First, I realize now (based on research and additional experience with clients) that we are not replacing a "bad" feeling with a good, warm, attuned one. I made too much of feelings in the strengthening exercise video; I should have simply asked that the person link and image of an attuned face to an image of the challenging flight situation.

IF there is a warm feeling when you first try out a memory of an empathic moment, the warmth proves you have a good moment. But don't expect the feeling to endure; it will not hold up.

All we really need to do is link the face to the challenge. Two ways the research by Stephen Porges shows faces calm us. First, an empathically attuned face slows the heart rate; that slowing in turn activates the parasympathetic nervous system, the one that calms us at the gut level, very thoroughly. The attuned face will OVERRIDE stress hormones present that are trying to rev the heart up.

The other is a face that involves what we can generally classify as "reproductive behavior" which means, 1. nursing a child; 2 being in the presence of a newborn; 3. foreplay (for females) and orgasm (for males and females) so afterglow is a good source of face to face contact. All of these produce oxytocin, the hormone that PREVENTS the release of stress hormones. No hormones, no anxiety, no fear, no panic.

It is as simple as that. But on more situation produces oxytocin. If you own a dog and gaze into your dogs eyes, and visa versa, that produces oxytocin. Apparently it is that look of total devotion, that says, "You are the only person in the world to me." is what triggers oxytocin, and it does so whether the look is from a lover or a dog (some say their cat looks at them that way).

Most of us have noted that we can depend on a dog to do that. A person we want to love us, . . . maybe.