Regulate Yourself

In the second part of the Vagus Nerve series, Jen talks to Deb Dana, LCSW, author & and one of the founders of the Polyvagal Institute about how everyone - even people without anxiety, need to learn how to regulate their nervous systems for better relationships in all area of life, what is polyvagal theory and how it plays into our daily life, and why certain people annoy us.

For more information on Deb Dana go to: https://www.polyvagalinstitute.org/about-deb

and for her latest book "Anchored: How To Befriend Your Nervous System Using Polyvagal Theory" go here: https://bookshop.org/books/anchored-how-to-befriend-your-nervous-system-using-polyvagal-theory/9781683647065

For more information on Jen Kirkman, the host of Anxiety Bites, please go here: https://jenkirkman.bio.link

and to get the takeaways for this episode please visit: http://www.jenkirkman.com/anxietybitespodcast

To send an email to the show write to anxietybitesweekly at gmail dot com.

Follow Jen on Twitter @jenkirkman or Instagram @jenkirkman 

Anxiety Bites is distributed by the iHeartPodcast Network and co-produced by Dylan Fagan and JJ Posway.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:08):
This is the Anxiety Bites podcast, and I am your host,
Jen Kirkman. Welcome to Anxiety Bites. I am your host
Jen Kirkman. Now, if you do not have anxiety, this
is the episode for you, because there are certain truths
that every human must face or must accept, scientific truths.

(00:30):
You have a nervous system. It doesn't mean you're nervous,
It doesn't mean anything. It means you have a nervous system.
It is the thing that informs your brain of how
your body is feeling. To put it very I don't know, stupidly,
I guess you know, non scientifically, but our nervous systems

(00:52):
connect with other people's nervous systems. You can you can
tell this by the way you feel with working with others,
living with others, in any kind of relationship with another person,
our nervous systems are always doing a subconscious sniffing out.
And when we become conscious of what's going on, we

(01:13):
might say things like that person annoyed me, or they
have a good vibe, or they're not validating me. I
feel unsafe, you know, or I must run. This really
feels dangerous. Even when we're talking about attachment styles in
love All of this comes back to our nervous systems
are always kind of sussing out the situation, and there
are times when we may not be regulated. So what

(01:37):
dev and I talked about is an example of a therapist.
So if you're in therapy for whatever reason and your
therapist comes running in, Oh my god, traffic was bad,
and you know she's spilling coffee, and she sits down
that her nervous system in that moment's unregulated. She can
get it regulated in a few minutes, but you're being
met with an unregulated energy, which is really not what

(01:58):
you're paying for, right, So how many times a day
are we just letting it fly unregulated around others without
realizing it affects them and now they have to regulate.
And now if you're in relation, they may need to coregulate,
which is to kind of help you on a subconscious
level chill the funk out as they maintain their boundary

(02:21):
and they're regulating. Now, I'm probably not saying any of
this correctly, So that's why we're just gonna take it
to deb Dana. But again, if you do not have anxiety,
this episode will fascinate you because it's all about how
the human brain works and how our nervous system informs
our brain about what we think about certain situations, and
a lot of times our brain might get it wrong.

(02:43):
And so what we have to do in those situations
is say, I know I'm not in any real danger.
Why am I so triggered or annoyed about this? And
even if you never figure it out, there's a way
to begin to regulate your nervous system. And it starts
with curiosity, and Deb takes me through something that I

(03:04):
think will be a really good example for you of
a situation I found myself in recently. How it makes
me feel. Deb explains what's going on in my nervous
system that I wasn't aware of, and then she shows
me how to regulate. Again. I find this all very fascinating.
We only scratch the surface, but let's just get there.
Let's just get to my interview with Deb Dana. Deb

(03:26):
Dana l c SW as a clinician and consultant specializing
in working with complex trump. She is one of the
founders of the poly Vagel Institute dot Org. Deb developed
the Rhythm of Regulation clinical training series and lectures internationally
on ways that polyvagel theory informs work with trauma survivors,

(03:47):
and we do talk a little bit about trauma survivors
as well towards the end of the episode. Deb is
the author of tons of books. A lot of them
are for clinicians therapists, but her newest book is really
for the everyday person and it teaches you everything that

