I am aware

I can be quite critical. Of the Greek predicament, in a political way. Of the well meaning of civil servants concerned with dispersing benefits. Of mindfulness. My experience with it hasn't been very positive in the past, which makes me quite critical of it now. And I was critical of the ACT training when I started it. But I thought no harm would come of it and I didn't want to rule out any benefits I might have from it.

Now I have to admit it really seems to work. This idea of telling myself "I am aware of having the thought that..." whenever a disruptive thought enters my head, does help a great deal in relieving anxiety. This simple wording trick puts the thought at a distance, relieving me of the immediate stress. When I experienced this, I was amazed and relieved. To finally have something which seems to immediately help in managing stressful thoughts.

So I have been saying this to myself a great deal over the past few days. And though the effect didn't seem to diminish, I did find one drawback. Although my mind can now be manipulated in abandoning escalating thoughts, for which I am grateful, it seems this message has not yet reached the rest of my body. For tonight, for example, I tensed up considerably, leaving me with a stiff neck caused by stress, and the inability to fall asleep even though I was very tired and thought I would do so in an instance. I did manage to drift away for maybe an hour, but then awoke again with an even stiffer neck, evidence of considerable stress in my body. Strangely enough I did not awake, as I would have in the past, with disconcerting thoughts. So I didn't have to tell myself I was aware of them. But what do I tell my body when it reacts like this? Here are some meds that will calm you down? My psychiatrist isn't in favor of that, though I did get medication temporarily that will do just that. So now I am aware of a new problem: how to have the rest of my presence fall in with my thoughts and get rid of escalating tension. Since ACT seems to focus solely on thought processes, I start to become critical again. Will this be the answer to my predicament, or will it just shift the problem to a field where it is medicatively manageable?