In part II and III, I explained how to do the observations. This is the crucial step and often great behavioral changes will be achieved by just doing this step without having to learn how to interrupt a pattern in process. Allow all the time it takes for the first step. As long as you are sticking to the observing, you are making progress.
Journaling and meditation are excellent tools for helping with the observations and reflections. They help calm and slow the mind making it easier to get to the point of real time observation. This hardest part with interrupting a pattern is being able to know your self and the pattern well enough that you can see the pattern as it is happening. Knowing a pattern well enough that you know the trigger is the best, but you can still interrupt a pattern without knowing the trigger, it is just hard to intercept and there will be remaining parts that could still be triggered later.
For this example I will use a very simple pattern. The pattern is one where I feel criticized. This causes fear to arise which a feel as a rush of blood and heat to my arms and trunk. Next step would be to try to deflect the conversation by focusing on a negative of the other person. If that doesn’t work then raising my voice and trying deflecting again. This information may have taking many months to observe and understand.
So here the trigger is the criticism. This may be a certain type of criticism coming from a certain type of individual most likely with some sort of authority or relationship.
The idea behind pattern interruption is that if a pattern is interrupted anywhere in it’s execution it will not continue or get back on track. So the best place to interrupt a pattern is at its source the trigger. The next best place is where ever you can.
To interrupt a pattern, first start by taking a deep breath. This will create a little space—often this simple step will derail the next emotion from arising. Then do anything except what your next external action would be. Consciously, think about what to put in here. In my example where I’m facing criticism, the best response might be: “You know you are right, I do that. I will look into that. Thank you for bringing that up.” Or just thinking something positive about the other person instead of something negative. I could try either of these, and see what the outcome is. If I like it then I could continue using it.
When I do my change, it may or may not interrupt the other person’s pattern, but should be sufficient to interrupt mine. The other person may continue on as if you did as you normally would. You may have to be very attentive not to get retriggered in the same conversation.
Doing this once is something to celebrate. Interrupting a process while it is running is an accomplishment. Be aware thought that once is not sufficient to overcome your brain’s automated processing. The next time you get triggered the old process will kick in. If you can, interrupt the process again at the trigger. Take a deep breath and run your interrupt. If you miss the trigger, you can do anything to interrupt the process. You can begin coughing, or make a silly sound and then avoid doing any of the known actions in the pattern.
Each time you interrupt the process, you are changing your brain’s chemistry and remapping the synapses that have wired in this pattern. Each time you interrupt the process it becomes weaker. Each time you are able to add a breath after the trigger the more time you have the next time to see and interrupt the pattern. It will happen quicker than you think; you just have to keep with it.
If the pattern doesn’t dissolve completely, you may find there are additional steps to learn more steps before what you thought was the trigger. You can then observe the new parts of the pattern and begin interrupting them.
Emotional patterns can be interrupted using the same process. It is once again important to get a breath after the trigger emotion. Then add a derail step, like laughing or jumping up and twirling three time in the circle.
Interrupting your brain chatter is just slightly different. First step is to name your pattern. There is that the “you are so stupid dialog.” Generally being able to name the dialog is enough to interrupt the pattern. Thinking the name is like adding the physical breath, only at your brain speed. The faster you can interrupt the pattern the weaker it becomes until you can catch your self about to think something and decide you are not going there. You can use a breath or a positive affirmation to derail.
Moods are entirely different. Moods are mostly effected and changed by external sources and corresponding emotions. Over all avoiding situations that negatively effect your mood and finding situations that positively effect your mood will work. More about this in part V.
Remember that interrupting a pattern is easy. Getting to the place where you can interrupt a pattern is the hard part. Once a pattern is interrupted, it loses any energy it had and it doesn’t do any more damage unless you are immediately triggered and re-enter the pattern.
It takes many interruptions to change a pattern. Maintaining you intention and attention long enough for your brain to rewire its synapses is also hard if you don’t maintain your priority and the understanding of the importance of making the change.
In part V, I will look at other areas that can affection emotions like physical inputs you are receiving.
No comments:
Post a Comment