Stress, Trauma & Earthquakes

A self-help Response to Stress

This simple exercise, Hook Ups, is known all round the world for its ability to calm our human response to stress and shock. It is particularly useful for the effects of stress following the Christchurch earthquakes and aftershocks.

Download Hookups Instruction Sheet

What is stress?

As far as the brain is concerned, ‘stress’ is an overload of sensory information arriving to be processed. An unfamiliar situation generates new sights, sounds, and also new feedback about where we are in space. This applies whether the new situation we are in is ‘good’ or ‘bad’. Add in a deluge of messages of fear or panic as well, and the brain really does have a lot to deal with!

Response to Stress:

Technically known as the reflex producing ‘fight or flight’, this is the instinct all mammals have to move – to run or to fight – when our senses tell us we are in danger.

Whether it’s fighting to protect our young from attack, or running for cover when the ground shakes (again), our system goes on alert, sending extra blood to prepare our limbs for action!

The responses are generated in the unconscious part of the brain. If the eyes, ears, and /or sense of balance send information that adds up to danger, we are wired to respond all other mammals with the fight or flight response.

Once the fight/flight response has served its purpose we may need help to calm down. This especially applies when aftershocks go on for months, and we’ve already done all there is to do to be safe.

Here’s how to relax again:

You can be sitting, standing or lying down in bed. You might have a small child in your lap while you do the exercise around them with your own hands and legs. As you calm down, so will they.

Hook Ups Reduce Stress by enabling you to:

1. think clearly and decide what to do now
2. relax, and focus on what’s appropriate right now – which may be to  rest and sleep.

The first position works with the Acupuncture energy lines to clear stuck energy patterns. This position has been found to direct our own energy to travel more directly in the pathways that cover the torso, starting and ending in specific locations on the fingers and toes.

The second position re-engages the full range of the brain’s ability to process and respond. When we experience the symptoms of stress, human beings react by becoming over-focussed on either

• The details: taking things slowly, one step at a time. Or
• The ‘big picture’: moving swiftly and randomly, scanning the whole pattern, and jumping to conclusions.

To respond well, we need access to both ways of processing.

Using these moves has been found to bring relaxation and relieve the effects of stress – whatever its source.  Do each exercise for at least a minute and continue as long as convenient. Watch your breathing to deepen and your heart rate slow as your body and brain relax.

Submitted by Marion Pawson

Dreaming in Colour

I felt as though a giant knot had been taken out of my body……. 

Hi Marion

I want to thank you for yesterday.

Something neat happened last night. Up until I was about 5 or 6 yrs I had a happy place, where if I closed my eyes I could make beautiful pictures and colours on a screen. I got a lot of comfort from that. Around the age of 5 or 6 yrs I lost that ability, I closed my eyes one day and could only see black, and all my dreams have always been black with very vague shadows. I missed that ability and comfort terribly right up until my twenties when I finally gave up on it.

Last night I had a dream which started off as normal which is (uncomfortable and me in a bad situation) but then it turned into the most wonderful dream full of beautiful colours. I was in control of what happened to me in the dream. I couldn’t describe the dream in a million years but I do remember lots of little snippets of the dream where there was violence and just plain conflict between people but I was able to avoid them and stay in my own happy place.

The other great thing was, when I woke up at 1.30 am I felt as though a giant knot had been taken out of my body, mainly my tummy.

I wrote this email by hand at 3.30 am last night and the amazing thing is I wrote it totally effortlessly. Which is amazing because writing has been a real hassle to me for years.

I was learning lessons during the dream. I learnt that I don’t have to walk with people every step of the way and try and rescue them. I don’t have to feel responsible or guilty because they are not happy or coping. I am allowed my own happy place. I don’t have to be attached to people at the hip for the relationship to feel real. I feel free.

This is a great gift I have received. If it wears off over time I will return for another session. I feel so good today I cant believe it.

Megan