(04:09):
we're going to talk about in this episode and more
about how to anchor your nervous system. Again, you don't
have to have anxiety for this to be a thing.
Her new book is called Anchored, How to be Friend
your Nervous System using poly vengel Theory. It came out
in so I talked to the by the way beautifully

(04:30):
regulated Deb Dana. She's regulated. I'm coming and regulated. She's
got good vibes. This is a super fun chill I think,
very calming conversation. So please enjoy my chat with the
very regulated Deb Dana. When I'm looking at the book Anchored,

(04:56):
it seems different than some of your other work and
that it's real, really geared towards the lay person. And
I'd love to know your thoughts and why it is
so important that everybody, not just smarty pants people who
study this we're living. Why everybody needs to understand our
nervous systems, and as you say, how to befriend your

(05:19):
nervous system using polyvagal theory wise is important. Yeah, it's
it's it's a lovely place to begin. And I loved
it when you said, you know, nervous systems connected globally,
because I do think this is such a fascinating time
to be thinking about about that. So I just wanted
to stop there for a minute and take that in
that you know, we're connected nervous system to nervous system

(05:41):
around the world. This is a fascinating thing to to
to think about and one of the reasons why I
think every human should understand how this part of our
biology works. Right, the nervous system is the common denominator
and our human experience, we all have one. It works
along these three basic organizing principles that Steve Forre just

(06:04):
developed in polyvagal theory. And you know, I you know,
I'm a I'm a clinician, and so I've written a
lot for other clinicians, and then you know, really want
to write for what I call curious human beings, right,
the general audience, because in my work as a therapist,
I really believe that part of my job is to

(06:24):
help my clients understand what's happening so that they can
manage the the everyday experiences and the ordinary ones and
even some of the more extraordinary ones without depending on
me as a therapist. They understand how their nervous system
works so that they could begin to work with it,
because that's what we do. We have to understand how

(06:45):
something works so that we can begin to then shape
it in in the way we want. So that's really
my reason for writing Anchored and for for moving out
into a more general audience, because you know where this
sort of is the the car we're driving through life, right,
and we should understand how it works. And you know,
I think I think that's part of our our our

(07:08):
human responsibility is to understand why am I behaving this way,
responding this way, thinking this way? How am I in
this story? Because if I understand how I got here,
then I can understand how to move out of here
and find another more regulated place. So that's I think
the call to action is to understand and to be

(07:30):
responsible for our nervous systems as we move through the world.
I'm always trying to appeal to the listener that doesn't
have anxiety but likes to check in with this show
because people can learn so much about their brains, their emotions,
their bodies by the people that I interview. And so
to the person without anxiety, who might think, well, you know,

(07:53):
that's great nervous system, that's for the nervous people. How
does the nervous system come into in everyday life for everybody,
not even those of us with anxiety? And sometimes I
think it's a these days, a name that can make
people turn a deaf ear they hear nervous system. I

(08:16):
think they think it's for nervous people. As you said,
we all have one. And so how give me an
everyday example. I don't know a family mom, dad, kids,
mom mom kids whatever, or a couple living together, or
people at work, how does knowing about your nervous system
help the every day that has really nothing to do
with like they have anxiety and that kind of thing. So,

(08:39):
you know what, we think it's our brains that are
are running the show, But in fact what happens is
the nervous system, through the pathways that travel to the brain,
send information about what's happening in your body to your brain,
and then it's the brain's job to make up a
story that makes some kind of sense about what's happening
in the body. Doesn't matter if it's anxiety, if it's overwhelmed,

(09:03):
if it's depression, or if it's regulation and safety and
calm and happiness. The brain then makes up a story, right, So,
so I think it's important for us to understand where
the stories come from the state your The state of
your nervous system creates the story. It's the platform for
the story. So you know, our nervous systems, yours and mine,

(09:25):
met about ten minutes ago, and our nervous systems are
getting to know each other. We're getting to know each
other through our conversation. But our nervous systems are having
an experience as well, and that happens moment to moment
as we move through life on a level below the brain.
Nervous system to nervous system, we are making a decision

(09:47):
is it safe to connect or not? And that has
nothing to do with anxiety or depression, you know, anger
or fear doesn't matter, right, It is all about what
are the cues that are of the systems are sending
to each other. They're communicating, and that's called neuroception in
the world of of the nervous system, and neuroception is

