With this pattern, we can begin to alleviate the tightness of fight, flight, and freeze.

Step 1: Identify a situation that elicits a strong emotional response in you. #

Step 2: Spend a few seconds getting in touch with your body’s general sensations. #

How would you make the distinction between the right and left sides of your body? Is there a side of your body that is noticeably less warm than the other? Take a few moments to focus on the sensations on each side of your body and describe them in sensory language.

Step 3: Elicit the kinesthetic sub-modalities. #

Step 4: You may experience a variety of emotions, including heaviness, lightness, tightness, burning, slackness, and ache. #

Identify them and note their driving sub-modalities.

Step 5: Now imagine that you can breathe in via the side of your body that is most comfortable for you, starting with your foot and lower leg on that side and moving up to the point where it seems like your breathing connects with your core. #

Step 6: Then follow the path of your breath as it travels from one side of your body to the other. #

Breathe out through your other foot and leg as you exhale, sending your breath back to earth.

Step 7: Repeat steps 5 and 6 at least three times, preferably 7 times, paying attention to your body’s sensations and how they differ at the end of each cycle. #

Step 8: Imagine your breath as a magnet that can take up pleasant feelings and shift them from one side of your body to the other. #

Make a mental note of these specific kinesthetic feelings and recognize them as you breathe in.

Step 9: As you inhale up from the more comfortable side of your body, your breath moves through your core, down into your leg, then into your foot. #

Pause once more and take note of how your bodily sensations have changed. Does it make you feel better, like you’ve gotten some much-needed energy? Do you feel calmer, more relaxed, or anything else? What’s this thing?

Step 10: Breathe up the side of your body that feels the least comfortable or even somewhat unpleasant, allowing your breath to cross over into your core. #

Step 11: Now, visualize exhaling from the side of your body that is most comfortable for you. #

How much of a difference does it make compared to the earlier cycles?

Step 12: Test. #

What does your lower body feel like now? How about your upper body? Of your entire body? When you think about the situation that troubled you, is the emotional response less intense? Lastly, if you have a particular trouble spot in your neck, upper torso, or lower back, or if you just need more experience with this breathing technique, imagine that you can inhale and exhale up to the top of your head. As you exhale, visualize your breath flowing down your spine and out of your tailbone, all the way from the crown of your head, neck, and mid-back. Repeat this as many times as necessary.