil-stained concrete, just managing to catch myself before I slammed into the side of her car. I heard the door shut behind me, and the lock click into place; heard her call Dad’s name as clearly as I heard the birds in the bushes outside the dark garage. She hadn’t even turned on the light for me. I pushed myself up onto my hands and knees, ignoring the bite of the frosty air on my bare skin. I launched myself in the direction of the door, fumbling around until I found it. I tried shaking the handle, jiggling it, still thinking, hoping, praying that this was some big birthday surprise, and that by the time I got back inside, there would be a plate of pancakes at the table and Dad would bring in the presents, and we could—we could—we could pretend like the night before had never happened, even with the evidence in the next room over. The door was locked. “I’m sorry!” I was screaming. Pounding my fists against it. “Mommy, I’m sorry! Please!” Dad appeared a moment later, his stocky shape outlined by the light from inside of the house. I saw Mom’s bright-red face over his shoulder; he turned to wave her off and then reached over to flip on the overhead lights.

The kail grows brittle from the cold in my dank and cheerless garden. A crust of bread gathers timid pheasants around me. The robins, I see, have made the coalhouse their home. Walter Lunny's dog never barks without rousing my sluggish cat to a joyful response. It is Dutch courage with the birds and beasts of the glen, hard driven for food; but I look attentively for them in these long forenoons, and they have begun to regard me as one of themselves. My breath freezes despite my pipe, as I peer from the door; and with a fortnight-old newspaper I retire to the ingle-nook. The friendliest thing I have seen today is the well-smoked ham suspended from my kitchen rafters. It was a gift from the farm of Tullin, with a load of peats, the day before the snow began to fall. I doubt if I have seen a cart since.

Paralysis, rage and disembodiment, three main elements of the Medusa story, are classic symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). According to trauma healing expert Bessel van der Kolk, numbing, freezing, and immobilization are common responses to trauma, particularly sexual trauma. As well as causing a sense of being emotionally shut down, long-term trauma held in the body can result in ‘stiff,’ ‘rigid,’ or ‘stilted’ movement, posture, and expression, resembling paralysis. Trauma can also erode key social skills of self-control and self-regulation, causing the uncontrollable rage characteristic of PTSD. The brutal separation of head from body, a third element of Medusa’s story, may reflect the dissociation, fragmentation, and disconnection from the body also typical of the post-traumatic state.

At Columbia, Obama wrote an article in a student weekly, Sundial, calling for an end to the U.S. military industrial complex. Obama’s article was a response to the so-called nuclear freeze movement that was sweeping American campuses at the time. As an undergraduate at Dartmouth in the early 1980s, I remember well the paranoia of the freeze activists, who seemed convinced that the world was about to end unless their nuclear freeze solution was immediately implemented. Calling as it did for a reciprocal freeze in U.S. and Soviet nuclear arsenals, the freeze was a liberal cause, but apparently not liberal enough for Obama. For him the issue came down to the big, bad military industrial complex and its irrational, insatiable desire for more costly weapons. “Generally the narrow focus of the freeze movement as well as academic discussions of first versus second strike capabilities suit the military-industrial interests, as they continue adding to their billion dollar erector sets.”21

Well, now, if we’d known we were going to have such…ah…gra…that is, illustrious company, we’d have-“ “Swept off the chairs?” Lucinda suggested acidly. “Shoveled off the floor?” “Lucinda!” Elizabeth whispered desperately. “They didn’t know we were coming.” “No respectable person would dwell in such a place even for a night,” she snapped, and Elizabeth watched in mingled distress and admiration as the redoubtable woman turned around and directed her attack on their unwilling host. “The responsibility for our being here is yours, whether it was a mistake or not! I shall expect you to rout your servants from their hiding places and have them bring clean linens up to us at once. I shall also expect them to have this squalor remedied by morning! It is obvious from your behavior that you are no gentleman; however, we are ladies, and we shall expect to be treated as such.” From the corner of her eye Elizabeth had been watching Ian Thornton, who was listening to all of this, his jaw rigid, a muscle beginning to twitch dangerously in the side of his neck. Lucinda, however, was either unaware of or unconcerned with his reaction, for, as she picked up her skirts and turned toward the stairs, she turned on Jake. “You may show us to our chambers. We wish to retire.” “Retire!” cried Jake, thunderstruck. “But-but what about supper?” he sputtered. “You may bring it up to us.” Elizabeth saw the blank look on Jake’s face, and she endeavored to translate, politely, what the irate woman was saying to the startled red-haired man. “What Miss Throckmorton-Jones means is that we’re rather exhausted from our trip and not very good company, sir, and so we prefer to dine in our rooms.” “You will dine,” Ian Thornton said in an awful voice that made Elizabeth freeze, “on what you cook for yourself, madam. If you want clean linens, you’ll get them yourself from the cabinet. If you want clean rooms, clean them! Am I making myself clear?” “Perfectly!” Elizabeth began furiously, but Lucinda interrupted in a voice shaking with ire: “Are you suggesting, sirrah, that we are to do the work of servants?” Ian’s experience with the ton and with Elizabeth had given him a lively contempt for ambitious, shallow, self-indulgent young women whose single goal in life was to acquire as many gowns and jewels as possible with the least amount of effort, and he aimed his attack at Elizabeth. “I am suggesting that you look after yourself for the first time in your silly, aimless life. In return for that, I am willing to give you a roof over your head and to share our food with you until I can get you to the village. If that is too overwhelming a task for you, then my original invitation still stands: There’s the door. Use it!” Elizabeth knew the man was irrational, and it wasn’t worth riling herself to reply to him, so she turned instead to Lucinda. “Lucinda,” she said with weary resignation, “do not upset yourself by trying to make Mr. Thornton understand that his mistake has inconvenienced us, not the other way around. You will only waste your time. A gentleman of breeding would be perfectly able to understand that he should be apologizing instead of ranting and raving. However, as I told you before we came here, Mr. Thornton is no gentleman. The simple fact is that he enjoys humiliating people, and he will continue trying to humiliate us for as long as we stand here.” Elizabeth cast a look of well-bred disdain over Ian and said, “Good night, Mr. Thornton.” Turning, she softened her voice a little and said, “Good evening, Mr. Wiley.

N.E.W.T. Level Questions 281-300: What house at Hogwarts did Moaning Myrtle belong to? Which dragon did Viktor Krum face in the first task of the Tri-Wizard tournament? Luna Lovegood believes in the existence of which invisible creatures that fly in through someone’s ears and cause temporary confusion? What are the names of the three Peverell brothers from the tale of the Deathly Hallows? Name the Hogwarts school motto and its meaning in English? Who is Arnold? What’s the address of Weasley’s Wizarding Wheezes? During Quidditch try-outs, who did Ron beat to become Gryffindor’s keeper? Who was the owner of the flying motorbike that Hagrid borrows to bring baby Harry to his aunt and uncle’s house? During the intense encounter with the troll in the female bathroom, what spell did Ron use to save Hermione? Which wizard, who is the head of the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures at the Ministry of Magic lost his son in 1995? When Harry, Ron and Hermione apparate away from Bill and Fleur’s wedding, where do they end up? Name the spell that freezes or petrifies the body of the victim? What piece did Hermione replace in the game of Giant Chess? What bridge did Fenrir Greyback and a small group of Death Eaters destroy in London? Who replaced Minerva McGonagall as the new Deputy Headmistress, and became the new Muggle Studies teacher at Hogwarts? Where do Bill and Fleur Weasley live? What epitaph did Harry carve onto Dobby’s grave using Malfoy’s old wand? The opal neckless is a cursed Dark Object, supposedly it has taken the lives of nineteen different muggles. But who did it curse instead after a failed attempt by Malfoy to assassinate Dumbledore? Who sends Harry his letter of expulsion from Hogwarts for violating the law by performing magic in front of a muggle? FIND THE ANSWERS ON THE NEXT PAGE! N.E.W.T. Level Answers 281-300 Ravenclaw. Myrtle attended Hogwarts from 1940-1943. Chinese Firebolt. Wrackspurts. Antioch, Cadmus and Ignotus. “Draco dormiens nunquam titillandus” and “Never tickle a sleeping dragon.” Arnold was Ginny’s purple Pygmy Puff, or tiny Puffskein, bred by Fred and George. Number 93, Diagon Alley. Cormac McLaggen. Sirius Black. “Wingardium Leviosa”. Amos Diggory. Tottenham Court Road in London. “Petrificus Totalus”. Rook on R8. The Millenium Bridge. Alecto Carrow. Shell Cottage, Tinworth, Cornwall. “HERE LIES DOBBY, A FREE ELF.” Katie Bell. Malfalda Hopkirk, the witch responsible for the Improper use of Magic Office.

We get up from the table to work our way through the crowd, but before I leave, I lean down, whispering in Hunter’s ear, “Even though it might be difficult, please, try not to miss me too much.” But I don’t wait for a response. Instead, I shoot him a flirty smile, pulling away as I spin around. But before I’m able to move two feet, he grabs my arm, yanking me down into his lap. With my face only inches from his, he parts his lips and leans in. Every ounce of my body tingles with anticipation of the kiss I’ve imagined a thousand times. He’s so close I can feel his warm, minty breath on my face. His nose grazes the tip of mine, but then he stops. My heart freezes. “Stay out of trouble over there,” he says. But before I know what’s happening, he has me off his warm lap and back on my feet. I stand there for a few seconds eyeing him, wondering what in the hell just happened. Was he just teasing me? Um, okay. Well, if that’s how he wants to be—two can most definitely play this game. I look him straight in the eyes. “Well maybe I’d like some trouble.” Then I paint on a mischievous smile and saunter away. I feel his eyes searing a hole through the back of my head. Vindication is oh so sweet. Yes! I smile to myself. Hunter Payne might be older and more experienced—but he has no clue who he’s dealing with. Ha. And neither do I apparently. Since when did I grow a set of balls?

Jesus, Our Strength “Comfort, comfort my people! says your God. But those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength; they will fly up on wings like eagles; they will run and not be tired; they will walk and not be weary.” (Isaiah 40:1, 31, CEB) Most of us default to the first instinct of calling on the Lord when things don’t seem to be going our way. We plead for strength in our weakness, healing in our sickness, life in our death. Truthfully, though, these responses are a result of our lack of knowledge about who we are. Jesus truly became your strength and faced every challenge you would. He opened his arms to hold you tight during your despair and covered you with his massive wings when you were cold. In the physical realm we live in, we face trouble and evil, people starving, freezing to death, and much more. All of these exist because humanity has been taught incorrectly, and those who perpetrate evil are operating from a lack of knowledge about who we are in the created works of God. When we realize who we are, we produce good fruit. When we are in our ignorant state of mind, we produce rot. With this said, when you are in Jesus, he becomes your strength. You actually become supermen and superwomen because he exchanged his strength for your weakness. Jesus is your strength in times of weakness. He is even your strength in times of strength. He is your all in all.

Also bearing witness to the unbearable nature of the vulnerability experienced by peer-oriented kids is the preponderance of vulnerability-quelling drugs. Peer-oriented kids will do anything to avoid the human feelings of aloneness, suffering, and pain, and to escape feeling hurt, exposed, alarmed, insecure, inadequate, or self-conscious. The older and more peer-oriented the kids, the more drugs seem to be an inherent part of their lifestyle. Peer orientation creates an appetite for anything that would reduce vulnerability. Drugs are emotional painkillers. And, in another way, they help young people escape from the benumbed state imposed by their defensive emotional detachment. With the shutdown of emotions come boredom and alienation. Drugs provide an artificial stimulation to the emotionally jaded. They heighten sensation and provide a false sense of engagement without incurring the risks of genuine openness. In fact, the same drug can play seemingly opposite functions in an individual. Alcohol and marijuana, for example, can numb or, on the other hand, free the brain and mind from social inhibitions. Other drugs are stimulants — cocaine, amphetamines, and ecstasy; the very name of the latter speaks volumes about exactly what is missing in the psychic life of our emotionally incapacitated young people. The psychological function served by these drugs is often overlooked by well-meaning adults who perceive the problem to be coming from outside the individual, through peer pressure and youth culture mores. It is not just a matter of getting our children to say no. The problem lies much deeper. As long as we do not confront and reverse peer orientation among our children, we are creating an insatiable appetite for these drugs. The affinity for vulnerability-reducing drugs originates from deep within the defended soul. Our children's emotional safety can come only from us: then they will not be driven to escape their feelings and to rely on the anesthetic effects of drugs. Their need to feel alive and excited can and should arise from within themselves, from their own innately limitless capacity to be engaged with the universe. This brings us back to the essential hierarchical nature of attachment. The more the child needs attachment to function, the more important it is that she attaches to those responsible for her. Only then can the vulnerability that is inherent in emotional attachment be endured. Children don't need friends, they need parents, grandparents, adults who will assume the responsibility to hold on to them. The more children are attached to caring adults, the more they are able to interact with peers without being overwhelmed by the vulnerability involved. The less peers matter, the more the vulnerability of peer relationships can be endured. It is exactly those children who don't need friends who are more capable of having friends without losing their ability to feel deeply and vulnerably. But why should we want our children to remain open to their own vulnerability? What is amiss when detachment freezes the emotions in order to protect the child?

