In certain situations it’s almost impossible to hold on to a thought. If it’s a thought that you might do predictable, maybe undesirable things under some forms of pressure, that you might find yourself unable to think clearly in those situations, what do you do? How can life not be a series of awful returns and repetitions?

Overwhelmingly intense experiences, as a child or as an adult, can lead to intense moments in your future life being unthinkable: you might fly into a rage or a deep sadness, or forget, or thoughtlessly comply, or lie, or jump into situations without noticing the complications or even danger. Maybe, for example, an angry parent has left you with a predisposition towards losing yourself in some way when you feel singled out, under the spotlight, or noticed in some way. These kinds of situation can occur in so many forms.

What you need when the time comes, when intensity threatens to overwhelm you, when you can’t regulate yourself as you normally might, is not only a thought. Not only insight. You need a thought contained within a word or a phrase, attached to a physical action. Maybe the word ‘stop’. Or ‘reverse’. Or some kind of a mantra: ‘no more of this’. When you’re in trouble you repeat that phrase to yourself and do something: step backwards, take hold of a necklace, a coin, yourself … something like that.

This way you can step out of the old dynamics. You can refuse the call of the situation. You can begin something new.