The balance of calm and anxiety is directed by the parasympathetic relaxing system and the sympathetic alerting system. Both carry information from the body into the core brain, which then controls the switch for more or less calmness.
You can choose calm over panic in confronting a stressful situation because the brain has systems for relaxation and calm to counteract the mechanisms for alertness and anxiety. The key isn't in the frontal lobes, the seat of logic and thinking, but within our core brain, which controls our emotions and impulses, and the vast environmental sensor that is our body.
The conflict between the primitive core brain and rational brain leads to the angst and unrest that characterizes so much of modern life. We can't sleep at night, we're tense and edgy during the day. We can't concentrate, can't relax. When we don't activate our body's calming parasympathetic mechanism, our runaway sympathetic system causes us to succumb to heart attacks and strokes, even as it helps us meet our daily deadlines.
Fierce Qigong, with it's mindful attention to the slow, rhythmic movements of the body, tunes into the parasympathetic system and familiarizes the body and the mind with the experience. With regular practice, we learn to monitor our emotions, our bodies, our state of mind, so that we can consciously choose calm rather than chaos. Eventually, sometimes quickly sometimes slowly, the choice moves into our subconscious where it becomes just a part of who we are--rational but calm.
When we choose the parasympathetic system over the sympathetic, we are better able to achieve our goals while avoiding the damage caused by chronic stress. We enjoy better sleep, greater peace and freedom from emotional and physical limitations that plague most of the human race.
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