Sociological Explanations Sociologists theorize that people can live together in peace because of the development of a social hierarchy that ranges from dominant to submissive. Everyone in a group takes his or her place in the hierarchy. A certain degree of anxiety around others allows people to assess the level of threat that they pose, and helps maintain the balance between aggression and inhibition. However, people with social anxiety tend to misinterpret others’ behavior as more aggressive or powerful than it really is. As a result, a socially anxious person often will become overly submissive--blushing, not making eye contact, freezing, or withdrawing. Sociologists believe this response may be the result of a fundamental fear of rejection. In monkeys, apes, and humans, being left to fend for oneself usually is a threat to survival. In social anxiety, people may see being judged as a threat to their position in the group. To them, rejection means failure. Kyoto went through her day at school constantly apologizing to everyone. Whenever she walked down the hall, opened her locker, sat down in an empty seat, or got in line in the cafeteria, she always said “Excuse me” or “I’m sorry.” Most of the time, she didn’t know why she was apologizing. She always wanted to please others. Kyoto’s mother took her to see a psychologist because of Kyoto’s anxiety. The psychologist helped Kyoto see that she misinterpreted others’ behavior as being more aggressive than it was. Her constant need to apologize was meant to tell others “I’m not a threat.” Now, before she apologizes, Kyoto asks herself if it is really necessary. Usually, she finds that other people aren’t angry at all.

Can a reasonable man ever truly question the nobility of the heat engine he calls his body? What option does he have but to heap praise on his form, to self-adore, to admire, and to hold it up as the greatest statement of beauty in a beautiful garden? What, though, is to be admired in such a frighteningly fragile machine; a perilously needy contraption laced with kilometres of liquid and electrical conduits prone to leaks, rot, clogs, and short-circuits? What is there to be proud of in a machine that has an eight hour battery life and is predetermined to spend half its existence in a defenceless, catatonic coma? What is to be revered in a mechanism let loose in a sealed off room where almost everything—including its single source of light and warmth—makes it sick, but whose immune system functions by late entry crisis-response imitation? Where is the awe in a contrivance that freezes and dies if placed a little over here, or overheats and dies if placed a little over there? Where is the wonder in an instrument that is crushed to a pulp if dropped a little down there, or boiled away to nothing if lifted a little up there? Where is the marvel in an appliance where three-quarters of the planet’s surface will drown it, and three-quarters of the atmosphere will asphyxiate it? What is there to be cherished in a machine born innately greedy and so utterly useless that it has to wait three years for its neural networks to hook-up and come online before it even begins to get a hint of who or even what it is, and only then can it start to relearn absolutely everything its forebears had already bothered to learn? Where is the artistry in a thinking engine whose sweetest fuel can only be embezzled from other thinking engines?

Obviously, the first place I go is Sanctuary. The omegas scatter like flies as I stalk through the doors, pausing to inspect the fact one is hanging precariously to the side. Bobo rounds the corner with a toolbox, smiling over at me before, he bows at the waist. “What happened here?” I ask when he straightens from the weird bow. He shrugs, and I remember he’s fucking mute. Right. Guess I’ll get answers elsewhere. Leiza freezes when she rounds the corner and spots me. “What happened to the front door?” I ask her. She turns and darts inside a wall. Bloody hell. I’m not wearing an angry expression, am I? I check the mirror, finding no major scare factor. I’m fucking devilishly good looking and my smile is positively charming. Usually she’s less skittish around me. At least in recent days. Shera is coming down the stairs, but she oddly pales when she sees me. What happened to front door?” I ask her. I’ve never seen my beta run so fast. “I’ll let Violet tell you about it,” she calls over her shoulder. “Gotta run, Boss.” Again, I check the mirror. Good hair. Perfect teeth. Excellent outfit. Not a fucking clue what’s going on. Typically, I enjoy instilling that sort of terror, but I’m still in trouble with Violet, and she doesn’t like her Sanctuary members feeling scared in their own home. I work harder on giving a wider smile and aim for looking like a nice vampire alpha. Literally, everyone scatters and disappears, aside from Bobo, who starts hammering away on the door, trembling just a little after jerking his gaze away from me. My smile falls. “You’re all scared little insects,” I call out very loudly, feeling mildly insulted. I think a cricket chirps, and it’s the only sound I get in response. Rolling my eyes, I head up the stairs to Violet’s room.

When we have poor vagal tone, we have higher sensitivity to perceived threats in our environment, which overactivates the body’s stress response and leads to reduced emotional and attentional regulation overall. Those of you who experience the discomfort of social anxiety might recognize this disconnect. Imagine walking into a party filled with strangers. You might have obsessed over what to wear to the party, planning every detail, every possible conversation topic, or you may have felt totally neutral about the party—no warning signs that you might feel uncomfortable and act accordingly. Either way, none of it matters once you actually walk into the room. Suddenly, all eyes are on you. Your face grows hot and red when you hear laughter, which you’re certain is about your outfit or your hair. Someone brushes past you, and you feel claustrophobic. All the strangers seem to be leering. Even if you know rationally that this is not a hostile place, that no one is looking at or judging you (and if they are, who cares?), it’s nearly impossible to shake the feeling once you’re trapped in it. That’s because your subconscious perceives a threat (using your nervous system’s sixth sense of neuroception) in a nonthreatening environment (the party) and has activated your body, putting you into a state of fight (argue with anyone and everyone), flight (leave the party), or freeze (don’t say a word). The social world has become a space filled with threat. Unfortunately, this kind of nervous system dysregulation is self-confirming. While it is activated, anything that doesn’t confirm your suspicions (a friendly face) will be ignored by your neuroception in favor of things that do (the stray laugh you felt was directed at you). Social cues that would be seen as friendly when you were in social engagement mode—such as a pause in the conversation for you to enter, eye contact, a smile—will be either misinterpreted or ignored.

Rape has been described by victim advocate and former police officer Tom Tremblay as “the most violent crime a person can survive.”10 Those who have not been sexually assaulted can perhaps most clearly understand the experience of a survivor by thinking of them as having survived an attempted murder that used sex as the weapon. Sexual violence often doesn’t look like what we think of as “violence”—only rarely is there a gun or knife; often there isn’t even “aggression” as we typically think of it. There is coercion and the removal of the targeted person’s choice about what will happen next. Survivors don’t “fight” because the threat is too immediate and inescapable; their bodies choose “freeze” because it’s the stress response that maximizes the chances of staying alive . . . or of dying without pain. Trauma isn’t always caused by one specific incident. It can also emerge in response to persistent distress or ongoing abuse, like a relationship where sex is unwanted, though it may be technically “consensual” because the targeted person says yes in order to avoid being hurt or feels trapped in the relationship or is otherwise coerced. In that context, a survivor’s body gradually learns that it can’t escape and it can’t fight; freeze becomes the default stress response because of the learned pattern of shutdown as the best way to guarantee survival. Each person’s experience of survival is unique, but it often includes a kind of disengaged unreality. And afterward, that illusion of unreality gradually degrades, disintegrating under the weight of physical existence and burdened memory. The tentative recognition that this thing has actually happened incrementally unlocks the panic and rage that couldn’t find their way to the surface before, buried as they were under the overmastering mandate to survive. But survival is not recovery; survival happens automatically, sometimes even against the survivor’s will. Recovery requires an environment of relative security and the ability to separate the physiology of freeze from the experience of fear, so that the panic and the rage can discharge, completing their cycles at last.

My father only saw six months of combat before being taken prisoner. How did they capture him? They were advancing over a frozen lake while the enemy’s artillery shot at the ice. Few made it across, and those who did had just spent their last strength swimming through freezing water; all of them lost their weapons along the way. They came to the shore half-naked. The Finns would stretch out their arms to rescue them and some people would take their hands, while others…many of them wouldn’t accept any help from the enemy. That was how they had been trained. My father grabbed one of their hands, and he was dragged out of the water. I remember his amazement: “They gave me schnapps to warm me up. Put me in dry clothes. They laughed and clapped me on the shoulder, ‘You made it, Ivan!’ ” My father had never been face to face with the enemy before. He didn’t understand why they were so cheerful… The Finnish campaign ended in 1940…Soviet war prisoners were exchanged for Finns. They were marched toward each other in columns. On their side, the Finns were greeted with hugs and handshakes…Our men, on the other hand, were immediately treated like enemies. “Brothers! Friends!” they threw themselves on their comrades. “Halt! Another step and we’ll shoot!” The column was surrounded by soldiers with German Shepherds. They were led to specially prepared barracks surrounded by barbed wire. The interrogations began…“How were you taken prisoner?” the interrogator asked my father. “The Finns pulled me out of a lake.” “You traitor! You were saving your own skin instead of the Motherland.” My father also considered himself guilty. That’s how they’d been trained…There was no trial. They marched everyone out on the quad and read the entire division their sentence: six years in the camps for betraying the Motherland. Then they shipped them off to Vorkuta to build a railway over the permafrost. My God! It was 1941…The Germans were moving in on Moscow…No one even told them that war had broken out—after all, they were enemies, it would only make them happy. Belarus was occupied by the Nazis. They took Smolensk. When they finally heard about it, all of them wanted to go to the front, they all wrote letters to the head of the camp…to Stalin…And in response, they were told, “Work for the victory on the home front, you bastards. We don’t need traitors like you at the front.” They all…Papa…he told me…All of them wept

It was discussed and decided that fear would be perpetuated globally in order that focus would stay on the negative rather than allow for soul expression to positively emerge. As people became more fearful and compliant, capacity for free thought and soul expression would diminish. There is a distinct inability to exert soul expression under mind control, and evolution of the human spirit would diminish along with freedom of thought when bombarded with constant negative terrors. Whether Bush and Cheney deliberately planned to raise a collective fear over collective conscious love is doubtful. They did not think, speak, or act in those terms. Instead, they knew that information control gave them power over people, and they were hell-bent to perpetuate it at all costs. Cheney, Bush, and other global elite ushering in the New World Order totally believed in the plan mapped out by artificial intelligence. They were allowing technology to dictate global control. “Life is like a video game,” Bush once told me at the rural multi-million dollar Lampe, Missouri CIA mind control training camp complex designed for Black Ops Special Forces where torture and virtual reality technologies were used. “Since I have access to the technological source of the plans, I dictate the rules of the game.” The rules of the game demanded instantaneous response with no time to consciously think and critically analyze. Constant conscious disruption of thought through television’s burst of light flashes, harmonics, and subconscious subliminals diminished continuity of conscious thought anyway, creating a deficit of attention that could easily be refocused into video game format. DARPA’s artificial intelligence was reliant on secrecy, and a terrifying cover for reality was chosen to divert people from the simple truth. Since people perceive aliens as being physical like them, it was decided that the technological reality could be disguised according to preconceptions. Through generations of genetic encoding dating back to the beginning of man, serpents incite an innate autogenic response system in humans to “freeze” in terror. George Bush was excited at the prospects of diverting people from truth by fear through perpetuating lizard-like serpent alien misconceptions. “People fear what they don’t know anyway. By compounding that fear with autogenic fear response, they won’t want to look into Pandora’s Box.” Through deliberate generation of fear; suppression of facts under the 1947 National Security Act; Bush’s stint as CIA director during Ford’s Administration; the Warren Commission’s whitewash of the Kennedy Assassination; secrecy artificially ensured by mind control particularly concerning DARPA, HAARP, Roswell, Montauk, etc; and with people’s fluidity of conscious thought rapidly diminishing; the secret government embraced the proverbial ‘absolute power that corrupts absolutely.’ According to New World Order plans being discussed at the Grove, plans for reducing the earth’s population was a high priority. Mass genocide of so-called “undesirables” through the proliferation of AIDS4 was high on Bush’s agenda. “We’ll annihilate the niggers at their source, beginning in South and East Africa and Haiti5.” Having heard Bush say those words is by far one of the most torturous things I ever endured. Equally as torturous to my being were the discussions on genetic engineering, human cloning, and depletion of earth’s natural resources for profit. Cheney remarked that no one would be able to think to stop technology’s plan. “I’ll destroy the planet first,” Bush had vowed.

It is objectively destructive to fetishize the past, to dismantle social safety nets, to deny the existence of structural inequalities and leave the most vulnerable to face impossible odds without succor. It is a fundamental betrayal of everything a society is for. There is no cool version of conservatism, no ethically responsible version, no rational version ready to reclaim the tiller after Trump leaves office. The word itself betrays an inherent violence: to conserve is to avoid change, to embrace stasis, to freeze frame the now because the now is treating certain people very, very well.

of the fight/flight/freeze stress response system. The sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous systems make up the autonomic nervous system. “Autonomic” means it doesn’t need any direction from us. The sympathetic nervous system sends stress hormones to activate fight or flight, like turning the dimmer switch all the way to “on.” The fight-or-flight responses are meant to occur quickly and strongly to meet immediate danger. Unlike the sympathetic nervous system, the parasympathetic nervous system slows things down. It turns the dimmer switch to “off” to activate the freeze part of the stress response (Porges 2011). It is also responsible for the rest/repair/restore functions that help to return your body, heart, and mind to balance once the threat is gone. The sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous systems usually work well together. But with post-traumatic stress, fight/flight/

Richard Davidson who is a neuroscientist at the University of Wisconsin has expertise in the brain and emotion, and he’s found in his research that when we’re agitated, when we are upset and angry and anxious, there’s a lot of activity in the right prefrontal area, just behind the forehead, also the amygdala, the brain’s trigger point for the fight-flight-freeze response, when we’re on the other hand in a really positive state, I feel great, enthusiastic, what a wonderful day, there’s a lot of activity on the left side and no activity on the right side, each of us have a ratio at rest of right-to-left activity that predicts our mood range day to day. He finds there’s a bell curve for this like for IQ, most of us are in the middle, we have bad days, we have good days, if you’re very far to the right you may be clinically depressed or clinically anxious, if you’re very far to the left, you’re very resilient, you bounce right back from setbacks. So Davidson paired up with a fella named Jon Kabat-Zinn who has made mindfulness, as he calls it, very popular, for example, in the medical sector, as a way to manage chronic conditions, and also in the states of business recently, a lot of businesses are bringing it in, and it’s more or less what we just did. Davidson and Kabat-Zinn went to a biotech start-up, a 24/7 you know high pressure environment and they taught people how to do mindfulness which is more or less the exercise of watching the breath, but they did it 30 minutes a day, for 8 weeks. What he found was that before that people’s brains were tilted to the right, they’re pretty hassled and stressed, after eight weeks, 30 minutes a day, they were tilting back towards the left and what’s very interesting is people spontaneously started saying: “Hey, you know, I’m starting to enjoy my work again, I remember what I love about this job”. In other words the positive mood was really making a difference.

