Under Pressure
I have dreams that I am losing all my teeth. Deep in the cavern of sleep, I slide my tongue all around my mouth checking for the loose ones. There is panic and shame when I feel when my tongue lands on a space where a tooth once lived. Then a chain reaction occurs and all the surrounding teeth get wiggly too, by making this little bit of space more space opens up. I try to avoid moving them too much with my tongue, but there is this uncontrollable urge to wiggle them more. Like an itch you cannot stop scratching even though you know it is getting worse. Then I make a dream call to a dentist and I try to explain that I all my teeth are loose, but I am holding my jaw tight, so my teeth don’t fall out of my face. The dentist cannot understand me because the words come out all garbled, I am talking like I have marbles in my mouth.
The hubs and I coincidentally both went to the dentist this week. He cracked a crown. I faired OK. I asked my dentist about it and she reported an extraordinary high level of patients cracking their teeth over the last few months due to grinding and clenching the jaw. The New York Times published an article about it recently too. Check it out HERE. This article is filled with solutions that us yoga teachers cheer for: sit up tall without slouching the spine, breathe deep through your nose, decompress and elongate the spine, and tapping into the parasympathetic nervous system. But it also introduced me to the term "doomsurfing". You can probably define that quickly on your own. I loved this quote the author Kevin Roose offers:
There’s nothing wrong with staying informed. But we need to practice self-care, and balance our consumption of grim news with gentler kinds of stimulation, for our own health and the sanity of those around us.
When I look up teeth falling out dreams there are two common themes. One is filled with gloom, loss, fear and insecurities. The other offers that this dream is about personal growth, renewed strength, self esteem, and rebirth. In seeking truth, explore both sides. Our brains are hard wired to explore and contemplate everything that is threatening and bad. The negativity bias is when things of equal intensity, the more negative in nature (e.g. unpleasant thoughts, emotions, or social interactions, harmful/traumatic events) have a greater effect on one's psychological state than things that are neutral or positive.
I invite you to remember and seek out the positive. It is easy to get sucked down the rabbit hole and keep clicking. Pause, take a moment and consciously flip the switch. Take action, feel empowered. MOVE your body in a way that is empowering and relieves tension. Invitation below to do that with me. Your dentist will thank you.