Out of your mind
Magnetic Earrings & the mind-body connection
It’s the late nineties and according to my younger sister and I, magnetic earrings are the best thing this world has to offer.
We weren’t allowed to get our ears pierced until we were older, so magnetic earrings were our gateway to a better life; the cool and edgy life we wanted where our ears flaunted tarnished dolphins and decorative shapes.
One night my parents went out on a date and left my sister and I in the loving care of my grandparents. Just before bedtime, instead of brushing our teeth and winding down, Renee and I found ourselves sitting criss-cross-applesauce on the bathroom counter. We were trying out all kinds of combinations with our prized magnetic earrings. As could be expected, our accessorizing escalated from double ear piercings to lip piercings to nose piercings- where our fun would come to an end.
Renee placed the itty bitty magnetic stud at the base of her little nose and spun around. We squealed with delight; it looked so real! Moments later those squeals turned to tears. Renee sniffed ever so slightly, shooting the internal magnetic piece up into the right side of her nasal cavity.
Before she even had a second to panic, I assured her I knew just what to do! I secured another magnetic earring where the previous one had been at the base of her right nostril.
They’re magnets, after all, and the solution was laughably obvious. To my credit, I wasn’t wrong. Just as I had expected, the new magnet was definitely attracted to the other magnet. But much to my surprise, it pulled the second magnet UP into her sinus cavity rather than pulling the other one DOWN out of her nose.
The worried frown on Renee’s face deepened.
“It’s okay, it’s okay, it’s okay. I have another idea!” The most confident Charissa is a panicked Charissa.
Clearly the magnetic pull was too powerful when both were placed inside the same nasal canal. We needed a bit of a barrier. So this is how I ended up putting another magnetic earring on Renee’s other nostril. Convinced this would fix it all, I was stunned yet again when the two magnets lodged in the right side of Renee’s nasal cavity sucked up the third magnet from Renee’s left nostril.
Let’s do a quick headcount: at this point Renee had three tiny little magnets wedged up her nose, pinching her face together between her eyes. I will never unsee this visual. And now that I have permission to laugh about it, I do. Often.
As a last ditch effort, I dragged our remaining magnetic earring along the outside of her nose. I hoped this would allow me to keep ahold of the magnet and tow the other ones to safety. But alas, the internal force was too strong, and I could not pull the magnets out of her nose.
GETTING BACK INTO YOUR BODY
Last week I wrote about the importance of knowledge. I made a case that knowledge is power, and when we understand our trauma responses, we are better equipped to perpetuate healing in our own lives and the lives of others.
Now I’m going to tell you how important it is to get out of your dang head. (Look at that, another one of those intimidating balances we have a lifetime to navigate!)
Because I constantly strive for control, I have a tendency to find comfort in information. The more I know, the more control I think I have over outcomes, decisions and experiences. But sadly for me, the bulk of trauma healing actually depends on getting out of our mind and into our body.
Have you heard that phrase before: get back into your body? It’s so clear and yet so confusing, isn’t it?
We go throughout our day getting bumped and pricked and poked by triggers that many of us never even register. All of a sudden we’re just gripping our to-go mug so hard our knuckles are white. Our shoulders are so tense, they’re practically touching our ears. How’s your jaw right now? Did you even realize you were clenching it?
As trauma survivors, our physical responses to real or imagined danger may feel completely overwhelming and unmanageable. Instead of noticing and managing the physical experience, we get sucked up into our minds, safely away from the threat of our physical experience.
Once we’re in our minds, some of us may use sleep as a way to convince our rapidly beating heart, tightening chest or trembling body to shut up. Others of us may try to numb our overactive mind with food, alcohol, substances, sex. And others of us may intellectualize our experience to pieces, using reason to wrestle our physical experience into submission.
Yes. We do have to intellectually acknowledge our reactions so we can process and make sense of them. But we must let our body process what it’s feeling too.
What happens when we don’t? Just like the magnets, when we get sucked up and out of our bodies into our minds, tension builds. We end up with triggers and anxieties pinching us between the eyes and distorting our experience. In these moments knowing all the things is not enough. Our mind can only do so much before we must get out of our heads and let our body process our pain.
WHAT DOES THAT ACTUALLY MEAN?
Eventually I surrendered in the great magnet fight and brought in the big guns: Grandpa. Because he is a scientist, he immediately went for the tweezers. The second he grabbed ahold and pulled one magnet out, the other two fell out on their own. One dropped out of Renee’s nose, and the other fell down the back of her throat. Her body knew exactly what to do and immediately coughed it up. Our bodies are so much smarter than our mind allows us to believe.
This is probably why so many of us avoid “getting into” our bodies. Not only are we afraid of an overwhelming experience we can’t control, we may also fear that we don’t know how to effectively be in our body. Spoiler: our minds do not have to act as cruise directors for our bodies to process what they need to. In fact, our minds might need to quietly step aside.
When we pull ourselves out of our heads, our body knows how to do the rest.
A PRACTICE
Take a minute and close your eyes while breathing deeply. Pretend there is a headlamp attached to your forehead. Run the light from the tip of your toes all the way to the top of your head. Wait and listen for your body to talk to you. Describe to yourself what you’re feeling. Where are you feeling it? When have you had this experience before? Don’t try to explain it, just notice and experience it.
It might not seem that helpful reading it on paper, but give it a try from time to time, and see how it goes.
Trauma healing is all about understanding our responses on an intellectual level so that we can recognize the signs when our body is asking us to pay attention. The gateway to healing is unifying the divide between mind and body. You can’t focus on one without the other, so today let’s start by giving our bodies some much needed air time.
For more healing resources, check this out!
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