Scientists have studied this phenomenon, proving that naming a negative emotion zaps some of its strength. Psychiatrist and proponent of mindfulness Dan Siegel3 explains naming your emotions as the “upstairs” brain (where you do your rational thinking and planning) dousing your “downstairs” brain (where those primal fight, flight, or freeze feelings reside) with feel-good chemicals that dampen the fight, flight, or freeze response. Simply saying how you feel out loud helps to take some of the stress away.

Note that when we are very young and can’t flee physically, we flee in our minds, and that’s called the “freeze response.” So if your monster controls more on the inside, and makes you run away or shut down, that can happen when you had a parent who could explode and get real mad without warning. Or maybe they were dominant, inflexible, or narcissistic, and they always got heated or wanted to get their way and be right. This parent was out of control with control. And when you’re real small, fighting back in these situations usually isn’t a smart idea. That might just make the problem worse. So, to avoid getting blowback and the consequences that come with it, the best control strategy was to start walking on eggshells. You kept them and any situation from getting out of hand by shutting up and going with the flow.

A full-body stress reaction would follow: my vagus nerve would activate my nervous system stress response, sending fight/flight/freeze messages to my body. Physiologically, I’d react as though a bear had just jumped on me in the woods, thrashing around to “save” myself from the attack of the dirty dishes.

THE HIPPOCAMPUS: TRACKING THREATS AND MAKING MEMORIES The hippocampus is a seahorse-shaped structure in the center of the limbic system. In my live workshops, the analogy I pick for the hippocampus is that of the military historian. Its most vital job is to compare incoming information with the memory of past threats. If there’s a match, it sounds the alarm by activating the amygdala, which in turn switches on the whole fight-flight-freeze (FFF) system. 3.6. The hippocampus: tracking threats and recording memories. By deciding which signals to pass to the amygdala and which to ignore, the hippocampus regulates our emotions. Some people have an active hippocampus that effectively regulates emotion. Others do not; these unfortunates have a hair-trigger response to their own emotions. They become angry, fearful, or anxious at the slightest stimulus. Their behavior is dictated by their emotions. The hippocampus is also the seat of learning. Novel experiences produce the growth of new synaptic connections in the hippocampus. Go take a class in Mandarin Chinese, learn pickleball, date a new love interest, experiment with recipes from a Hungarian cookbook—your hippocampus will start to grow new connections. But the most essential function of the hippocampus is to catalog the bad stuff of the past, and if anything coming our way in the present resembles that bad stuff, it makes a match and turns on the FFF response.

A freeze response might look like a “good” baby, but it is really a baby learning to give up. She is learning that her needs won’t be met, that human connection can’t be trusted. This painful lesson won’t unfold well as she gains maturity.

But we must be aware of anxiety as well. Anxiety doesn’t come from the fight-flight-freeze response. Anxiety comes from uneasiness with our circumstances or discouragement from our inability to see positive pathways forward in life.

When we are in high-stress situations, large doses of cortisol and adrenaline are released, which activates the ‘fight, flight or freeze’ response. The average person is unable to control this process, but the Navy SEALs are capable of doing so because they have been trained to, and depending on the situation, their responses to stressful situations could mean the difference between life and death. They use several techniques to do this, including box breathing. When a SEAL starts feeling stressed or overwhelmed, they focus on their breath to regain control. They take a series of breaths for four seconds at a time—they breathe in, hold their breath, and then breathe out. This process is repeated until the heart rate returns to normal

it’s an extension of the fight-or-flight response. Fight, flight, freeze, or fawn. When I’m in stress, I—fawn. I try to make people like me. It’s just a reflex, I don’t think about it, but it’s awful. My voice changes, the way I speak changes.

Chicken curry be a adored dish in Indian cuisine, well-known for its rich flavour and aromatic spices. Be it a classic butter chicken and a spicy masala, the inquiry regularly arises: can you freeze it? Well, the response be yes, you can!

Once, unfortunately, in a crisis situation (as the Greek poet Archilochus pointed out so long ago) we don't rise to the level of our expectations, we fall to the level of our training. Once again, the issue is fear. The more fear in the equation, the fewer options at our disposal. In times of strife, the brain limits our choices to speed up our reaction times. The extreme example being, fight or flight, where the situation is so dire, that the brain gives us only potential actions. Freezing is the third, yet the same thing happens to a lesser degree under any high stress conditions. And the responses we fall back upon under duress, are the ones we fully automatized: those habitual patterns we've executed over and over again.

To make good environmental decision, we must stop focusing on trying to remove or undo human influence, on turning back time or freezing the non-human world in amber. We must instead acknowledge the extent to which we have influenced our current world and take some responsibility for its future trajectory…We should not seek to carefully control every plant and animal on the planet. We couldn’t even if we wanted to.

Maybe you are at home, at night. Assume you are alone. It is dark and late. An unexpected noise startles you, and you freeze. That is the first transmutation: unknown noise (a pattern) to frozen position. Then your heart rate rises, in preparation for (unspecified) action.3 That is the second transmutation. You are preparing to move. Next, your imagination populates the darkness with whatever might be making the noise.4 That is the third transmutation, part of a complete and practical sequence: embodied responses (freezing and heart-rate increase) and then imagistic, imaginative representation. The latter is part of exploration, which you might extend by overcoming your terror and the freezing associated with it (assuming nothing else too unexpected happens) and investigating the locale, once a part of your friendly house, from where the noise appeared to emanate. You have now engaged in active exploration—a precursor to direct perception (hopefully nothing too dramatic); then to explicit knowledge of the source; and then back to routine and complacent peace, if the noise proves to be nothing of significance.

Saying No is a way for you to communicate with yourself. It forces you to breathe, which breaks the freeze response. It gathers your energy. It gets your adrenaline going. It reminds you of the [self-defense] class, your muscle memory, the support of the line [your peers], and the fact that you have the right to fight for your own safety.

Interestingly, No can attract more help if you are being attacked than even the word help. So say the trainers at Impact Bay Area, the organization that trains women in self-defense. Shouting “No!” attracts the attention of others naturally and recruits any help that may be available in earshot. Equally important, the trainers say, “saying No is a way for you to communicate with yourself. It forces you to breathe, which breaks the freeze response. It gathers your energy. It gets your adrenaline going. It reminds you of the [self-defense] class, your muscle memory, the support of the line [your peers], and the fact that you have the right to fight for your own safety. Most attackers are looking for easy victims. They’re not looking for a fight, not even a verbal one. Saying No makes you a less attractive target. Submitting and being nice to attackers in the hope that they will be nice to you in return is not the safest strategy.” Saying “No!” helps you gather your energy, reminds you of your right to say No, draws attention, and expresses your power.

perfectionism also seems to be an instinctual defense for emotionally abandoned children. The existential impossibility of perfection saves the child from giving up, unless or until lack of success forces her to retreat into a dissociative freeze response or an anti-social fight response.

Whether you freeze and become paralyzed; you become combative; [you] start kissing ass and trying to prove your way out -- it's all a response to our discomfort. They're all just different strategies to the same thing: I don't have a way to handle discomfort that keeps me in my integrity.

We are too often told that anger is an unhealthy emotion, but when someone or something has stolen your soul and destroyed your life, anger is a natural response. I am not talking about irrational rage, which can be disastrous and lead you down an even darker hole. I am talking about controlled anger, which is a natural source of energy that can wake you the fuck up and help you realize that what you went through wasn’t right. I have cracked open anger several times. It has warmed me when I was freezing, it has turned my fear into bravery, and it has given me fight when I had none. And it can do the same for you. Anger will snap you out of the spell you’re in until you are no longer willing to remain confined in your mental prison. You’ll be scratching and clawing at the walls, looking for cracks where the light leaks in. Your fingernails will be broken, the tips of your fingers bloody and raw, and you will continue to fight to expand those cracks because your anger will be purifying and the human mind loves progress. Keep at it, and eventually, those walls will tumble until you are free, standing in a debris field one more time, with your eyes wide open. That’ll work. Because destruction always breeds creation.

But my fear response is neither fight or flight; it is to freeze and wait for the fear to find me.

I wanted my pain to be gone, now—so I modified my strategy. Each time I would move and get hit by pain, or run and “get hit” with pain, or get up in the morning and be in pain, I would punish my inner self severely by running longer and lifting more weights. I can now see that this punishment I was putting myself through was my way of letting out my frustration and guilt slowly. It was psychologically safer than letting all that repressed energy out at once—for me, and for those around me. I now realize I was discharging a freeze-survival response from my system, finishing a last act of survival, by running from a situation where I previously felt powerless. Running became, metaphorically, running. When we feel helpless we can flee, fight, or freeze to survive the situation. I chose to freeze instead of fighting or fleeing, which is a dangerous thing to do because freezing never allows for the resolution of the trauma—it freezes the trauma in your system, encoding a very dangerous state of existence, disrupting autonomic function. If you don’t fight or flee under trauma, you lock the memory of the event into your system because you never “escaped” the situation in your mind.

Early trauma—fear or separation anxiety—met with a freeze response due to helplessness—disrupts the ANS in a manner that causes it to dramatically malfunction throughout life by over-functioning or under- functioning—if the corrupted memories are never purged, or discharged. Infant separation trauma can lead to over-sensitization, to colitis, skin problems, allergies, mitral valve prolapse, irritable bladder, ulcers, asthma, immune problems, and of course pain.

Then my fear and stress response kicked in, and I experienced what’s called the amygdala hijack.2 My brain was stuck in fight, freeze, or flight mode.

Dad lets out a sigh. “You’re right. I’m sorry. Well, did you ask Billy to explain what’s going on?” “He said it’s not what I think it is. That he would never cheat on me. But he was so cagey and weird, and when I asked him to prove it by showing me the messages on his phone, he looked like a deer in headlights. It was like dating Ezra all over again.” I freeze when my father’s eyes snap to mine. Oh, shit. I slap my hand over my mouth and frantically shake my head. “No. Forget I said that last part.” He braces his arms on the table and looks down. We sit in silence for several minutes. “I wondered if Ezra was Marley’s father. She has his dark hair. And Billy punched him in the face. The better I got to know Billy, the more I realized he wasn’t just a loose cannon, that he must’ve had a good reason for doing that, but I didn’t want to believe the kid I treated like my own son would get you pregnant and then bail on you.” Finally, he looks at me. “I’m assuming you told Ezra the truth?” It’s a sad day when my father wonders whether I told the father of my baby I was pregnant. After how I behaved back then, I guess I deserve that doubt. “Of course.” “And he didn’t want to be involved?” “His response was basically, ‘Fuck no, I don’t want a baby.’” I take a deep breath. “Swear to me you won’t say anything. Because I promised Ezra I wouldn’t tell you the truth if he dropped the charges against Billy.

When something stressful occurs, our bodies are wired to release an entire cocktail of chemicals into our bloodstream to activate the sympathetic nervous system’s fight/flight/freeze/appease defense response. This is meant to be a short-term strategy to keep us alive. Once the event is over, our bodies are supposed to return to a state of parasympathetic nervous system balance, where we can function as usual in a calm and clear-minded way. But bigger traumatic events can activate our natural stress response to such a degree that our nervous system is overwhelmed and dysregulated to the point that this chemical cocktail is unable to be processed and we are left unable to fully recover. This can have a lasting effect on the nervous system, and when left untreated, trauma can interfere with our ability to inhabit our bodies, exhibit mental flexibility, function in everyday ways, learn, grow, love and securely attach.

Experiences of grief over a lost loved one, financial deprivation, loneliness, or military conflict cause the body to go into fight, flight, or freeze mode, the pattern of the nervous system that reflects threat, separation, and disconnection. When the body stays caught in the sense of threat, it triggers a gene pattern with two distinct features: the genes responsible for inflammation increase in activity, while the genes involved in antiviral responses decrease their functioning. In other words, when a body anticipates adversity and isolation, it prepares itself to face bacterial infections, while when it is doing well and feeling connected socially, it prepares to face viruses.

