Tips for stress reduction in emergencies.

A cyclone and floods up one end of the country and fires at the other. I thought I’d share some practical tips to help with the stress of it.

The same release, inner peace and joy that we experience when we discover and use our Feel for our horse, is the same release, inner peace and joy that we experience when we understand our inner guidance in the rest of their lives – even in emergencies. And yeah/na I doubt that many people are actually feeling joy at a cyclone or fire bearing down on them, but it IS possible to feel inner peace. I’ll talk about how in a minute.

My neighbour Sue and I found exactly that inner peace as a bushfire came hurtling over the horizon at us a few years ago.

We listened to every bit of our Feel preparing us and the animals and our surroundings for the fire, knowing that there were terrible losses of homes and properties happening just over the hills, with friends too in the firing line. At times, smoke and ash were dropping all around us.

When it was time, I brought my herd up from the paddock and into the relative safety of the undercover arena on my “come on come on come on” call that routinely brings the whole mob galloping to me and following the bike even if they’ve just been fed.

Sue’s horses were the rockstars of the day though, because I’d never called them like that before. Maybe they knew the drill from listening to my horses coming galloping up from the back paddock on the same call so many times? I can’t remember why it was me getting them – maybe Sue wasn’t home? But I went down to her bottom paddock on the four wheeler bike and brought all of her herd following me too – galloping across the paddocks and slowing down to come through the open gates to the arena with the same big echoey cry of “come on come on come on!” that I use with my own horses.

There was all kinds of things that we were guided to do that afternoon, I can’t remotely remember all of them.

But here’s the thing – we systematically acted on every bit of our inner guidance – so there was no stress.

We were calm as the fire came towards us, because all the preparation that we’d been guided to do, had been done. We’d worked our butts off. I found a lovely photo of us sitting with our feet up watching the fire come towards us off to the left. Our horses too were also perfectly calm even at the times when the smoke was everywhere and the ash was falling.

Then the miracle happened.

The firefighters described it as a miracle. As the fire came over the hill at us, the wind came up from a dozen different directions one after the other, swirling around, driving the fire in on itself. Within minutes instead of smoke we could smell that “fire out” smell. The glow on the sky line got less and less. At that point our herd leader Boots came up to the arena gate asking to go back home to his own paddocks. He was right, that was the end of it…

What were Sue’s and my keys to success for dramatic stress reduction that day?

• We were used to using our Feel for our horses and speaking for myself, it was second nature for me to use the same inner guidance system that the horses teach us, in all aspects of my life. You can’t see me shrugging… it simply makes for an easier and happier life.

• I didn’t wait to feel crappy – I took action on the early warning signal where I felt something wasn’t right and then I was feeling into what I had to know or do to change that warning signal feeling back to active inner peace.

• We took ACTION that reduced or eliminated every stress and fear, until there wasn’t any more to do and we simply weren’t afraid any more. Actually I shouldn’t speak for Sue – I wasn’t anyway!

Tips from what I know all these years later, if you feel fear or anxiety surging in an emergency.

• Ground yourself to the earth and breathe. Flex your feet, stamp them on the ground if you need to, feel the beingness of the earth underneath you. Have the deliberate intent of allowing those feelings to run through you instead of getting stuck. Pay attention to your OUTward breath as you breathe and use that breath to keep those feelings running through you into the earth. She can deal with it, she turns sh’t into beautiful things all the time. Keep half an eye on that outward breath as you move around doing whatever it is that you have to do, that’ll keep you more Present.

• Pay attention to the problem solving thoughts and ideas that come to you while you’re feeling calmer from the grounding and breathing. You’ll find those problem solving thoughts and ideas will come a LOT easier when you’re grounding and consciously breathing.

• Be open to the idea that not everything you are feeling is yours – that in an emergency you may well be getting messages about something to know or do for someone else. I use the word “someone” to include both humans and animals.

• And last but not least, ask yourself “Is it true or not that miracles happen to me too?”

A healing meditation from my reiki grid