To be petrified is to be a piece of wood that has been preserved, and it is also to be so frightened as to be frozen. What to do when you are petrified? How do you know that you are indeed petrified, frozen.
A clue might be that all is cold and bleak and colorless. If you are petrified, your armor might be drawing together more tightly, such that no external lifeline can reach you.
Please look for the lifelines. They are all around us, in the smiling faces of others (though we might have to look to the eyes to see the smile), in the birds, in the grass, in the sunlight, in the dirt. The lifelines may come as music, or movies, or dance, or art. Even the slightest stirring within you, while frightening after you have been petrified for so long, can act as a lifeline. Follow this stirring…