Energy - Emotions - Purpose
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Spotlight collapse - 3 realms to address
I’m on a kick of focus around “spotlight collapse” – also known as performance anxiety, also known as stage fright.
This is not just for performers - it’s for anyone who struggles under pressure. That pressure brings a kind of intensity and so much comes to the surface.
It’s a bit like a rainstorm and the sewer system, or the river, or the flood plain. There’s lots of space in theses systems to address water most of the time. But then an intense storm happens (your performance), and the amount of water (your feelings, unaddressed energies) cannot flow all at once.
And then if you haven’t addressed your emotional realm, there’s a lot of backup, taking up space. So your channels for flow are already narrowed because of the build up.
When pressure brings up panic
Do you know this situation:
Sweating, shaking, cotton mouth, you need to pee. Your brain doesn’t feel right. You can’t find your thoughts, much less put them into words.
You want to hide….but you’re a grown up, so you force yourself to stay and do the thing you planned to do.
<<You might call this performance anxiety, stage fright, introversion, or high sensitivity.>>
When advice causes inner conflict
If you related to the feelings of panic and agitation at the prospect of conflicting advice, let me suggest it is amplifying internal conflict. Right? Maybe you already knew this. Probably you did. However, it's taken me forever to learn this lesson.
Stand your sacred ground
A number of years ago I worked as an apprentice at a summer vocal program. One of my duties was playing for voice lessons every day. One of the teachers was intense and mean, to say the least. She would regularly scream at her students, all kind of profanities, and call them stupid, or fat, or anything else nasty. Sometimes she got really physical with them, yanking on their face or jaw or pushing with all her might on their abdomen.