In the real world, when we encounter something that triggers our fight, flight, or freeze response, we don’t go behind a tree and shake it out. We just keep moving, and unlike the bunny, our process never completes. That trauma lives on in us, and then when we encounter something that reminds us of the traumatic event, we get transported right back into it, and experience it exactly as if it were happening in the present—there is absolutely no difference between a body that is running for its life, and a body that thinks it’s still running for its life ten years later; only the environment has changed.

have to. That’s who I… that’s who I’ve always believed myself to be.” “It is who you⁠—” I can’t finish a sentence because he keeps interrupting me. “No, it’s not. I keep… I keep freezing. When it matters. I keep freezing. Instead of acting. A few weeks ago when Maria’s crew was under attack, I froze. When we saw Elizabeth yesterday on the motorcycle, I froze. Even this morning, when we found that asshole with his pants down, I froze yet again. I knew he was a kidnapper and that he was a danger to Elizabeth and to you. But instead of acting when I should have, I froze. You had to kill him instead. That never—never—would have happened last year.” I want to burst out with another denial, but I make myself think about his words, what he’s expressing. I have to process it so I can give his naked confession the response he deserves. Still massaging his lower back, I finally say slowly, “I understand what you’re saying, and I understand why you think it means something is wrong with you. But I honestly don’t believe the reaction time of your trigger finger defines whether you’re a good or bad man. There’s so much more to you than being a protector, Mack.” He’s shaking again, more urgently this time. His eyes are still squeezed shut. “What else is there?” “What else? Are you serious? You’ve got the biggest heart of anyone I’ve ever known. You encourage people. Make them laugh. Make them happy. Make them want to be brave, want to do the right thing. You’ve been like… like a beacon fire, lighting the way for us. And keeping all of us warm. You’ve always taken care of people in so many ways that have nothing to do with handling weapons. Even if you never get back to the reaction time you used to have, you can do so much good in the world. And you can have a really good life. You don’t have to be the same man you were to be good or be happy. You don’t. And maybe you should offer the same grace to yourself that you’ve always offered everyone else.

CULTIVATING A “YES” STATE OF MIND: HELPING KIDS BE RECEPTIVE TO RELATIONSHIPS If we want to prepare kids to participate as healthy individuals in a relationship, we need to create within them an open, receptive state, instead of a closed, reactive one. To illustrate, here’s an exercise Dan uses with many families. First he’ll tell them he’s going to repeat a word several times, and he asks them just to notice what it feels like in their bodies. The first word is “no,” said firmly and slightly harshly seven times, with about two seconds between each “no.” Then, after another pause, he says a clear but somewhat gentler “yes” seven times. Afterward, clients often say that the “no” felt stifling and angering, as if they were being shut down or scolded. In contrast, the “yes” made them feel calm, peaceful, even light. (You might close your eyes now and try the exercise for yourself. Notice what goes on in your body as you or a friend says “no” and then “yes” several times.) These two different responses—the “no” feelings and the “yes” feelings—demonstrate what we mean when we talk about reactivity versus receptivity. When the nervous system is reactive, it’s actually in a fight-flight-freeze response state, from which it’s almost impossible to connect in an open and caring way with another person. Remember the amygdala and the other parts of your downstairs brain that react immediately, without thinking, whenever you feel threatened? When our entire focus is on self-defense, no matter what we do, we stay in that reactive, “no” state of mind. We become guarded, unable to join with someone else—by listening well, by giving them the benefit of the doubt, by considering their feelings, and so on. Even neutral comments can transform into fighting words, distorting what we hear to fit what we fear. This is how we enter a reactive state and prepare to fight, to flee, or even to freeze. On the other hand, when we’re receptive, a different set of circuits in the brain becomes active. The “yes” part of the exercise, for most people, produces a positive experience. The muscles of their face and vocal cords relax, their blood pressure and heart rate normalize, and they become more open to experiencing whatever another person wants to express. In short, they become more receptive. Whereas reactivity emerges from our downstairs brain and leaves us feeling shut down, upset, and defensive, a receptive state turns on the social engagement system that involves a different set of circuits of the upstairs brain that connects us to others, allowing us to feel safe and seen.

Harvard psychologist Amy Cuddy has demonstrated that standing for two minutes in a ‘power pose’ – a stance in which we expand our body and take up space – has the benefit of increasing testosterone (a hormone that makes us feel powerful) and decreasing cortisol (a hormone released during the fight, flight, or freeze response that makes us feel anxious).

tagged along. He felt that Marvin was now his responsibility, and he wanted to keep an eye on him. No telling what the captain might say that could possibly upset Marvin. A brisk, cold wind was blowing as the passengers stepped from the ferry onto the dock at Ostend. Marvin later commented that he had never felt such raw weather, but his memory was short. He had forgotten the freezing winters we had lived through when we were growing up in Washington, D.C. From the waterfront at Ostend, Freddy led Marvin, Bubby, and Eugenie to a small boarding house at 77 Rue Promenade, just a block from the beach. Freddy’s wife, Lilliane, a joyous woman, was waiting for them with open arms. She had already prepared a room on the fifth floor for Freddy’s guests and had a hot meal simmering on the stove. The boarding house was owned by Freddy and managed by his wife. They lived in the basement apartment, along with their two young daughters. Lilliane had told them that a new playmate would be arriving, and they had eagerly anticipated meeting Bubby. Freddy seemed happy too, now that Marvin was safely in tow. As for Marvin, he was simply relieved to be warm again and on dry land. From the moment she first saw Marvin,

Science and philosophy have for centuries been sustained by unquestioning faith in perception. Perception opens a window on to things. This means that it is directed, quasi-teleologically, towards a *truth in itself* in which the reason underlying all appearances is to be found. The tacit thesis of perception is that at every instant experience can be co-ordinated with that of the previous instant and that of the following, and my perspective with that of other consciousnesses—that all contradictions can be removed, that monadic and intersubjective experience is one unbroken text—that what is now indeterminate for me could become determinate for a more complete knowledge, which is as it were realized in advance in the thing, or rather which is the thing itself. Science has first been merely the sequel or amplification of the process which constitutes perceived things. Just as the thing is the invariant of all sensory fields and of all individual perceptual fields, so the scientific concept is the means of fixing and objectifying phenomena. Science defined a theoretical state of bodies not subject to the action of any force, and *ipso facto* defined force, reconstituting with the aid of these ideal components the processes actually observed. It established statistically the chemical properties of pure bodies, deducing from these those of empirical bodies, and seeming thus to hold the plan of creation or in any case to have found a reason immanent in the world. The notion of geometrical space, indifferent to its contents, that of pure movement which does not by itself affect the properties of the object, provided phenomena with a setting of inert existence in which each event could be related to physical conditions responsible for the changes occurring, and therefore contributed to this freezing of being which appeared to be the task of physics. In thus developing the concept of the thing, scientific knowledge was not aware that it was working on a presupposition. Precisely because perception, in its vital implications and prior to any theoretical thought, is presented as perception of a being, it was not considered necessary for reflection to undertake a genealogy of being, and it was therefore confined to seeking the conditions which make being possible. Even if one took account of the transformations of determinant consciousness, even if it were conceded that the constitution of the object is never completed, there was nothing to add to what science said of it; the natural object remained an ideal unity for us and, in the famous words of Lachelier, a network of general properties. It was no use denying any ontological value to the principles of science and leaving them with only a methodical value, for this reservation made no essential change as far as philosophy was concerned, since the sole conceivable being remained defined by scientific method. The living body, under these circumstances, could not escape the determinations which alone made the object into an object and without which it would have had no place in the system of experience. The value predicates which the reflecting judgment confers upon it had to be sustained, in being, by a foundation of physico-chemical properties. In ordinary experience we find a fittingness and a meaningful relationship between the gesture, the smile and the tone of a speaker. But this reciprocal relationship of expression which presents the human body as the outward manifestation of a certain manner of being-in-the-world, had, for mechanistic physiology, to be resolved into a series of causal relations.” —from_Phenomenology of Perception_. Translated by Colin Smith, pp. 62-64 —Artwork by Cristian Boian

A free child might have asked: Why do our parents go on having children, when they can't even feed them, keep them warm or pay them any attention, when they can't even remember their names? But a mistreated child cannot ask such questions. He believes what he has been taught to believe: that God wanted these children. Is God, then, responsible for all the unwanted, mistreated, and neglected children in the world? Does he enjoy watching millions of children starve or freeze to death? As we all know, God's wishes are not open to query. One simply has to obey them, however absurd they may seem. Many devout believers assume that behind such wishes, there must be hidden meaning to which we have no access.

positive psychology” (Fredrickson 2004) suggests that creating or focusing on positive emotions can have three important benefits. These benefits could potentially help us deal better with stress. First, positive emotions help us recover physiologically from stress. Second, they encourage us to engage—to explore, be curious, and take reasonable risks, rather than fleeing, fighting, or freezing. This can lead us to new information and resources that may help us deal with the stressor. Third, positive emotions can help us think more broadly about our stressors, which increases our chances of finding a novel and creative solution.

He felt that in a way he was taking part in the Revolution. He was returning the mighty general’s cape. He had been given the responsibility for keeping the father of our country from freezing! He climbed out of the boat feeling like a true rebel!

Understanding the limbic system and its core freeze, flight, or fight responses is the first phase in detecting a threat. It’s important to remember that the enemy stalking a Marine on patrol or a seemingly helpless woman on her way home is under duress. This stress manifests itself in physical actions. If we look for these particular physical actions when our limbic system gives us the “heads up, something’s

Employing the NLP Fast Phobia Cure The NLP Fast Phobia Cure allows you to re-experience a trauma or phobia without experiencing the emotional content of the event or having to face the trigger that normally sets off the phobic response. You need to ensure that you work on this process in an environment where you know yourself to be completely safe, in the presence of another person who can help to keep you grounded if you begin to panic. This process ensures that you examine an experience while you’re doubly dissociated from the memory, creating a separation between you (in the now) and the emotions of a trauma or a phobic response. In the following list, the double dissociation is done through having you watch yourself in a cinema (dissociation), while watching yourself on a cinema screen (double dissociation) (you can find more on dissociation in Chapter 10): 1. Identify when you have a phobic response to a stimulus or a traumatic or unpleasant memory that you want to overcome. 2. Remember that you were safe before and are safe after the unpleasant experience. 3. Imagine yourself sitting in the cinema, watching yourself on a small, black-and-white screen. 4. Now imagine floating out of the ‘you’ that’s sitting in the cinema seat and into the projection booth. 5. You can now see yourself in the projection booth, watching yourself in the seat, watching the film of you on the screen. 6. Run the film in black and white, on the very tiny screen, starting before you experienced the memory you want to overcome and running it through until after the experience when you were safe. 7. Now freeze the film or turn the screen completely white. 8. Float out of the projection booth, out of the seat, and into the end of the film. 9. Run the film backwards very quickly, in a matter of a second or two, in full colour, as if you’re experiencing the film, right back to the beginning, when you were safe. 10. You can repeat steps 8 and 9 until you’re comfortable with the experience. 11. Now go into the future and test an imaginary time when you may have experienced the phobic response

Whilst I am on the subject, and I am pre-warning you now, do not come up to me on a freezing cold winter’s evening and tell me that you have just flown back from your holiday and expect me to feel sorry for you, “because when we left, it was blazing sunshine and ninety degrees!” You may be offended by my response.

Morgan then examined the effects of PFCVM lesions in rats and found that, again, the animals could not stop freezing in response to the CS. It was as if removal of PFCVM influences resulted in an out-of-control amygdala, one that responded to stimuli that were, objectively speaking, no longer threatening. This immediately suggested that the type of unregulated fear and anxiety that occurs in people with anxiety disorders might involve some dysregulation of prefrontal-amygdala circuits. It

Figure 11.4: Recovery of Extinguished Threats. a. Through extinction, the ability of learned threats to control defense responses is weakened. Successful extinction results in low levels of defensive responses like freezing. However, the original threat memory can be revived, suggesting that extinction is a form of inhibitory learning that suppresses the original threat memory. Recovery can occur due to the mere passage of time (spontaneous recovery), exposure to the context in which the original memory was formed (renewal), or by exposure to the unconditioned stimulus (reinstatement). b. Spontaneous Recovery occurs when there is a long delay between conditioning and extinction; it is less likely to occur with a short delay. c. Renewal occurs in the training context but not in novel context. d. Reinstatement involves the delivery of the unconditioned stimulus (US) after extinction. If the subsequent test occurs in the same context, then freezing is reinstated. FROM QUIRK AND MUELLER (2008), ADAPTED WITH PERMISSION FROM MACMILLAN PUBLISHERS LTD.: NEUROPSYCHOPHARMACOLOGY (VOL. 33, PP. 56–72, © 2008, AND MYERS AND DAVIS (2007), ADAPTED WITH PERMISSION FROM MACMILLAN PUBLISHERS LTD.: MOLECULAR PSYCHIATRY (VOL. 12, PP. 120–50)), © 2007.

biological, instinctual, unconscious response to threat or violation. And it can actually be the very thing that saves your life. In freezing, the human body enters an altered state in which little to no pain is experienced.

Let me stress that we cannot bring anyone to faith though pressure, guilt, argument, or cleverness. Conversion and true faith are works of the Holy Spirit. But it is also true that we can, by our responses, help or hinder another's journey. Responding to seekers in a way that does not accept and honor their lived experience may cause them to "freeze" or even move away from God. Understanding the thresholds can help us help them or, at least, help us to not get in the way of what God is doing.

that in modern life we overuse the “fight, flight, or freeze” response, because we respond to many situations as if they are life-threatening when they are not. As a result, our nervous systems don’t have time to recover, because we are activating this response too frequently.

The prophets make us partners of an existence meant for us. What was revealed to them was not for their sake but intended to inspire us. The word must not freeze into habit; it must remain an event. To disregard the importance of continuous understanding is an evasion of the living challenge of the prophets, an escape from the urgency of responsible experience of every man, a denial of the deeper meaning of “the oral Torah.

