Safety is one of the aspects that we learn early in life and then over time we develop “strategies”: how do we establish safety in the environment, when we feel unsafe what we do then, and so on.
To run, to avoid, to dissociate is a strategy to get away from a situation in which we feel uncomfortable. To tense up, to become defensive, is an attempt to fight the situation. To appease the situation, to please the “scary” person, to do what is expected, to fake it at all costs. These are all working strategies that we have developed. They have helped us at some point in the past. This is a great thing that enabled us humans to survive, but it also makes us stuck, non-spontaneous – rigid. We cannot just decide to drop it. We can however commit to exercising different patterns, and different behaviours, to make a change over time.
Rope bondage is a “concentrated” environment that sets you under pressure. When you hang from the ceiling, with six ropes on your chest, your body has to find a way to cope – it will do the exact same thing that worked last time.
We will look later at some strategies that are more or less helpful in ropes. But now for a moment, I would like you to have a moment of respect and admiration for how much your body already knows and does for keeping you safe, for the intelligence and wisdom of your body, that would try to ensure your survival at all times. It is truly touching, isn’t it?
Next time in ropes, when you have your resistance coming up, you cannot shut down your brain or let go of control – don’t get annoyed with yourself. Appreciate how intelligent and dedicated your body is to keeping you safe. The way to learn and expand the space where we play goes through appreciating and working together with these patterns, not pushing through them.
We are the same people in and out of ropes.
What I say now, is more on the general side of safety. Because the mechanisms are the same. Your sense of safety in a rope session works the same when you need to give a presentation at work or try to survive a family dinner… You are the same person.
This is the same pattern that shows up when we feel under pressure.
When we understand that, we understand that our sense of safety has something to do with us – also in ropes.
When we are aware of our patterns, we have a space for change, for experimentation, for growth. We can learn what our bodies do to cope wth the impact, what is within our capacity and how far on the edge we can go in the moment.
We start taking agency for our own safety.
To be continued!