(10:08):
this way the nervous system listens, and it listens inside
our bodies. So it's early morning here, it's my nervous
systems listening to you know, how am I digesting what
I've had so far? What's my heart rate, what's my
breath like? Right, what's happening in my viscera? And out
of that information, it's making a judgment is this a
safe time or an unsafe time? And then it listens

(10:31):
in the environment. Right. So we just I just had
a ding from my message because I hadn't turned on
do not disturb, right, So the environmental cue was one
of danger, Oh my gosh, you know we're doing this
podcast in my thing. Just think that was like, right,
And then you said, oh, don't worry, we can edit
that out. And immediately in this space between the two

(10:54):
of us, I felt a welcome and a and a
sense of safety. Right. So it has nothing to do
with whether I have anxiety or I'm an anxious person.
It simply is this flow that we are always in
um in that inside outside and between neuroceptive experience. This
is great. So and and you know, to everyone listening,

(11:15):
we're not in studio together, right, We're over a zoom
type situation. So I'm assuming, I mean, I know the answers,
I read your book, but I'm assuming the nervous system
can communicate even across zoom. And can you tell us
how that would be happening without I know, as you said,
my words, we're very comforting because I'm a great person.

(11:37):
But how are our nervous systems communicating wordlessly without even
being in the same room, right, right? And so you're
saying I'm a great person, you're talking to my brain.
But your your tone of voice, the look on your face,
the smile, that the engagement with your eyes, the way
you lean forward to connect, that's communicated by nervous system, right,

(11:59):
And that's that's the experience. So through our eyes, through
our our prosody, our tone of voice, through our our
head movements, through our ears, how we take in information.
These are wired in to our biology. Right. So it's
not the words you're saying, it's the way you're saying them.

(12:20):
And we know that we've heard that all along. But
now we have the science underneath it to say yes,
it's your your intonation, it's your prosody, and if that
feels welcoming to my nervous system, then I'm going to
tune into the information and the words. But if it doesn't,
if if for some reason, your tone of voice or
the look on your face, you know, or the way

(12:42):
you move is feels unsafe to my nervous system, I'm
not going to listen to you. I'm not going to
be able to. Not that I don't want to, but
my biology is going to say no, not safe. And
that happens all the time when we're connecting with people,
right we don't do you get sometimes like a gut
feeling about somebody. I don't know why, but I don't
really want to hang around with this person. Or I

(13:03):
don't know why, but I really want to spend more
time with this person. Yeah, and you know it's there's
an article, very unscientific article. Um what it's saying can
be scientifically proven that the article is a little more
you know, just fun that I read a few weeks
ago about why some people just rub us the wrong
way and someone else, you know, might say that, oh

(13:24):
my god, that's the greatest guy ever. And I had
this experience recently. Um, I don't want to say in listening,
but I'll just say. It's a work situation where someone
at my job and they actually don't work in our company.
They work outside of our company, but they have to
come in once a day to do something COVID related. Oh,

(13:45):
I'm just exposing it. And this person annoys me. And
it is the words they say. Sometimes they don't say
offensive words, but they just they just have kind of
an awkward, joking around style that I find aggressive. And
everyone else loves this person, and I at I'm not
joking when I say it. I get physical anxiety, not

(14:05):
overwhelming like I need to, you know, lay down, but
I do get a tense My shoulders go up thinking
about I've got to see name redacted this morning and
in a minute, and I actually feel physically nervous. Now,
I don't think that's because I have anxiety and I've
had a history panic disorder. I think I would be

(14:27):
that way even if I were an anxiety free person,
right right, because their their cues of warning that his
nervous system sends to your nervous system and our nervous
systems are shaped by our lived experience. Right, So there's
something in that person's way of being that is a

(14:49):
familiar cue of danger to your nervous system and it
enacts this heightened activated response. Right. I had the same
um experience with a colleague who my brain knew he
was a very skilled clinician and that he was good
at what he did, but when we were in team meetings,

(15:11):
I just wanted to argue with him all the time.
And I could not figure out what that was, right
until I was able to take a step back and
really sit with my nervous system and see what's happening.
And there was a way he moved and in a
posture and in a look to his presence that reminded
me of someone from my past. So it had nothing

