Safety & imagination.

What does safety feel like to you?

For some people, the answer is 'I don't know'. Particularly for people living with a lot of trauma, or for those under a lot of stress or going through challenging times. The idea of feeling safe seems a bit abstract and unknowable in a real world sense.

Which makes sense - trauma and stress are carried in the nervous system, in the body, so they're always present until they're resolved in some way. In the world we live in now, the nature of the things that threaten us is very different to thousands of years ago - along with real, physical danger that might include harm from other humans, many of the threats we face are more nebulous. Less tigers, more overwork and sleep disturbances. Less lions, more pressure to live a perfect Instagram-worthy life, more pressure to buy things we don't need to fix problems manufactured by marketing telling us we're not and will never be enough.

It adds up.

Sometimes it's hard to know what safe feels like in our increasingly complex and fast paced world. One way to begin to find a sense of safety is by starting with your imagination.

But if it's 'just your imagination', is it real?

If you're just 'making it up', does it have value?

Yes, and yes.

Imagination is one of the most under-used resources we have.

If we can't imagine it, we can't choose it.

And our imagination is powerful, particularly if we learn to trust and believe in our own imagination.

Imagine I give you a gift. It's wrapped in green paper and tied with a silver ribbon. The box has weight to it that feels nice to hold in both your hands. Maybe you put it down on a table, and pull the end of the ribbon to untie it…

What do you feel, as you imagine that? Curious? A sense of anticipation?

Whatever you feel, those sensations in your body are real. The feeling is real. And it came from something imagined. Imagination is powerful because it can change how we feel, and it can shape where we go.

So back to safety - what if you were to imagine a place that felt safe?

A place where you feel like your favourite self. The way you most like to feel.

If you're struggling for some ideas, here are a few of mine:

A magic library where every book is my favourite book, and it's accessible from anywhere - I just have to walk through a wall to get there. Which, in my imagination, I can do. There's a comfortable old wingback chair by a window that feels like a cocoon where I can sit and read.

Another is a tiny planet that's mostly trees. The ground is warm and sandy-feeling under my feet. It's a hot day, but not too hot. I breathe in the smell of the leaves. It's a quiet place, restful, but very alive.

Another is an impregnable fort on a cliff overlooking a shipwreck sea. The fort has many cats in it. The wind is cold but I am warm. It smells of salt.

How about you? Where are you? Are you alone, or with others? Are there animals around? Nature? A city? Are you sitting, standing, running, resting, dancing? What does it smell like?

As you imagine, what do you feel?

Any feeling is welcome - sometimes you try to imagine safety and instead find everything that doesn't feel like safety. Which can be disheartening, but it's good information for what might need to be tended to on the way to safety. Or is safety the wrong word for you? Perhaps comfort might feel better. Or peace. Or security. This imaginal game has no rules - do what feels best for you.

Feeling safe can be a tender thing, particularly if there are parts of you who might not have felt much safety before. It can feel like a reclamation to start to build a place - even an imagined one - where safety can feel a bit more possible. Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to spend some time imagining your place of safety. If you like, take some time to draw it. Write about it. Dance it. And then, when you're feeling tired or stressed or overwhelmed or you just need a quiet moment - visit it.

This place is yours, and you can go there whenever you like.

With time, and continued attention, these 'imaginary' places get stronger, and the feeling of being held by them gets stronger too.

So. Imagination is powerful. Safety can start in your imagination.

And if you'd like to play with this idea in a friendly creative way, come along to the next online art group, or book in a 1:1 session with me. I look forward to imagining with you.