I teached our process hundreds of times, in all kinds of special places, but one small workshop is etched in my memory.
I remember I was not satisfied when I entered the lecture room. The room was too small and it was impossible to arrange the chairs in a circle. The workers who entered earlier sat in the back of the room to talk to each other leaving the front row to a few older female workers. I thought no one had told them what a Detant workshop was and I started the presentation a little discouraged. To be honest, I didn't think the crowd was suitable.
Usually in short workshops we explain and practice the Detant method without measuring data. This time I thought it might be interesting if we measured the heart rate, so I asked, who is willing to put a heart rate monitor, who is ready? the women sitting in front said they don't mind. I put them on, made sure the heart rate was projected on the screens and started talking. During the round of introductions, I realized that the women sitting in front were very experienced, fifteen, twenty, even twenty-five years of daily care for a difficult disabled population of the hospice.
After a few minutes I started to notice something strange, the eyes of the four workers who wore a heart rate monitor were not on me, they were on the screens that showed their heart rate. I looked together with them. All of them lowered their heart rate by more than ten beats per minute relative to the heart rate they had when I assembled the system.
Amazing.
Rarely do I see such ability before the learning the protocols. Once, in a workshop, I saw such control in a practitioner whose hobby was deep free diving. Here sat a quartet of older women in front of me, working one of the hardest jobs I can imagine, but with the level of control of a free diver.
I asked, can you also reach a higher pulse rate? In a few moments they were able to do this and then lower it again.
And how do you do it? I asked one of them, she smiled and shrugged, she didn't know.
I actually do know, from the fact that I practice protocols with the help of which I lower and raise my heart rate at will, but I had to learn them. I was surprised by the indirect ability to control the heart rate, an ability that developed working years where it is mandatory to carry out emotional regulation all the time.