(15:33):
to do with him at all, but but my nervous
system just felt the familiar cues, and then here I
was fighting with him all time. Right. And once I,
once I could get that that awareness, then I could change.
My nervous system still had that response, but I could
then my brain could say, oh, not fill in the blank,

(15:54):
and then I could relax. Okay, So that's an interesting point.
So even you figure out why you have this urge
to argue with someone that you know is skilled. Once
you figure that out, you still might have that physical
nervous system reaction even if you're not like feeling it
so strongly. But you can now make a decision as

(16:18):
someone with a brain right to not argue. Right, the
brain can get the information might still be the same
a less intense body response, but the brain can make
up a different story. So for you, the question would be,
as you think back in your history, what are the
familiar cues that this person gives off? And then to

(16:40):
kind of explore, Okay, what is it? Right? Yeah, and
I think with this person, I don't for right now,
I cannot think of someone specific in my life, but
it reminds me of just a pattern of a type
of person that when they're anxious or nervous, they make jokes,
they may have some boundary problems, and those people make
me just feel icky. But now my brain just has

(17:05):
to make a choice too. I don't know whatever it's
going to do, send love and compassion or just say, Jen,
you know you don't have to physically get anxious this
this person's no threat and you knew this, but just
saying it to myself, maybe trying to make it more fun.
You know, maybe I come in with a different attitude
and I say something to you know, I don't let

(17:28):
him start the conversation I come in because it's literally
a I'm not joking when I say a two minute
interaction every morning. It's it's just taking a COVID test.
But but how how hard for your biology to have
that two minute experience every day? And so we want
to not have to do that. So as you you know,

(17:48):
you can pre plan because you can think about oh okay,
and you can feel that move into activation, which is
sympathetic nervous system that fight and flight a little lengths
a dy angers is in sympathetic right. You can feel
that activating, and you can turn towards it. This is
the befriending piece. You can turn towards that experience with

(18:09):
a bit of curiosity and say, oh, I hear that,
you know, um, and I wonder what else we could
do this morning. You know, there's a discernment question that
I use, UM, which I think is really helpful because
we all have these experiences that make no sense. There's
an overreaction or an underreaction. So the discernment question, is

(18:30):
in this moment, in this place with this person, is
this level of response or this response needed, And so
you just ask yourself that question. That's inviting your brain
to partner with your nervous system to be curious about that.
And sometimes the answer is yeah, I do think it's needed.
But most of the time, for for many of us,

(18:52):
it's no, probably that that intensity response does not needed. Okay,
And then I can partner with my nervousness and say
thank you for minding me about this pattern that I find. Um,
what word would you say? That I find difficult or
just annoying annoying around you? Yeah? Right, thank you for

(19:14):
reminding me about this pattern that I find annoying. And
I'm going to anchor in that place of regulation, which
is ventral in this place of regulations, so that I
can meet this moment without having to disrupt the flow
of my day. And and I don't mean to you
harp on this situation too much, but it's it's bringing
up for me all of the ways that our nervous

(19:36):
systems are interconnected. So in my past, before I've done
a lot of work on myself, I was a little
more of a reactionary person. To put it mildly, so
say gen one point. Oh may have not reacted to
him in front of him, but I would have gone two,

(19:56):
I mean zero to a million with a story in
my head after my interaction with him, which would have
gone something like, my life is hard enough and I
have to do this first thing in the morning instead
of blah and being mingming ming ming, and it somehow
would have gone into how my life sucks and I'm

(20:17):
not getting what I want in life, in relationships and work.
I mean, it would have just gone out of control.
And then I bring that energy to my coworkers. And
that is what I mean by I heard you say
that our nervous systems are all interconnected. So now my
coworkers have to have a nervous system to brain response

(20:38):
about I'm coming in hot, you know, after this thing
that really could have dissipated by now. And so I
think that's is that like a responsibility in a way
that we all have. They always say, you know, if
everyone meditated, the world will be a better police. It's
sort of like if everyone could self regulate and just

(20:59):
or not take get that way, self regulate or coregulate
you could still come in hot as you call it.
You could come in and that sympathetically mobilized chaotic energy
which their nervous systems are they're going to feel through neuroception,
but they could understand, oh, I know this is a

(21:19):
tough thing for Jen every morning, and they could meet
you with regulation and then you would coregulate back to regulation.
So it's not simply self regulation. Coregulation is so important, right,
that's the third organizing principle. We have neuroception we talked about.
We have hierarchy that we touched on briefly. It gets