April 2 The God of all grace, who called you to his eternal glory in Christ, after you have suffered a little while, will himself restore you and make you strong, firm and steadfast. 1 PETER 5:10 DEVOTION Through the Storm Winter snow and ice storms may stretch into the spring, offering one last blast of bitter cold. A late burst of freezing temps can kill fragile blossoms and snap icy branches with bitter winds. Some trees will buckle under the weight of heavy spring snow and lean toward the ground, burdened by the unexpected, unseasonable storm. They will require assistance in their restoration, someone to brush the remaining snow away and sometimes to stake them upright. You, too, may experience a late, unexpected storm. Things seem to be going well in your life and then suddenly, you hit a wall, overwhelmed by your responsibilities, weighted by countless burdens, unsure of how you’ll keep going. This is when God, our perfect and loving Gardener, will sustain and restore you. His grace is more than sufficient to keep you alive and fruitful. Don’t be frightened when spring snows come. DAILY INTERACTION CONNECT: Send an e-card to someone who might need encouragement as they experience a trial or hardship.

Predictable, consistent, and shared procedures for arriving at and starting class, distributing materials, and accomplishing daily routines lower stress and provide a comfortable environment. If we can set up routines and procedures so that the brain does not have to resort to the fight, flight, or freeze response, we will alleviate a lot of stress and distraction.

That means, the longer you remain in the freeze response, the more easily overwhelmed you become each time a stressful situation occurs. Over time, the body begins to startle and freeze as a conditioned reflex to even the smallest stressors : a loud noise, a traffic jam or an unexpected change at work. It then becomes so increasingly hard to relax that, eventually, the body can no longer adapt to stress, causing physical and emotional symptoms to develop.

freeze response is activated, which causes your body to suppress the negative impact of the experience. In essence, if you feel helpless to change a threatening, painful, or stressful experience, the freeze response will cause your body to bury any intense, negative sensations, thoughts and emotions that are arising, keeping them hidden from your conscious view.

You never mentioned a single thing about running into Everett.” “Because you just got home, and again, I’m trying to take a bath, and just so everyone knows, the water is turning a little chilly.” She sent what she hoped was a pointed look toward the door, but her message was ignored. “Chilly water is incredibly beneficial for a lady’s skin, but back to Everett.” Lucetta scooted her chair forward. “Did his wards run off another nanny, and did he ask you to accept a position with him, and . . . did you feel compelled to turn down his offer because of that pesky attraction you feel for the man?” “I’m not attracted to Mr. Mulberry,” was the only protest she could think to respond. “How could you not be attracted to the gentleman?” Abigail countered. “A person would have to be blind not to notice that he’s incredibly handsome. Add in the fact he’s now responsible for three children, and well that must make him downright scrumptious to a lady who has a soft spot for little ones.” “I do not find Mr. Mulberry scrumptious,” Millie argued, wincing when Abigail sent her an incredulous look. “Oh, very well, I might have, when I first laid eyes on the man, thought he was a little handsome—although not scrumptious, mind you. But after he refused to consider me as a nanny for his wards, his handsomeness faded in a flash. Furthermore—” A knock on the door interrupted her speech. “Mrs. Hart? Are you in there?” Mr. Kenton, Abigail’s butler, called through the door. Abigail rose to her feet and moved across the room. “I am, Mr. Kenton, but Miss Longfellow is in the middle of her bath, so in order to preserve her modesty, I suggest you don’t open this door.” “Very good, ma’am, but I’m here to tell you that Miss Longfellow has a visitor. He gave his name as Mr. Everett Mulberry. May I tell him Miss Longfellow is receiving this evening?” “Of course she’s receiving, Mr. Kenton. Tell Mr. Mulberry she’ll be down directly.” “Tell him I’m not available,” Millie called. “Do no such thing, Mr. Kenton,” Abigail countered. “Millie is certainly available, and she’ll receive Mr. Mulberry in the drawing room in five minutes, ten at the most.” “Very good, ma’am.” Listening to Mr. Kenton’s departing footsteps, Millie frowned at Abigail, who’d turned away from the door and was beaming back at her. “I have no desire to see Mr. Mulberry, and since I am in the middle of my bath, which does, indeed, make me unavailable, you’ll need to go and make my excuses to the man.” “You’ve been complaining that your water is getting cold. That means you’ll have to get out of the tub soon to avoid freezing to death, making you available to speak with Mr. Mulberry.” “Perhaps I’ve decided to heed Lucetta’s advice and enjoy the benefits cold water is supposed to deliver to my skin.” Abigail

people who are reliving a trauma, nothing makes sense; they are trapped in a life-or-death situation, a state of paralyzing fear or blind rage. Mind and body are constantly aroused, as if they are in imminent danger. They startle in response to the slightest noises and are frustrated by small irritations. Their sleep is chronically disturbed, and food often loses its sensual pleasures. This in turn can trigger desperate attempts to shut those feelings down by freezing and dissociation.

When we discipline with threats—whether explicitly through our words or implicitly through scary nonverbals like our tone, posture, and facial expressions—we activate the defensive circuits of our child’s reactive reptilian downstairs brain. We call this “poking the lizard,” and we don’t recommend it because it almost always leads to escalating emotions, for both parent and child. When your five-year-old throws a fit at the grocery store, and you tower over him and point your finger and insist through clenched teeth that he “calm down this instant,” you’re poking the lizard. You’re triggering a downstairs reaction, which is almost never going to lead anywhere productive for anyone involved. Your child’s sensory system takes in your body language and words and detects threat, which biologically sets off the neural circuitry that allows him to survive a threat from his environment—to fight, to flee, to freeze, or to faint. His downstairs brain springs into action, preparing to react quickly rather than fully considering alternatives in a more responsive, receptive state. His muscles might tense as he prepares to defend himself and, if necessary, attack with freeze and fight. Or he may run away in flight, or collapse in a fainting response. Each of these is a pathway of reactivity of the downstairs brain. And his thinking, rational self-control circuitry of the upstairs brain goes off-line, becoming unavailable in that moment. That’s the key—we can’t be in both a reactive downstairs state and a receptive upstairs state at the same time. The downstairs reactivity holds sway. In this situation, you can appeal to your child’s more sophisticated upstairs brain, and allow it to help rein in the more reactive downstairs brain.

There was so much to think about and so much to do with all this activity and responsibility that he hardly had time to really consider how he missed London, the hum of it, the Brixton roar and the beloved river, the West Indian take aways, the glittering of the tower blocks at night, the mobile phone shacks, the Africans in Peckham, the common proximity of plantain, the stern beauty of church women on Sunday mornings, the West End, the art in the air, the music in the air, the sense of possibility. He missed the tube, the telephone boxes. He even missed, deep down, the wicked parking inspectors and the heartless bus drivers who flew past queues of freezing pedestrians out of spite. He missed riding from Loughborough to Surrey Quays on his bike with the plane trees whizzing by, the sight of some long-weaved woman walking along in tight jeans and a studded belt and look-at-me boots and maybe a little boy holding her hand. The skylines, the alleyways, and yes, the sirens and helicopters and the hit of life, all these things he knew so well. And the fact, most of all, that he belonged there in a way that he would never, could never, belong in Dorking. He was outside, displaced. He was off the A-Z. He felt, in a very fundamental way, that he was living outside of his life, outside of himself. And the problem was, if indeed it was a problem – how could you call something like this a problem when there were bills to pay and children to feed and a house to maintain? – the problem was that he did not know what to do about it, how to get rid of this feeling, how to get to a place where he felt that he was in the right place. And this not being such a serious problem, not really a problem at all, he had suppressed it and accepted things as they were.

That night on the show, there's an expert giving advice about how to survive disasters, natural and man-made. He says it's a myth that people panic in emergencies. Eighty percent just freeze. The brain refuses to take in what is happening. This is called the incredulity response. "Those who live move," he says.

So much depended upon the daft schedule of Trenitalia and the unions so imbued with whimsy and given to strikes. In theory, Trenitalia, the national corporation responsible for rail travel in Italy, is organized, codified, simple, and comprehensible. In actual lived experience, however, Trenitalia is chaotic, disordered, complex, and arcane. I’m sure there are some who understand the great mysterious force that is Trenitalia; the fascist conduttori, for one, and the persons who wrote Trenitalia’s adulatory Wikipedia entry, for another. To my thinking, the logic of Trenitalia was the worst kind of Italian disregard for rules. Even the Trenitalia website appears to have been created by workers who have a slender understanding of how humans think. It reads like it was written in Cyborg, fed through Google Translate into Italian, and slapped on to a webpage. More than one time, I’ve sat in the wrong Trenitalia car, taken the wrong train, or bought an online ticket for a trip other than the one I’d intended to take. And all this even before the trains mysteriously stop running because of a sciopero bianco, a work-to-rule strike, otherwise known as an “Italian strike,” when workers register protest by doing no more work than is mandated by their employment contracts. A butterfly flaps its wings in Chioggia, and a train running to Siena freezes on its tracks, such is the indescribable strangeness of Trenitalia. It’s a fascist adage: “Say what you like about Mussolini, but at least the trains run on time.” This was true neither in Mussolini’s day nor today. Trains exist and there are many, which makes Italy already superior to the car-logged, rail-beleaguered United States, but don’t set your watch by them. However predictable, Trenitalia’s inconstancy is an issue when you’re planning a perfectly orchestrated murder from 4,000 miles away. I raise the bureaucratic specter of Trenitalia because much of the success of Marco’s murder rested upon it. The remainder hinged on my skill with knives.

When your system is under threat, your response is not voluntary—your rational mind is not doing the choosing. You don’t decide to fight, flee, freeze, or collapse. Your nervous system responds with the capacity it has in that moment, based on how it’s been conditioned by past experiences, what was modeled to you as a child, what you’ve tried before that worked or didn’t work, and where you have gotten stuck in a rut.

[Rape is framed] as something that a potential victim can prevent if they learn the steps of this peculiar dance that is trying to avoid being possibly assaulted, the immediate response is often one of several questions ranging from “What were you wearing?” to “Why were you there?” to “Had you been drinking?” The answers to those questions can never be relevant — ultimately victims are assaulted because someone chose to attack them. Instead of tips on how not to be a rapist, how to teach people not to rape, or even on creating therapeutic outlets for potential rapists, we find a half dozen tips on preventing a mythical stranger from raping an able-bodied, alert, physically fit person with excellent reflexes and an exceptional amount of luck. These tips never address disability, differences in flight-or-flight (or freeze) adrenaline responses, or even the reality that most assailants are known to their victims.

Humans will run, fight, or freeze. Humans are driven by fight-or-flight responses, which translate into certain autonomic responses and behaviors. We will discuss these responses later as well as the autonomic responses to stress. For now, it is sufficient to say that our bodies often exhibit uncontrollable, automatic reactions to our emotions in response to the situations we are in. Because these reactions are automatic and uncontrollable, they are reliable indicators

Trauma has a way of overwhelming us. When we are threatened, our first response is fight, flight, or freeze.

1.          They were perfect… initially. We’ve discussed this one, but it’s worth mentioning again. A narcissist wants you to believe they’re totally into you and put you on a pedestal. Once they have you, though, they stop trying as hard and you end up being the one working to keep them. 2.          Others don’t see the narcissist the way you do. It’s hard enough to see it yourself, but when those around you, especially their friends and family, make excuses for them, you start doubting yourself even more. Stick to what you see. 3.          They’re making you look bad. In order to maintain their facade of perfection, they make you look like a bad person. Usually this involves spreading rumors, criticizing you behind your back, or creating lies you supposedly told. The worst part is that when you try rectifying the situation, or laying the blame where it should belong, the narcissist uses your defense to back their own lies. It’s frustrating because the generous, wonderful person they displayed initially is what those around you still see, even if you see them for who they really are. 4.          You feel symptoms of anxiety and/or depression. The toxic person may have caused you to worry about not acting the way you’re expected to, or that you haven’t done something right or good enough. In making this person your entire world, you may lose sleep, have no interest in things you used to or have developed a, “What’s the point?” attitude. You essentially absorb all of the negative talk and treatment so deeply, you believe it all. This is a dangerous mindset to be in so if you feel you’re going any steps down this path, seek outside help as soon as possible. 5.          You have unexplained physical ailments. It’s not surprising that when you internalize a great deal of negativity, you begin to feel unwell. Some common symptoms that aren’t related to any ongoing condition might be: changes in appetite, stomach issues, body aches, insomnia, and fatigue. These are typical bodily responses to stress, but if they intensify or become chronic, see a physician as soon as you can. 6.          You feel alone. Also a common symptom of abuse. If things are really wrong, the narcissist may have isolated you from friends or family either by things they’ve done themselves or by making you believe no one is there for you. 7.          You freeze. When you emotionally remove yourself from the abuse, you’re freezing. It’s a coping mechanism to reduce the intensity of the way you’re being treated by numbing out the pain. 8.          You don’t trust yourself even with simple decisions. When your self-esteem has been crushed through devaluing and criticism, it’s no wonder you can’t make decisions. If you’re also being gaslighted, it adds another layer of self-doubt. 9.          You can’t make boundaries. The narcissist doesn’t have any, nor do they respect them, which is why it’s difficult to keep them away even after you’ve managed to get away. Setting boundaries will be discussed in greater detail in an upcoming chapter. 10.    You lost touch with the real you. The person you become when with a narcissistic abuser is very different from the person you were before you got involved with them. They’ve turned you into who they want you to be, making you feel lost and insecure with no sense of true purpose. 11.    You never feel like you do anything right. We touched on this briefly above, but this is one of the main signs of narcissistic abuse. Looking at the big picture, you may be constantly blamed when things go wrong even when it isn’t your fault. You may do something exactly the way they tell you to, but they still find fault with the results. It’s similar to how a Private feels never knowing when the Drill Sergeant will find fault in their efforts. 12.    You walk on eggshells. This happens when you try avoiding any sort of conflict, maltreatment or backlash by going above and beyond to make the abuser happy.

