Falling head first onto concrete

And walking away un-injured

And sometimes we get big jolting personal reminders of how amazing our unconscious is. 

Last week I took a head-first fall off my bike inside the parking garage of my apartment building. The combination of dead algae and rainwater at the bottom of the ramp leading-into the parking garage into my apartment building in Singapore was slippery as hell.

I felt my glasses crush into the side of my face as I hit the concrete floor head first on Friday morning two weeks ago. The front wheel of my bike had slipped from under me, and the next thing I remember was the sensation of my glasses being crushed into my face as my head hit the floor. 

I remember thinking “This is going to really f***ing hurt.

The algae starts growing within minutes of rainfall here in Singapore and it even makes walking dangerous.

If you’ve ever wondered why people don’t walk so fast in the tropics, it’s not just the heat and humidity, it is actually safer to take small slower steps when it is wet.

I wasn’t going fast, less than 10km/h because I knew it was slippery and I had not begun to get out of the saddle to push up the ramp.

I lay there on the cold wet concrete floor for a good three minutes and I swore with each panting breath as my system dealt with the shock of taking a head-first dive onto concrete. 

I checked my legs. My knees hurt like hell but they were working. Weeks later they still are a light shade of yellow and green.

Left hand was really sore but my fingers and wrist were working. Head, neck, collar bones were all working. Left cheek bruised & grazed but the eye-socket was intact.

I realised that in those split seconds as I fell that my unconscious had kicked in to protect me and I must have tucked my head in and rolled. 

In my upcoming book “Making Darkness Visible,” I talk in much more depth about the power of the unconscious and how our body-mind takes a much more active role than we realise. It is protecting us not just when accidents happen, but all the time, and particularly with respect to our emotions and our triggers into drama. 

This power of the unconscious body-mind is not always visible to us, just like the air that we breathe.

It really did f***ing hurt but there was no serious damage. Apart from cuts and bruises I was fine. 

I had avoided skull fracture, broken collar bones, broken ribs, punctured lungs or worse. 

And my unconscious body did all of that completely without any conscious control from me.

I looked around - the bike was behind me on its side and my feet were pointing up the ramp.

The bike had a scratch on the seat, and a bit of superficial damage to the handlebar tape. The front wheel of the bike was facing backwards but it was still straight & true with no buckles or warps.

The plastic left lens of my glasses had deep gouges in it, and my watch on my right wrist was smashed.

When we let our whole body-mind take control we are safe, and that goes for emotional clearing work too.

The resources section of my book references the leading neuroscience research and shows how science is finally beginning to recognise this emotional mind-body connection  and how deeply connected we are to our body, AND each other.

Electromagnetic synchronisation of heartbeat, vagus nerve activation and the endocrine systems. To our ancestors and our children epigenetically.

It is a relationship of trust with ourselves and each other.