(21:39):
that regulated ventral, it's the sympathetic anxiety anger, and it's
the dorsal which I don't know if you go there
that that collapse disconnect, right, and too that's a hierarchy.
And then we have coregulation. We humans need to have
other humans to coregulate with. And so that morning, you know,

(22:00):
test is not a coregulating moment for you. Where is
a coregulating moment that you can have either before or
after it. That's really what we're looking for. And this
brings up so many things about relationships, friendships, romantic relationships, whatever,
where if you are with good people that you can trust, right,

(22:20):
they will co regulate with you. So it's absolutely true,
I hope in a non dumping things on them way.
I have tried to make it funny and told my
work friends, I don't want this guy annoys me and
it's it's sort of a funny joke. They tease me
about it and it's fun, but they do know that
it actually does touch off something where uh, for me,

(22:44):
it's just about like I'll give you so that people
don't think I'm completely out of my mind and this
is completely out of nowhere. But in my other life,
I'm a stand up comedian and this person found out
so for me, a lot of times when men find
out I'm a comedian, they whatever they do, it makes
them want to be funny, and that's fine. I don't

(23:05):
need that. I'm not really interested in people being funny
around me. And it is a thing where I can
get very angry at men because I think it's a
gendered thing. I think sometimes they try to be funnier
than the woman to prove themselves, and I think some
most people have a tendency to go mean with their humor.

(23:26):
So he might make fun of what I'm wearing. It's
that kind of thing where it's like, oh, he's representing
this cultural force that I'm very exhausted by. And so
my friends at work understand there's actually something kind of
deeper underneath this. But you know, they're also not going
to coddle me because I need to handle my ship.
So so it's this wonderful coregulation that I get from

(23:48):
them where they're like, I'm sorry, but then we laugh
about it, right, And it is fascinating what you just
you know, talked about because your nervous system um is
responding to this other nervous system and then from that
state of um sympathetic, a bit of it felt like
a bit of anger along with the anxiety. So that's

(24:09):
simple because sympathetic survival has those twin pathways of anger
and anxiety both our survival responses. And when we enter
into a sympathetic state of anger anxiety a survival state,
we enter into a certain survival story and we began
to hear the survival story that comes along with that state.

(24:30):
For you about about larger than this person, right, right, Yeah,
And so you know, one of the things that's interesting
to do is if you can get to a place
where you're feeling regulated and anchored, in ventral in that
place of curiosity, right to to turn toward the morning

(24:52):
experience from that anchor, from curiosity, from um, you know,
where they're different stories can emerge and what's the story
that you hear? Then? Right, because it's a very different
story and and you know, as it just comes to
mind what the story could be, it's nothing to do
with me. I'm not in that story. My curiosity goes, well,

(25:16):
maybe he's just you know, excited to be here, and
you know, it's just trying to he he doesn't know me,
so he's just going to make an assumption like, well,
she probably likes funny people. So I'm just gonna try
to make her COVID test a fun experience because I'm
a nice person. So look at that. I mean, what
a different story it is, right, So, and and that's

(25:37):
what we do. The experience does not change, right, You
still going to get the code test. Yeah, but depending
on what nervous system state you're in, the story is
very different. And so could I then start to change
my nervous system and that if I come in with
that story that I got to by looking at it

(25:59):
in a curious way. Could that actually change? I know
you say it may not change, like we may still
come in and have that nervous system response, but could
that change with my brain doing a different story. So
so we do it the other way. So what I
want you to do before you go in for the
COVID test is find a way to anchor in ventral,
find your way to regulation, because then organically your feelings,

(26:21):
your behaviors, your stories come along with it. And that's
why I want to get into what we're saying when
you say ventral, endorsal and all that, which is you know,
funny where I meant to start. But sometimes interviews I
just they go their own way. And what I loved
about this, and I'm sorry to the listener if you
think I was trying to have my own personal therapy
session with deb. I like to give these real life

(26:42):
examples to show what could seem like the most meaningless,
little moment, not that it's such a big deal, but
it just illustrates how many times a day we have
that with other people. And the coregulation is so important
because we need to um. I want to ask you
more about that later if we get to it in
terms of like when people meet romantically for the first time,