Further confusion also arises in the case of ADHD [Attention Deficit Hyperactive Disorder], as well as obsessive/compulsive disorder, both of which are sometimes more accurately described as fixated flight responses to trauma [see the 4F’s below]. This is also true of ADD [Attention Deficit Disorder] and some depressive and dissociative disorders which similarly can more accurately be described as fixated freeze responses to trauma.

Conversely, ND spouses often find that their partner initially marveled at their abilities, enjoyed their idiosyncrasies, and “got” them in ways others did not. They felt accepted and safe to be themselves. As this safety grew, they became more comfortable with being who they are, only to find their partner complaining that they are distant and not putting the energy into the relationship as they once did. The criticism grows, and with each interaction, what was once a safe haven becomes a jarring experience on the nervous system, activating the fight-flight-or-freeze response. The nervous system’s response to potential threat causes the ND person to withdraw, further threatening reliability and safety of the relationship for the NT person, who often responds with more of the same (elevated requests, threats, or demands).

provide a lightning-fast response to threat, but then quickly return us to equilibrium. In PTSD patients, however, the stress hormone system fails at this balancing act. Fight/flight/freeze signals continue after the danger is over, and, as in the case of the dogs, do not return to normal. Instead, the continued secretion of stress hormones is expressed as agitation and panic and, in the long term, wreaks havoc with their health.

The elementary self system in the brain stem and limbic system is massively activated when people are faced with the threat of annihilation, which results in an overwhelming sense of fear and terror accompanied by intense physiological arousal. To people who are reliving a trauma, nothing makes sense; they are trapped in a life-or-death situation, a state of paralyzing fear or blind rage. Mind and body are constantly aroused, as if they are in imminent danger. They startle in response to the slightest noises and are frustrated by small irritations. Their sleep is chronically disturbed, and food often loses its sensual pleasures. This in turn can trigger desperate attempts to shut those feelings down by freezing and dissociation.11 How do

The majority of women, like the mice trapped in the drug company experiment, are confined in a woman hating culture from which they cannot escape. They suffer continual shocks: Verbal, sexual, emotional and physical abuse in and outside the home, pervasive social contempt, a sense of powerlessness and despair, and a lack of control over their ability to work effectively or even take care of their own children. Women’s depression, as feminists have pointed out, is a logical and rational response to having one’s human rights continually abused. Depression, burnout, or learned helplessness can be compared to the ways in which the mice freeze when they hear the sound before their torture.

The vagus nerve controls the parasympathetic nervous system, counteracts the symptoms of an overactive sympathetic nervous system, namely stress, anxiety, and other fight-flight-freeze adrenal responses, including some forms of depression.

I want to make this point, though, and might also come back to it a few times. It’s an evolutionary response to shut down and go numb like this. When we can’t fight or flee from a horrible threat, we lie down and play dead – we freeze. A deer will do it as a last-ditch survival trick when being chased by a tiger. Playing dead might fool their predator into being a bit casual in their final lunge, giving the deer an opportunity to suddenly jerk back to life and escape. Abuse victims do it as a form of self-protection; anxiety sufferers do it in the face of too many decisions and existential overwhelm. And I reckon it’s what we do to survive when we find ourselves living a life that is so removed from the miraculous. Which is useful to reflect on; it certainly makes me more compassionate about things when I do. Of course, freezing or numbing out can work as a survival trick for a while, but if we remain asleep, particularly as a society, we face our collective demise.

It is becoming increasingly clear that the predominant determining factor in predicting the eventual development of PTSD is whether or not dissociation occurred during a traumatic event, as dissociation directly correlates with the deployment of the freeze response in the face of threat (Rothschild 13).

States should impose individual sanctions, including travel bans and asset freezes, against officials and individuals responsible for the continued commission of these serious crimes and condition arms sales and military and security assistance to Israel on Israeli authorities taking concrete and verifiable steps towards ending their commission of the crimes of apartheid and persecution.

We read often about the “fight or flight” response, but the freeze response is often left out of literature describing trauma reactions. The freeze response is the one that most human beings are embarrassed about, although it makes just as much sense as a protective strategy as fight and flight do. A freeze response is no more a failure than any other protective coping strategy and is nothing to be ashamed of. Peter Levine states that there are four potential evolutionary survival benefits to the freeze response: • Most predatory animals won’t eat an animal they believe is already dead unless they are really hungry. Most animals have encoded information that meat that is already dead may be spoiled and therefore is a risk to eat. • It is more difficult for predators to detect prey that is not moving. Immobilization shuts down all movement responses. Even if we are trying to be still and quiet it is difficult to do so unless we have become biochemically immobilized. • When one animal collapses in a group, this distracts the predator from the rest of the group, allowing their escape. • The freeze response releases a numbing agent in the body that makes the pain of attack more bearable.

As is posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) subsequent to the trauma that often initiates chronic sorrow, somatic disturbance is also at the core of shame. Shame evokes some of the same physical manifestations, such as freezing, numbing, feeling one’s very life is threatened, hypervigilance, and the flight-or-fight stress response. There is a cogent argument that shame goes deeper than guilt. Moreover, there is risk that it may permeate and dominate self-image and personality. Susan Roos, in The Shame of Death, Grief and Trauma (Jeffrey Kauffman, Ed.)

Exercising the stress response just allows a person to assert a measure of control when the environment gets challenging.

The presumption is that an anger response provokes the fight response. But that isn’t necessarily true. The fight/flight/freeze response is a survival response, not a dominance response. Which means that our brain is doing some background calculation of how to best survive the threat it has detected. We fight if fighting is our best chance for survival, but fleeing the situation may make more survival sense. And there is lots of evolutionary evidence that freezing is also a great protective response if we can’t overwhelm or outrun our attacker. It numbs the pain of attack, and sometimes confuses the attacker into thinking we’re already dead, therefore, uninteresting.

When we sense danger, we will instinctively react with a fight, flight, or freeze response. Not a lot of thought goes into this response. The body just naturally does its thing.

Chronic helplessness occurs as the freezing, orienting, and defending responses become so fixated and weakened that they move primarily along predetermined and dysfunctional pathways. Chronic helplessness joins hypervigilance and the inability to learn new behaviors as yet another common feature of the traumatized person’s reality.

ONE STRESS RESPONSE FOR ALL STRESSORS There is but one stress response for all stressors. When I say all stressors, I mean all stressors, including exercise stress, relationship conflict, abuse of any kind, financial strain, discrimination, work tension, harassment, and racism. In the same way that moderate-to-vigorous-intensity exercises activate the SAM and HPA axes, so do psychological stressors; however, unlike exercise, psychological stressors tend to be involuntary and long-lasting, meaning that they are less likely to give you the allostasis that you want and more likely to give you the allostatic load that you don’t want. If you’re here because your mind needs healing, you’re probably familiar with chronic stress. At worst, it leaves you feeling helpless. And then something very unexpected happens: Instead of fight or flight, stress causes you to freeze. Learned Helplessness and How to Overcome It “There’s nothing I can do to change things, so what’s the point in even trying,” Leslie thinks to herself before crawling back into bed and burying herself under the covers.

Men have a fight-or-flight response, they say. For women, it’s fight or flight, or freeze. Because in the face of overpowering physical strength, our overriding instinct is to survive, to not die here. I went numb, suspending my consciousness. It was a technique I had perfected as a child during beatings.

Your amygdala sounded the alarm and triggered your stress-hormone system and your autonomic nervous system to kick into high gear. You were flooded with cortisol and adrenaline; your heart rate and breathing rates increased. You had a full body stress response that resulted in fight, flight, or freeze.

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These emotions and attachment needs were the plot behind negative interactions like the Demon Dialogues. Now I understood why this kind of pattern was so compelling and never ending. When safe connection seems lost, partners go into fight-or-flight mode. They blame and get aggressive to get a response, any response, or they close down and try not to care. Both are terrified; they are just dealing with it differently. Trouble is, once they start this blame-distance loop, it confirms all their fears and adds to their sense of isolation. Emotional edicts as old as time dictate this dance; rational skills don’t change it. Most of the blaming in these dialogues is a desperate attachment cry, a protest against disconnection. It can only be quieted by a lover moving emotionally close to hold and reassure. Nothing else will do. If this reconnection does not occur, the struggle goes on. One partner will frantically try to get an emotional response from the other. The other, hearing that he or she has failed at love, will freeze up. Immobility in the face of danger is a wired-in way to deal with a sense of helplessness.

So when the two come into conflict in a child’s life, the outcome is well-nigh predetermined. If the choice is between “hiding my feelings, even from myself, and getting the basic care I need” and “being myself and going without,” I’m going to pick that first option every single time. Thus our real selves are leveraged bit by bit in a tragic transaction where we secure our physical or emotional survival by relinquishing who we are and how we feel. The fact that we don’t consciously choose such coping mechanisms makes them all the more tenacious. We cannot will them away when they no longer serve us precisely because we have no memory of them not being there, no notion of ourselves without them. Like wallpaper, they blend into the background; they are our “new normal,” our literal second nature, as distinct from our original or authentic nature. As these patterns get wired into our nervous system, the perceived need to be what the world demands becomes entangled with our sense of who we are and how to seek love. Inauthenticity is thereafter misidentified with survival because the two were synonymous during the formative years—or, at least, seemed so to our young selves. Here we see the perilous downside of our much-vaunted and wondrous capacity to adapt to diverse and challenging circumstances. After all, most adaptations are meant for specific situations, not as eternally applicable responses in every possible case. Here’s an analogy plucked from the headlines: At the time of this writing, freezing weather has enveloped Texas.[*] People are adapting by wearing extra clothing, heating their homes when power is available, wrapping themselves in warm blankets—all necessary strategies for surviving inclement winter conditions. Those same adaptations, meant to be temporary, would jeopardize health and life if not discarded by the time of summer’s blazing heat. The internal adaptations we make to our own personalities in order to survive adversity early in life carry the same risks as conditions shift, but we are far less wise to the danger. No matter how the weather changes, the protective gear, welded as it is onto the personality, never comes off. It is sobering to realize that many of the personality traits we have come to believe are us, and perhaps even take pride in, actually bear the scars of where we lost connection to ourselves, way back when.

But here’s the thing… demands can trigger, or activate, the fight/ flight/ freeze response. Whether real or not, the brain may interpret a demand as a threat. When this happens, the lower brain goes into a defensive or offensive state.

You freeze momentarily, at which point the assailant begins running toward you. You don’t think; you run. This is the stress response; it’s automatic, thoughtless, and lifesaving. It’s only after your rapid retreat that it’s possible for you to strategize a more reasoned escape plan/route. But, in the interim, your amygdala has sounded — and continues to sound the biological alarm — conveying signals to numerous parts of the cortex commanding them to pay attention to all relevant aspects of the situation (whether the man is following you, at what speed, etc.). At this point all energy is directed toward survival. So, the hippocampus goes off-line, as there is no need for long-term potentiation of memory, if you’re not going to survive to benefit from it.

The technique was simple, but the response was complex. I also discovered that eye wobbles and eye freezes were not the only reflexes that revealed the presence of traumas held deep in the brain; I observed many other reactions when I stopped my hand movement, such as multiple or hard blinks and eye widening or narrowing. Any reflex of the face (or ultimately the body) seemed to manifest when the eyes arrived at a position of relevance. I experimented with stopping my hand when I observed a cough, a deep inhale or exhale, a hard swallow, lip licking, a head tilt, a nostril flare, or a change in facial expression.

There are many religious people who believe if they act or believe in accordance with God’s will, God should and will protect them from calamities such as bad health and early death. Many pious people have been afflicted with disease and many non-religious and evil people have lived long and healthy lives. It should be obvious to anyone there is simply no correlation between religiosity and being protected from illness. (There are measurable health benefits to leading the purposeful, family-centered, and community-centered life healthy religious practices provide, but that is another matter.) How could there be such a correlation? As Harold Kushner has observed, does the belief God protects the righteous mean a good religious person can go out in freezing weather without a coat and never get sick? If God really did protect religious people from all illness, why would any rational person not be religious? Moreover, faith would no longer be faith. It wouldn’t take any faith to believe in God and to lead a religious life. It would be a completely empirically based decision: Observe x and you will never get cancer; believe y and you will never get heart disease. That’s not faith, it’s a health care decision. The belief God protects those with proper observance or faith from all disease must ultimately lead to an unsympathetic, even judgmental, response to people who get sick: ‘If only they were more observant [or] if only they had a deeper faith—they wouldn’t have gotten cancer or had that heart attack.’ The victim of cancer or a heart attack is then doubly victimized.

