SCREAM Yourself Healthy This Week

SCREAMING Into Our Best Selves Never Felt So Good

It was calm morning walking my dogs out to do their business on an otherwise peaceful Sunday, when my eyebrows high-jumped my forehead to the grinding sound of a chainsaw grinding, blown over palm branches that were no match for this morning’s early howling wind.

While this chainsaw was wielded by a local county worker off of his Tampa Bay county work truck, last night’s chainsaws were slashed about by the other-worldly scare actors at Busch Garden’s Howl-O-Scream night.??I am a returning Florida resident from years ago, this time with a wife by his side, the amazing Maria Paula, and as we looked about for a fun possible activity to share an evening together, we chose to walk around a dark park that was staged with fear factors and supplied with demonic actors.?Many of my friends and colleagues have made “Halloween Horror Nights” or Howl-O-Scream” nights annual trips to their calendars and I finally understood why, courtesy of the sound of that Tampa ?worker’s tool.

Here are my Top FIVE Reasons why a good “SCREAM” is healthy this week and always moving forward:

1.?????The ANITCIPATION- walking together like Fred and Daphne in a Scooby scene from childhood, we KNEW there were frights around every corner, but you never knew, you know?!?Leaning in on each other and when tension is high in relationships and allowing both parties to SCREAM it out is a great way to knock 30 points off your blood pressure…Being the rock while another screams off your arm is an honor in life and in most couples it is reciprocated through life’s many painful or scary experiences.?If you are an anxious person, then screaming (or deep breathing Homs in more meditative setting) is a great exercise or just faceplant yourself into a pillow and belt one out.

2.?????THE UNKNOWN- In my years as a clinician and in my personal life, I’ve come to believe that we are not “afraid of the unknown.”?What we are truly afraid of is- “Loss of our known.”?Explore this in your lives and you may be onto your next most amazing experience because you leave the comfort of what you knew for a proposition of something of greater value to you.?All you have to risk is everything, and in those circumstances a good SCREAM can alleviate the stress bubbling up in the cauldron of your lost soul soup.

3.?????THE ANGER- Releasing that putrid energy that harms us both internally and externally through scream is much more beneficial than doing the physical opposite by destruction in times of hurt or pain.?If you are feeling a little irritated and angry and some scares (when they are known coming in a setting like Howl-O-Scream) can lift the deadened spirits quicker than any witchcraft potion or magic pill that the corner Witch tries to sell you.??If all we do is “dull the noise” then the bell will still be ready to ring at the next interaction with friction!?GET IT OUT OF YOU with a yell!?“I have exorcized the demon OUT of me…if exorcism doesn’t do it, try exercise.

4.?????IT’S OKAY TO BE AFRAID! What I didn’t do in the haunted house was act all macho and pretend like it wasn’t scary!??The unexpected “BOO’s” were just as awesome as the make up and stage creations Busch Garden’s put into their experiences. In our daily lives we come to some situations where the presence of fear is inevitable.?When that happens ACKNOWLEDGE it, pinpoint where there “feeling” is really affecting you, and SHARE IT.?Just like a burden is lightened by a friend, so is that fear knowing another “feels” like you do too. ??Best part they may have already gone through the “haunted house” and know how to get you out safely!

5.?????WE’RE SO MUCH MORE THE SAME THAN NOT: Having to feel like you have to pick a side, or if I don’t support this than I am labeled “that” might be any Ghoul’s bloodlust number one, so keep in mind during these days, “We all scream.” “We ALL have lost someone close to us,?ALL of our times are not the same as they were two years ago (let alone two hours ago), and we ALL don’t know what tomorrow is because we are creating it today.

?Let’s all enjoy the here and now with “screams” of hope, joy, and togetherness and we can throw all of our menacing ghoulish behaviors back to the intended never-world!?

Happy Halloween!

Adam, Maria Paula, Candy, and Huckleberry