(27:04):
and how the nervous system can be a little wonky there.
But so let's get into like what the poly Vagel
theory is. So you're saying, our nervous system has three
parts to it, and and can you tell us those
three parts? So we have these three states, we have ventral,
sympathetic endorsal, and that's called the autonomic hierarchy for listeners

(27:28):
who want that term. That the brilliant thing about the
hierarchy again that Steve um Poor just when he developed
poly Vagel theory helped us understand, is that we move
through these states in a particular way, right, it's not random, right,
and our our our biology are nervous system really longs

(27:49):
to be in a state of regulation, safety and connection.
That sort of the energy is is flowing. That's called
ventral ventral ventral um. And in ventral we have access
to everything from zen like calm to passion, play, alert,
excited um. And that the thing that helps us understand

(28:14):
ventral is again we go back to neuroception. The neuro
sption is one of feeling safe enough, right, So it's
a it's a neuro sption of I'm okay. And when
neuro sption is in this bringing us cues of welcome
or safety. Our state is one of ventral and from
ventral um we can connect, communicate, we can see possibilities,

(28:38):
we can solve problems, we can move through the world
um in a way that that feels organized, that we
have purpose, we have passion, all of these wonderful things. Right,
nervous system longs to be there, I think inherently knows
how to bring us to that place. What happens for
many of us is that traumatic experiences or ongoing UM

(29:01):
danger in the world covers up those pathways, so they're
harder to find and they're harder to travel. Those pathways,
but they exist inside all of us. And so when
my work as a therapist, I'm not creating something new
with my clients, were uncovering what's already there, you know.
So for everybody in the world, your pathway home to
ventral exists inside your biology. And I think that's a

(29:24):
really reassuring thing to understand, right right, It's not like,
you know, if you were born with early challenged trauma,
or you experienced trauma as a young kid, it's not like, um,
you were born without a kidney. It's not a thing
you don't have, right, It's just a thing you don't
have access to, or you don't feel like you have
access to. It's less easy to access, probably because the

(29:45):
other thing I do want to say is that in
the course of every day, we have these micro moments
of ventral, micro moments of of okayness, right, which I
call blimbers, and we want to be looking for of
those glimmers. And even in the most trauma saturated life
or the most dangerous world, there is a micro moment,

(30:08):
there is a glimmer that will appear. And I think
that's really lovely for people to be on the lookout for.
And it's reminder that this amazing thing that is our
nervous system can hold all of the trauma and all
of those experiences and see a see a glimmer. Right,
it's a both end, it's a it's a really helpful

(30:29):
thing to remember that that, yes, this is a really
hard day for me, and and and I am overwhelmed
and oh a bird just I just heard a bird sing, right,
And I could take that in So that that's important
because our two survival states, which are the other two
parts of the hierarchy. Sympathetic and dorsal sympathetic we've talked about.

(30:52):
You know, for people with anxiety, sympathetic is probably very familiar.
It's a place of fight and flight, of of you know,
anxiety to panic attack, you know, this whole continuum and
anger from you know, frustration to rage. Right, it's a
survival response, and we want to remember that when it
first activated for us, it was very adaptive. It may

(31:14):
not be so adaptive now in the moment, which is
why we want to begin to shape it in another way.
But we call it an adaptive survival response, and that's sympathetic,
and we all go there in some form or flavor
most every day. Right, there's a moment of oh, I
am so done with this energy, right, you know. And

(31:35):
then dorsal is the third state that we have access to,
another survival state, and that takes us to the opposite
of sympathetic. Sympathetic mobilizes us with disorganized, chaotic energy. Dorsal
immobilizes us. It drains all the energy from us. Is
that different um than parasympathetic nervous response, So parasympathetic is

(31:58):
both ventral and dorsal it's the parasympathetic nervous system. It's
both the calm connect safe and the disconnect collapse disappear,
and so parasympathetic which has those two branches, and sympathetic,
which is fight flight. When you put them together, that
gives you the automotive nervous system. Anxiety bites will be

(32:25):
right back after a quick little message from one of
our sponsors. I think often on this show because people
I think that I talked to aren't is studied in
Polly veagele A is you and so we always talk
about when you're having a panic, you want to go