A few years ago, I led an expedition to return to Mount Everest, the mountain I had climbed aged 23, a mountain where I had risked everything and survived - just. I had always held a secret dream to return and attempt to fly over the mountain in a small one-man paramotor - like a paraglider, only with a backpack engine strapped to your body. At the time, the highest altitude that one had been flown was around 17,000 feet (5,180 metres). But being an enthusiast (and an optimist!), I reckoned we shouldn’t just aim to break the record by a few feet, I thought we should go as high as it was possible to go, and in my mind that meant flying over the height of Mount Everest. This in turn meant we needed to build a machine capable of flying to over 29,000 feet (8,840 metres). Most of the people we spoke to about this thought a) we were crazy, and b) it was technically impossible. What those naysayers hadn’t factored in was the power of yes, and specifically the ability to build a team capable of such a mission. This meant harnessing the brilliance of my good friend Gilo Cardozo, a paramotor engineer, a born enthusiast, and a man who loves to break the rules - and to say yes. Gilo was - and is - an absolute genius aviation engineer who spends all his time in his factory, designing and testing crazy bits of machinery. When people told us that our oxygen would freeze up in minus 70°, or that at extreme altitudes we would need such a heavy engine to power the machine that it would be impossible to take off, or that even if we managed to do it, we would break our legs landing at such speed, Gilo’s response was: ‘Oh, it’ll be great. Leave it with me.’ No matter what the obstacle, no matter what the ‘problem’, Gilo always said, ‘We can do this.’ And after months in his workshop, he did eventually build the machine that took us above the height of Everest. He beat the naysayers, he built the impossible and by the Grace of God we pulled it off - oh, and in the process we raised over $2.5 million for children’s charities around the world. You see, dreams can come true if you stick to them and think big. So say yes - you never know where it will lead. And there are few limits to how high you just might soar.

69. When You’re Going Through Hell, Keep Going Whether I have been in the middle of a dusty, barren desert, stuck in a mosquito-infested swamp, or freezing cold and wet in the middle of the ocean, there is always one thing I tell myself above everything else (and it is an easy one to remember, even when you are dog tired and not feeling particularly brave or strong). It’s this… …just keep going. JKG. Winston Churchill said it in one of the darkest moments of World War Two, when the outlook was as bleak as it had ever been. On 10 May 1940, the British looked to be finished. They stood alone against the vicious and victorious Nazis. Two weeks after Churchill came to power, France was knocked out of the war, and 340,000 British troops had to scramble to escape over the beaches at Dunkirk. The Germans had absolute control of all of Europe. It seemed impossible that Britain could survive. What was Churchill’s response? ‘When you’re going through hell, keep going.’ It is reassuring to know that the real heart of survival is as simple as this. All you have to do is to keep putting one foot in front of the other. Even if you don’t make much progress, you just have to keep going. It is not only the heart of survival, it is also the key to success. It’s really not that different when we face traumas elsewhere in our lives. Bereavement, illness and heartbreak are part of every human life. Sometimes the emotional impact of these events can bring us to our knees. But the way through is always the same: keep going. When we give up, we know our destiny. When we keep going, we earn the right to choose our fate. Ingrain it in your DNA: JKG.

The Rules of Improvisation That Will Change Your Life and Reduce Belly Fat* The first rule of improvisation is AGREE. Always agree and SAY YES. When you’re improvising, this means you are required to agree with whatever your partner has created. So if we’re improvising and I say, “Freeze, I have a gun,” and you say, “That’s not a gun. It’s your finger. You’re pointing your finger at me,” our improvised scene has ground to a halt. But if I say, “Freeze, I have a gun!” and you say, “The gun I gave you for Christmas! You bastard!” then we have started a scene because we have AGREED that my finger is in fact a Christmas gun. Now, obviously in real life you’re not always going to agree with everything everyone says. But the Rule of Agreement reminds you to “respect what your partner has created” and to at least start from an open-minded place. Start with a YES and see where that takes you. As an improviser, I always find it jarring when I meet someone in real life whose first answer is no. “No, we can’t do that.” “No, that’s not in the budget.” “No, I will not hold your hand for a dollar.” What kind of way is that to live? The second rule of improvisation is not only to say yes, but YES, AND. You are supposed to agree and then add something of your own. If I start a scene with “I can’t believe it’s so hot in here,” and you just say, “Yeah…” we’re kind of at a standstill. But if I say, “I can’t believe it’s so hot in here,” and you say, “What did you expect? We’re in hell.” Or if I say, “I can’t believe it’s so hot in here,” and you say, “Yes, this can’t be good for the wax figures.” Or if I say, “I can’t believe it’s so hot in here,” and you say, “I told you we shouldn’t have crawled into this dog’s mouth,” now we’re getting somewhere. To me YES, AND means don’t be afraid to contribute. It’s your responsibility to contribute. Always make sure you’re adding something to the discussion. Your initiations are worthwhile.

Those who have experienced trauma may find that they blow up in response to minor provocations, freeze when frustrated, or become helpless in the face of trivial challenges. This inflexibility diminishes the capacity to choose, and without understanding the context of the reactions, their behavior can appear bizarre or out of control. “Neuroimaging

The minute we get triggered, our brains amp up the Fight, Flight, Freeze, or Freak Out reaction. Our limbic systems (our inner toddlers) fire up and our prefrontal cortexes (the grown-up in our brains) shut down. Our nervous systems prepare us to move quickly, even in response to emotional and psychological threats that don’t require a physical response. And so there we are, all agitated and twitchy and ready to leap into action but with nowhere to go. Whether we realize it or not, we’ve gone from noticing mode to reacting mode, buttons are primed and ready for pushing. The minute kiddo #1 starts tossing sand at #2, we have the action our nervous system has been looking for, and so we leap, and shit is lost.

Any preprogrammed physical response is potentially susceptible to the wedge as long as it has three key characteristics. First there needs to be a clearly identifiable external stimulus. Second, that stimulus must trigger a predictable automatic biological response or reflex. Third, that physical response must elicit a feeling or sensation you can visualize or imagine independently of the external trigger. If the reflex has these characteristics, then using the wedge is as simple as setting up an environmental stimulus and then resisting the sensation that it triggers. Over time it becomes easier to maintain the tension between reflex and mental control.

THE VICTIM AND THE PREDATOR The victim and predator act as the two basic archetypes of the ego. The victim represents the passive aspect, while the predator represents the aggressive side of human conditioning. Essentially, the movement of ego is various patterns of passive-aggressive behavior. It is the unconscious energy of passive-aggressive behavior that inspires the activities of worry, anticipation, and regret that also play out as responses of fight, flight, or freeze. Whether spending more time in one aspect or ping-ponging back and forth, the greater purpose of unconsciousness is to help build up emotional momentum to inspire an awakening of renewed perspective. While there are many paths and approaches to waking up from the incubation of ego, it is common when not rooted in the most heart-centered approach to transform the victim into a spiritual victim and exchange the predator for a spiritual predator. This is why it is so essential to always remember how everything is here to help you. When life is on your side, even when appearing as characters that seem to undermine your radiance and joy, you are able to be in communion with the choices always available to you that no person, place, or thing can ever take away.

As a final exercise for this chapter, can you identify which of the three patterns—Find the Bad Guy, the Protest Polka, Freeze and Flee—most threatens your current love relationship? Remember that the facts of a fight (whether it’s a fight about the kids’ schedule, your sex life, your careers) aren’t the real issue. The real concern is always the strength and security of the emotional bond you have with your partner. It is about accessibility, responsiveness, and emotional engagement. See if you can summarize the pattern that takes over your relationship by filling in the blanks in the following statements. Then edit them into a paragraph that best fits you and your relationship. Share it with your partner.

Know Yourself: Are You a Freezer, Flyer, or Fighter? How avoidance coping manifests for you will depend on what your dominant response type is when you’re facing something you’d rather avoid. There are three possible responses: freezing, fleeing, or fighting. We’ve evolved these reactions because they’re useful for encounters with predators. Like other animals, when we encounter a predator, we’re wired to freeze to avoid provoking attention, run away, or fight. Most people are prone to one of the three responses more so than the other two. Therefore, you can think of yourself as having a “type,” like a personality type. Identify your type using the descriptions in the paragraphs that follow. Bear in mind that your type is just your most dominant pattern. Sometimes you’ll respond in one of the other two ways. Freezers virtually freeze when they don’t want to do something. They don’t move forward or backward; they just stop in their tracks. If a coworker or loved one nags a freezer to do something the freezer doesn’t want to do, the freezer will tend not to answer. Freezers may be prone to stonewalling in relationships, which is a term used to describe when people flat-out refuse to discuss certain topics that their partner wants to talk about, such as a decision to have another baby or move to a new home. Flyers are people who are prone to fleeing when they don’t want to do something. They might physically leave the house if a relationship argument gets too tense and they’d rather not continue the discussion. Flyers can be prone to serial relationships because they’d rather escape than work through tricky issues. When flyers want to avoid doing something, they tend to busy themselves with too much activity as a way to justify their avoidance. For example, instead of dealing with their own issues, flyers may overfill their children’s schedules so that they’re always on the run, taking their kids from activity to activity. Fighters tend to respond to anxiety by working harder. Fighters are the anxiety type that is least prone to avoidance coping: however, they still do it in their own way. When fighters have something that they’d rather not deal with, they will often work themselves into the ground but avoid dealing with the crux of the problem. When a strategy isn’t working, fighters don’t like to admit it and will keep hammering away. They tend to avoid getting the outside input they need to move forward. They may avoid acting on others’ advice if doing so is anxiety provoking, even when deep down they know that taking the advice is necessary. Instead, they will keep trying things their own way. A person’s dominant anxiety type—freezer, flyer, or fighter—will often be consistent for both work and personal relationships, but not always. Experiment: Once you’ve identified your type, think about a situation you’re facing currently in which you’re acting to type. What’s an alternative coping strategy you could try? For example, your spouse is nagging you to do a task involving the computer. You feel anxious about it due to your general lack of confidence with all things computer related. If you’re a freezer, you’d normally just avoid answering when asked when you’re going to do the task. How could you change your reaction?

Despite all of our technology, our bodies are just not ready for a world so completely tamed by our desire for comfort. Without stimulation, the responses that were designed to fight environmental challenges don’t always lie dormant. Sometimes they turn inward and wreak havoc on our insides. An entire field of medical research on autoimmune diseases suggests they originate from fundamental disconnect between the outside world and an understimulated biology.

For a second, I’m too shocked to react. I don’t know why; this thing has been lurking between us for weeks, never dormant, always present. But she’s been wary, pushing me away, and I didn’t expect this. My surprise lasts almost no time at all. Just a second’s worth of her lips against mine, her hands, warm against the cool, bare skin of my shoulders. My last intelligent thought is that I’m not letting this go to waste, and then I’m kissing her back. Wrapping my arm around her, bringing her close so that her body lies flush against mine. My free hand tangles in her dark hair, wrapping it around my fingers, following it up to her scalp, the line of her ear. She tastes so good—sweet, like an apple. Her hands slide down my chest, leaving a trail of heat, coming to rest on my hips. Tina shifts her weight and then straddles me. My nerves light up at that, sparking with desire. Fuck, I want her. She’s wearing jeans. I’m wearing jeans. Doesn’t matter that there’s layers of thick denim between us; my body still recognizes the feel of hips pressing against my pelvis. The friction of fabric is rough against my cock, but it’s everything I could have asked for. Her hands rise again, sliding up my chest to rest against my shoulders. She kisses me like she’s been thinking of this as long as I have, like this kiss has been building from the first day we saw each other. She kisses me like there’s no space between us. And there isn’t—not much. I’m not trying to escalate things. I’m not even really thinking about it. But when she smoothes her palm down my chest, my hand creeps up by her side, sliding up until I find the fabric of her bra. Under other circumstances, I might rip it off. But I don’t want to freak her out. I cup her breast in the palm of my hand. She gasps instantly. I was already hard; with that, I find myself turning to stone. Needing, wanting, stone. If I’m stone, she’s fire. Her hips grind into me as my thumb finds her nipple. My lips graze her neck. My tongue darts out and traces down her collarbone. I can’t even remember why I ever thought it was cold in here. It’s a fucking furnace. I pull her close. She’s so fucking responsive. It’s hot beyond belief to watch her go up in flames on top of me, to watch how the smallest touch, the slightest pressure in the right place, gets her going. I don’t have much of a thought process, but it goes something like yes, yes, more now. And she must be thinking the same thing—thank God—because she takes her shirt off. She’s wearing a simple white cotton bra, no padding, and her nipples poke through. I lean forward and catch one in my mouth. She likes it. She grinds against me. Her fingers clench on my shoulders, gripping tight, so fucking tight. I find her other breast—small enough that I can palm it with one hand, so that my fingers can explore every last inch. She’s letting out little moans that seem to go straight to my dick. “You,” I growl out, “have awesome tits.” She freezes on top of me. And then, seconds later, she pulls away. “Don’t.” She reaches for her shirt. “Don’t lie to me. I have nonexistent boobs.” I run my finger over her nipple. “Yeah? What’s this, then?” She shivers. “You have awesome tits,” I repeat. “I love touching them. Licking. Sucking. It makes me fucking wild to be able to drive you crazy like this. Tits are a fucking gift for sexual pleasure. So never tell me you have nonexistent boobs again. I think I just proved otherwise.” She draws in a deep breath. Her eyes meet mine. She looks almost shattered.

