“I want to make this point, though, and might also come back to it a few times. It’s an evolutionary response to shut down and go numb like this. When we can’t fight or flee from a horrible threat, we lie down and play dead – we freeze. A deer will do it as a last-ditch survival trick when being chased by a tiger. Playing dead might fool their predator into being a bit casual in their final lunge, giving the deer an opportunity to suddenly jerk back to life and escape. Abuse victims do it as a form of self-protection; anxiety sufferers do it in the face of too many decisions and existential overwhelm. And I reckon it’s what we do to survive when we find ourselves living a life that is so removed from the miraculous. Which is useful to reflect on; it certainly makes me more compassionate about things when I do. Of course, freezing or numbing out can work as a survival trick for a while, but if we remain asleep, particularly as a society, we face our collective demise.”