Saturday morning, December 3, 2011. I am sitting in a "checking in" circle at a Facilitation Training weekend event. I sit with my feet planted flat on the floor, sitting up straight, hands on my thighs with palms up and relaxed, eyes closed. I am instructed to breathe deep through my nose, hold a few seconds then blow out and make noise while exhaling.
The facilitator then instructs us to visualize when we were young, to see our loving parents caring and guiding us, vision ourselves crafting our jar, or something, filling it with pure clean water, then visualize our family, grandparents.......and then I lose it. I snap out of it. I can't go any further. I sit and wait for the exercise to end. When it does we are asked to express what the experience meant to us. There are 30 plus people in the room. Someone five chairs to my left starts to tell us what it meant to him, then he passes it to his left. Now there are about 25 people to speak before my turn comes.
Each person relates their thoughts. Some are happy memories, some are sad - and I am boiling up as I stir in my seat. My blood pressure feels like it’s rising to the point my ears plug up. I take one deep breath after another but there is this pounding in my ears that makes it hard to hear. I'm glad I have the time to think of what I am going to share when my time comes. I look to the others as support, that their stories are happier or worse than mine so I can just say it and get it out.
It must have taken at least 20 minutes to get to me. I'm not sure. Time was oblivious at this point. When I opened my mouth, I just blurted out "the experience for me was the exact opposite". I wasn't seeing the perfect family, my father had left me and my mother when I was 3 or four years old, the jar of water became the bottle of milk that was thrown at my mother as I stood beside her. It smashed against the wall behind us.
As I describe it all, tears start flooding from my eyes. I'm stunned; this doesn't happen. I have told this story many times and it’s never happened like this before. Now I feel like I'm on the spot, everyone is looking at me. Some looked questioning, some look supportive and most don't know what to think or do. I feel good being amongst them. I hear the facilitators speak and tell the others to “breathe”.

When the exercise ended the facilitators shared with me the fact that these things can happen in those circles, something might trigger emotions that need to be addressed. They told me I had just gone very deep in to my state of "Self"- or something like that.
Not too long ago on PositiveLite.Com I wrote about how my story wasn't as traumatic as others/ I wrote about growing up and being molested, writing without having these feelings - to me they didn't exist. Well I guess this was an awakening of sorts; they are just buried deep but some managed to come out. I had no idea it would come out that way, that I would be crying as it did.
I was able to talk more about it in another exercise while talking about "triggers" - how during a facilitation, what one person might talk about can trigger a thought or memory in someone else in the group. I shared with everyone how I had sat through the "check in" circle the day before, how I felt like the kettle on the stove with the cork in it. The facilitators asked why I didn't just get up and leave the room; it was allowed. I was frozen I guess, I felt I had to get it out. The guy who had been sitting beside me shared that he had felt my energy but couldn't identify what it was. He said he could feel this intense heat coming from me but he had no idea why it was happening. The facilitators were very curious about what they should look for in the future from me because I took them by complete surprise.

I see myself as someone who can bottle things up very well, so well I could run a bottling company. I am also guilty of minimalizing my life in comparison to others. I will always be grateful for what I have because so many have less, but I don't have everything I need. Many of my supporters and friends have tried to drill into me that my story is just as important as theirs.
There are some very relevant feelings here that I need to attend to. I have to stop telling everyone I am alright all the time; it’s clear to me now I’m not. I will practice saying, “I am good and I'm working on getting much better”. I am going to add this experience to my list for the doctor tomorrow.