Tail Bone Drop Exercise (Grounding)
The purpose of this exercise is to refocus your mind-body system from a fear based perspective to a relief based perspective.
I sometimes recommend it for clients when they are in stage nine of their healing process. In stage nine, they have already completed the most difficult part of their detox journey (stage five, surfacing of past imprints, merging with the shadow parts of the psyche). They are on the other side of the "crisis" for this particular layer and are feeling relatively clear and relieved.
This is when the tail bone drop exercise is most beneficial - when you're already in a somewhat neutral state.
I should note here that I do not recommend this exercise for people when they are in other stages of their healing process. This is because the inner dialogue used in this exercise (variations of the statement "what a relief") if used when parts of the psyche are in a place of tremendous woundedness or suffering - could have a suppressive effect.
In other words, if part of your psyche is needing to experience and express sadness or anger or confusion and you are telling yourself "What a relief, I'm in the hands of a Higher Power and I can relax now.", then you could be sending a message to the messy parts of your psyche (the parts that are sad or angry or confused) that they are not wanted, not embraced and not worthy of your attention. This can create a split within your psyche and in the long run slow down your process.
So, you should be careful and conscious about how and when you use this exercise.
A good application of this exercise would be when you're in bed at night (assuming you're already in a semi-neutral state). You could try doing this exercise 10-30 minutes every night before you turn off your light. You can also do it when you wake up in the morning. Stay in bed an extra 10-30 minutes if you can - and practice the tail bone drop exercise repetitively.
It goes like this…
Imagine that cells of your spinal cord are little people and they are in a state of on-going worry and hyper-vigilance. Then imagine that a miracle has occurred. Your Higher Power is now in charge of healing your situation and now you can relax. You now have nothing to worry about. You think to yourself - "What a relief. No more need to worry. What a relief. God's in charge now. What a relief. I can let go of all that hyper-vigilance. What a relief. What a relief!"
As you're tuning into this inner thought process imagine the cells in your spinal cord having these thoughts and the emotion of relief. Then imagine that they are all relaxing out of their hyper-vigilance. As this occurs imagine the discs in your spine relaxing downward and starting to separate. They look less clenched now.
Then imagine that the cells in your tail bone area have also relaxed. Now instead of your tail bone tucking up under your pelvic area (a sign of chronic fear and protection), now it's relaxing downward toward the floor.
This is a visualization or course. At the same time you're doing this visualization try to feel your tail bone actually dropping down. Give your tail bone and your spinal cord permission to let to go of the hyper-vigilance.
Your focus and inner dialogue might look and sound like this:
What a relief.
Imagine your tail bone dropping down.
What a relief. I'm finally healed of my chronic illness (or whatever situation you are struggling with).
Imagine your tail bone dropping down.
What a relief. I'm finally healed of all of my financial challenges.
Imagine your tail bone dropping down.
What a relief. God really is in charge. I can relax now.
Imagine your tail bone dropping down.
What a relief. It's been taken care of by my Higher Power. No more need to try to figure this out.
The repetition of this exercise is important because it's your way of telling your body wisdom and your Higher Self that you are intending to move into this relief-based perspective. You are willing to envision yourself being in this perspective over and over again.
When you practice this type of repetition, your body wisdom hears you and then starts to follow your intention. Eventually your system will start to shift towards a more relaxed, more freed up place. You'll eventually start to experience a nice feeling of relief and expansion.
The expansion and opening may continue for a short while… expansion, opening, tail bone dropping, expansion, opening, tail bone dropping until you hit the next "wall" - that is, the next layer of body armor that is blocking you from being in a more relaxed, relief-based perspective.
When you hit the next "wall", your system will most likely clench and contract. Often when this happens with people they start to connect with an inner voice that says something like "You can't relax. You're not safe. Look at the situation. You're just deluding yourself. Look at all the scary stuff and look at what happened last time you let go of your guardedness. You can't relax. Fear, fear, fear."
Know that this is to be expected. This is an indication that you've moved forward in your process and surfaced the next layer to work through. At this point you'll need to be present with the shadow material or past body memory that is surfacing. Witness and relax into the material. Another self-healing practice may be needed at this point or the material that surfaces may pass through gracefully and quickly as you stay present with yourself. You can always use the tools of Self Parenting or Voice Dialogue. And, if you need support or input you can call me.
If you do this exercise before you go to sleep at night then you may open up a healing process that you can work through in your dream state. A lot of my clients prefer processing in their dream state for obvious reasons. You can always set the intention to maximize how much processing you do in your dream state (to the degree that it's in your highest good) and then let your body wisdom respond accordingly.
Another note about the tail bone drop exercise - this exercise could also be considered a grounding exercise. It can help move you out of your head, out of entrancement, out of distorted perception and into a more grounded feeling state. If you're obsessing about how to solve a problem, mentally going in circles, then this exercise may be a way to ground yourself and shift your focus.
And, one variation one of my clients suggested is to imagine that a 500 pound weight is connected to the bottom of your tail bone. This heavy weight is attached via a long cord ten miles deep into the earth.
Another variation is to envision this heavy weight being a heart (or something that you find comforting or strengthening, maybe some type of spiritual symbol) and as the tail bone relaxes downward this heart releases healthy cerebral spinal fluid and healing energy into your spinal cord.
You can experiment with your own variations. Be your own laboratory and see what works for you.