For a second, I’m too shocked to react. I don’t know why; this thing has been lurking between us for weeks, never dormant, always present. But she’s been wary, pushing me away, and I didn’t expect this. My surprise lasts almost no time at all. Just a second’s worth of her lips against mine, her hands, warm against the cool, bare skin of my shoulders. My last intelligent thought is that I’m not letting this go to waste, and then I’m kissing her back. Wrapping my arm around her, bringing her close so that her body lies flush against mine. My free hand tangles in her dark hair, wrapping it around my fingers, following it up to her scalp, the line of her ear. She tastes so good—sweet, like an apple. Her hands slide down my chest, leaving a trail of heat, coming to rest on my hips. Tina shifts her weight and then straddles me. My nerves light up at that, sparking with desire. Fuck, I want her. She’s wearing jeans. I’m wearing jeans. Doesn’t matter that there’s layers of thick denim between us; my body still recognizes the feel of hips pressing against my pelvis. The friction of fabric is rough against my cock, but it’s everything I could have asked for. Her hands rise again, sliding up my chest to rest against my shoulders. She kisses me like she’s been thinking of this as long as I have, like this kiss has been building from the first day we saw each other. She kisses me like there’s no space between us. And there isn’t—not much. I’m not trying to escalate things. I’m not even really thinking about it. But when she smoothes her palm down my chest, my hand creeps up by her side, sliding up until I find the fabric of her bra. Under other circumstances, I might rip it off. But I don’t want to freak her out. I cup her breast in the palm of my hand. She gasps instantly. I was already hard; with that, I find myself turning to stone. Needing, wanting, stone. If I’m stone, she’s fire. Her hips grind into me as my thumb finds her nipple. My lips graze her neck. My tongue darts out and traces down her collarbone. I can’t even remember why I ever thought it was cold in here. It’s a fucking furnace. I pull her close. She’s so fucking responsive. It’s hot beyond belief to watch her go up in flames on top of me, to watch how the smallest touch, the slightest pressure in the right place, gets her going. I don’t have much of a thought process, but it goes something like yes, yes, more now. And she must be thinking the same thing—thank God—because she takes her shirt off. She’s wearing a simple white cotton bra, no padding, and her nipples poke through. I lean forward and catch one in my mouth. She likes it. She grinds against me. Her fingers clench on my shoulders, gripping tight, so fucking tight. I find her other breast—small enough that I can palm it with one hand, so that my fingers can explore every last inch. She’s letting out little moans that seem to go straight to my dick. “You,” I growl out, “have awesome tits.” She freezes on top of me. And then, seconds later, she pulls away. “Don’t.” She reaches for her shirt. “Don’t lie to me. I have nonexistent boobs.” I run my finger over her nipple. “Yeah? What’s this, then?” She shivers. “You have awesome tits,” I repeat. “I love touching them. Licking. Sucking. It makes me fucking wild to be able to drive you crazy like this. Tits are a fucking gift for sexual pleasure. So never tell me you have nonexistent boobs again. I think I just proved otherwise.” She draws in a deep breath. Her eyes meet mine. She looks almost shattered.

Incoming call: Adam Reynolds. I let those words fill my vision for a moment. Not because I intend to make him wait; it’s simply that for a second I freeze. Blake’s dad is a wolf, and I feel very much like the rabbit. The last time Adam and I talked, it didn’t turn out particularly well. But right now, the CEO of Cyclone—and the man who, incidentally, still thinks I’m dating his son—is calling me. What can I do? I hit accept. He appears on the screen: messy pepper-gray hair and beard scruff in need of a shave. His gaze fixes on mine. “Tina.” His voice is just a little hoarse. He clears his throat and sniffs. “Is Blake there?” “No.” “Good.” He frowns. “Look. Blake’s a little distant right now. Is something going on with him?” Something is obviously going on between them, but even I can’t tell what it is, and I suspect I know about as much as anyone on the planet except these two. I shake my head. “I’m not talking to you about Blake.” “Yeah.” He blows out a breath. “Probably just as well that you’re loyal to him. I just…” He pauses, tapping his fingers against his cheek. “It’s not that,” I interject. “It’s just that you’re an…” I choke back the word I’d been planning to put in that blank. Last time was bad enough. “You’re a little intense,” I finish. For a moment, he stares at me. Then, ever so slowly, he smiles. “Don’t start holding out on me now. I’m an asshole.” My surprise must show, because he shrugs a shoulder. “I’ve never claimed otherwise.” I suspect this is as close as Adam Reynolds will ever come to apologizing for his behavior in that restaurant. “Blake thinks you’re not an asshole.” “Blake,” Mr. Reynolds says with a roll of his eyes, “is a ridiculously good kid. There’s a reason I’m a little protective of him. I’m always afraid people will take advantage.” I don’t say anything. A little protective is what he is? Despite my silence, he sighs and waves his hand. “Good point,” he mutters in response to the thing I didn’t say. “It hasn’t happened yet, and God knows if he were as naïve as I really feared, it would have by now. Of all the women he could have had, he did choose you.” I think this is intended as a compliment. “Still,” his dad continues. “I worry. Is everything okay with him?” I have the distinct impression that even though Blake has never said so, most of his problems lie with this man. Somehow. Some way. “This is a conversation you should have with Blake.” He puts his fingers to the bridge of his nose. “Fuck.” He doesn’t move for a few moments. And then—of all things—he sniffles. Unconvincingly. “Mr. Reynolds, are you fake crying to try to get my sympathy?” The hand lowers. He glowers at me—obviously dry-eyed. “Fuck me,” he says. “First, call me Adam. Mr. Reynolds makes me sound like some bullshit old fart. Second, I don’t fucking cry. I especially don’t fake cry. Emotional manipulation is for morons who don’t have the strength of will to get people on their side with reason. I have a cold.” “Aw. Poor baby. You should get some rest.” I incline my head toward him, and then widen my eyes. “Oh, wait. I forgot. You can’t.” He shakes his head, but he’s smiling. “Yeah, yeah. My kid has good taste. I’m fucking things up for you. I hope it won’t be too much of a disturbance.” “You know.” I swallow. “I think Blake gave you the wrong impression about us.” “What, that he’s into you more than you’re into him? I got that from him.” I swallow. “That you need to be convinced? That he’s going to end up convincing you, no matter what you’re telling yourself right now? I let out a breath. “Exactly.” Adam points a finger at me. “That’s what I thought. My money’s on my boy. But hey, don’t tell me what’s going on. Who needs details? Surely not his own father. I’m not invasive.” “Right. Calling me in the middle of the night when Blake’s not around isn’t invasive at all.

The Intuitive or Emotional Brain is where our Core Beliefs reside and relates to our intuitive response to outside happenings which result in fight, flight and freeze. Our responses and decisions are fast, automatic, unconscious and difficult to control or modify. This part of our brain gives only partial understanding.

freeze response is triggered when a person, realizing resistance is futile, gives up, numbs out into dissociation and/ or collapses as if accepting the inevitability of being hurt.

How can you explain the loneliness I felt? While In the darkness by myself. How can you explain the hurt that exists from the trauma that persists. My voice seems lost Or as if aside it is tossed. My breath was taken the moment my reality was shaken My defensive behaviors were created to protect me and became automated In my fight, flight or freeze response my intimacy with others was lost at once. Now more darkness falls upon me for the protective behaviors no longer protect me but keeps me in the darkness by myself.

Most of the blaming in these dialogues is a desperate attachment cry, a protest against disconnection. It can only be quieted by a lover moving emotionally close to hold and reassure. Nothing else will do. If this reconnection does not occur, the struggle goes on. One partner will frantically try to get an emotional response from the other. The other, hearing that he or she has failed at love, will freeze up. Immobility in the face of danger is a wired-in way to deal with a sense of helplessness.

According to psychology, cognitive dissonance is when people are confronted with information inconsistent with their beliefs, and their familiar emotions take over their behavior. First, something or someone triggers us. Conflict arises; anxiety escalates; and we react in one of three ways: fight, flight, or freeze. These angry, tearful, or even explosive reactions are our survival responses to perceived threats.

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Most people think there are two natural responses to fear: fight or flight. But there's a third reaction to a bad situation: freeze.

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HELPING KIDS MANAGE EMOTIONAL FLASHBACKS This list is for social workers, teachers, relatives, neighbors and friends to help children from traumatizing families. It is adapted from the steps at the beginning of this chapter. Depending on the age of the child, some steps will be more appropriate than others. Even if you are not in a position to help other kids, please read this list at least once for the benefit of your own inner child. Help the child develop an awareness of flashbacks [inside “owies”]: “When have you felt like this before? Is this how it feels when someone is being mean to you?” Demonstrate that “Feeling in danger does not always mean you are in danger.” Teach that some places are safer than others. Use a soft, easy tone of voice: “Maybe you can relax a little with me.” “You’re safe here with me.” “No one can hurt you here.” Model that there are adults interested in his care and protection. Aim to become the child’s first safe relationship. Connect the child with other safe nurturing adults, groups, or clubs. Speak soothingly and reassuringly to the child. Balance “Love & Limits:” 5 positives for each negative. Set limits kindly. Guide the child’s mind back into her body to reduce hyper-vigilance and hyperarousal. a. Teach systemic relaxation of all major muscle groups b. Teach deep, slow diaphragmatic breathing c. Encourage slowing down to reduce fear-increasing rushing d. Teach calming centering practices like drawing, Aikido, Tai Chi, yoga, stretching e. Identify and encourage retreat to safe places Teach “use-your-words.” In some families it’s dangerous to talk. Verbal ventilation releases pain and fear, and restores coping skills. Facilitate grieving the death of feeling safe. Abuse and neglect beget sadness and anger. Crying releases fear. Venting anger in a way that doesn’t hurt the person or others creates a sense of safety. Shrink the Inner Critic. Make the brain more user-friendly. Heighten awareness of negative self-talk and fear-based fantasizing. Teach thought-stopping and thought substitution: Help the child build a memorized list of his qualities, assets, successes, resources. Help the child identify her 4F type & its positive side. Use metaphors, songs, cartoons or movie characters. Fight: Power Rangers; Flight: Roadrunner, Bob the Builder; Freeze: Avatar; Fawn: Grover. Educate about the right/need to have boundaries, to say no, to protest unfairness, to seek the protection of responsible adults. Identify and avoid dangerous people, places and activities. [Superman avoids Kryptonite. Shaq and Derek Jeter don’t do drugs.] Deconstruct eternity thinking. Create vivid pictures of attainable futures that are safer, friendlier, and more prosperous. Cite examples of comparable success stories.

You’re probably familiar with the three main stress responses: fight, flight and freeze. There’s a fourth. Fawn. And I’m a major fawner. Apparently, it’s a proven response among people who’ve grown up in a household with an emotionally unstable person in it, particularly an adult. I placate. I smooth over. I bend over backwards to keep the peace, because the cold dread that washes over me when someone loses their rag is as irrational as it is real,

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If you’ve ever heard someone refer to the “fight, flight, or freeze response,” that’s the exact same thing as your “stress response”—meaning that when you are stressed, your amygdala is in control. This can cause rash decision-making and more impulsive behaviors.

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Abused children often find a way to live through abuse and cope with the aftermath of these experiences. This may result in common trauma responses: fight, flight, freeze, or fawn. In adulthood, these trauma responses may continue to resurface as a way of coping with intrusive memories or feelings of shame, guilt, or anger related to the abuse.

Set-Based Design: Toyota designs multiple solutions for a problem or multiple options for a situation and holds those options open longer. They’d resist freezing the design and wait as late as possible—until the last responsible moment.

Trauma could be characterized as an event that waws much, too big, and happened too fast. Cars, for example, move way too fast for our nervous system. . . In the case of a motor vehicle accident, it can help to "make more time," to slow down the process to such an extent that the client can find a sequence of events he can respond to, one by one. . . Such expansion of time allows the titration completion of the embedded active motor responses, and the completion of these fight-flight impulses will settle the amygdala and turn off the alarm, because only now has the brain stem truly understood that the danger is over. The same applies for all traumatic memories held in the body- tension in the muscles, the knot in the gut, the lump in the throat. All these are freeze responses: they are frozen motion, defensive movements we did not execute in the time of the event.

Trauma could be characterized as an event that was much, too big, and happened too fast. Cars, for example, move way too fast for our nervous system. . . In the case of a motor vehicle accident, it can help to "make more time," to slow down the process to such an extent that the client can find a sequence of events he can respond to, one by one. . . Such expansion of time allows the titration completion of the embedded active motor responses, and the completion of these fight-flight impulses will settle the amygdala and turn off the alarm, because only now has the brain stem truly understood that the danger is over. The same applies for all traumatic memories held in the body- tension in the muscles, the knot in the gut, the lump in the throat. All these are freeze responses: they are frozen motion, defensive movements we did not execute in the time of the event

amygdala sets off a chain reaction of protective and defensive responses (Pittman and Karle 2015). Your heart rate speeds up, and your blood pressure increases. Neurochemicals spill into your bloodstream. The same information setting off your amygdala arrives at your cortex too, milliseconds later. By the time your rational mind catches up with what’s happening inside you, your body has prepped itself to fight, freeze, or flee. This is the point at which rumination kicks in. Sensing the body’s anxiety, your cortex uses its cognitive abilities to control, manage, and make sense of a formless internal experience of danger. How does your mind exert control? Take a wild guess. Bingo. Overthinking.

Handout The Impact of Stress on Learning … When we experience strong emotions (fear, extreme sadness, anger, embarrassment, etc.), our bodies release the hormone Cortisol, known as the “stress hormone.” This activates the rapid, reflexive responses of the amygdala (located at the back part of the brain), and the thinking part of our brain (the prefrontal cortex where the executive function are), shuts down. Reasoning and decision-making become challenging, we have a hard time considering other people’s perspectives, and we have a harder time accessing our memory. The brain goes into survival mode, which is often experienced as fight, flight, or freeze. Without calm: No learning can take place No problems can be solved Empathy for others becomes difficult

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