Oi, Oi – I so love this piece from the Barefoot Doctor. Incredible truths here that are very useful for unlocking the body.

You either manage the fear or the fear manages you.

Real fear is the fear arising from the shock of loud noise (sudden bangs, explosions, crashes, roars, shouts etc), falling from a great height, facing off with a wild animal or human with violent intent and so on. Real fear is a crucial survival tool when required as it propels you to make an instant (and hopefully correct) choice between escape or standing your ground.

All other fear is merely anxiety generated in the mind and is purely imaginary.

The adrenalin released the first time you felt real fear as a child, albeit unpleasant in the moment is highly habit-forming, possibly even more so than crack cocaine. so with the relief that flooded your body that first time after the cause for the fear had been eliminated.

Hence the compulsive propensity for continually manufacturing fear-thoughts in the mind, even when there is truly nothing to be afraid of.

Along with this propensity comes a tendency to hold the breath and generate tension (holding) in the muscles and soft tissue of the body. This tension gradually forms into set holding patterns throughout the body which increasingly limit the range of both physical movement and movement through life in general. Eventually these patterns cause you to seize up altogether and you die.

To avoid this or at least delay it as much as possible, it is essential therefore, that you desist immediately from holding your breath and holding your muscles and soft tissue tight.

As soon as your breath flows freely and your muscles soften, your mind ceases to feel inclined towards indulging the fear-thoughts and is more inclined to dwell on thoughts and pictures of potential outcomes that make you feel happy instead. And as it’s your mind, you’re totally free to choose which of the two to give dominance to.

One makes you miserable. The other makes you happy. The choice seems clear.

Yet unless you train yourself to be mindful all the while, your mind will unconsciously default to fear-generating mode, as that’s what it’s become habituated to and we always veer towards the familiar.

However the trick is not to attempt in vain to eliminate the tendency. This only makes it go underground and fight back more insidiously. The trick is simply to remind yourself that it’s perfectly natural and ordinary to fee afraid and that as well as that and overriding that, you choose to be fearless and live fearlessly. Having set the mental tone like that, the next step is to stop inhibiting your breathing and to let the breath flow in and out deeply, slowly, evenly and smoothly constantly. Once the breath is regulated, relax every muscle in your body and ask yourself, ‘am I OK like this here and now in this moment,’ to which the answer will invariably be yes. And if not, breathe and relax some more then ask again.

Repeat this every time the fake fear is threatening to overtake you and within three weeks your whole relationship with fear, with yourself and with the world, will have improved by a quantum leap.

May it serve you well.