(32:46):
from the sympathetic nervousism to the parasmithetic nervous system. But
now you're telling us there's this other way to look
at it, which is sounds even more fun going into
dorsal right, which sounds is It's interesting because sympathetic is
if if we put this on a hierarchy, at the
top is ventral, in the middle of sympathetic at the

(33:08):
bottom iss dorsal right. So sympathetic is the only place
you have two choices, right your nervous system, your brain
is really not helping you. Here is your nervous system. Right,
Your nervous system can either bring you back to ventral,
where you come back into regulation and connection, or it's
going to be you're going to get pulled down to dorsal,

(33:30):
which is where you disappear, dissociate. Um, just going through
the motions. But I'm not really here. So it's not
a it's not an adaptive behavior. It's it's like shutting down.
It's it's not it's not like sleep. I mean, well,
I mean it can be. I mean people can enter
dorsal and just sleep and disappear in that way. But

(33:52):
but it's and so it's an adaptive survival response, but
it doesn't bring it doesn't nourish your nervous system and
bring you back back into connection. Correct. Okay, so I
was wrong that it's even more relaxing than paras of
aathetic It's like, no, that's a you know, disordered way, right, right. So,
so those are the three states, and we moved through

(34:14):
them down and up all the time, in small ways
and then sometimes in big ways. Right like this morning
it's it's it's nine where I am in the morning,
and already, as I reflect on my day, I had
a beautiful ventral experience. I went for a walk in
the nature preserve. It was beautiful. And then I came
home and I was met with an email that totally

(34:37):
frustrated me. So that was a bit of sympathetic. And
then I had a connection with one of my trainers
and it was like, I am so overwhelmed by all this.
I could feel the flavor of just give it up, right,
you know, And so all of that is normal. So
I want people to understand that this movement into sympathetic

(34:58):
endorsal is normal, is expected. It brings us some of
the richness of life. It's when we get pulled out
of regulation into a survival state. So when you get
stuck in anxiety, then we suffer. But if you have
an anxious moment and you return recover to regulation, that's
normal and it's and it's okay for your body. In

(35:20):
other words, it's when people here, oh, we go through
these three things all day. You know a lot of
people who want to heal their anxiety or they're into
self help. You know, there is just such a lack
of I don't know how to put it. But if
you're on Instagram and you're following these you know, wellness things.
There's such a lack of helping people to understand that

(35:42):
you you're not bad, You're not doing it wrong, there's
no perfect. So the goal isn't I'm going to live
in ventral only and I'm never going to get into
symbathetic or dorsal. It's like, as long as you can
dip in and dip out, you are actually living your
best life exactly the exactly yes. And and for you
know trauma survivor clients, um, it's when they get pulled

(36:06):
out and get stuck. Because when we enter sympathetic endorsal,
as we've been talking about already, you can see the
stories that activate, we get stuck in that story and
we can't find our way out. And so the work
to to be a you know, a healthy human is
to find pathways to come back to ventral and to

(36:27):
to be able to to know I just get pulled
into survival story and I can find my way back
right and with practice it gets easier. And I want
to you before we get into I want to ask
you some things about how people can heal from trauma.
But I want to throw in just a few of
my comments that I like, what you said about someone

(36:50):
who has had a traumatic life, who's working through things,
they might have glimmers of hope or of something that
brings them contentment. And what I love about that. And
you said it with the word curious too. So there's
two C words and there's two G words. Okay, so
we've got glimmers versus gratitude. So somebody who's having a
very hard time might not be there yet. And I

(37:12):
always say gratitude doesn't have to mean you feel it
or you love something, but you know, maybe just think
about something. But the better way to put it as glimmer.
You know, you don't have to force someone to get
into this gratitude state before they're ready, but they can glimmer.
Oh you know what, my favorite book, my favorite author,
they just released a book today. It's just a glimmer

(37:33):
of something that brings you joy, connects you to you,
has nothing to do with your trauma story. Great. And
then when I was talking to you about my little
friend there at the COVID test, I jumped to, well,
maybe I should have compassion for him, and what you
said was curiosity. So those those two C words again,
jumping to I need to have compassion is again like
putting this pressure on myself to be this amazing person,

(37:56):
and curiosity got me there anyway without me having to
say in a judgmental way towards myself, why don't you
have compassion? And So I love these words curiosity and glimmers.
I think everyone out there should replace compassion and gratitude
with these words when they need to. It's interesting because

(38:18):
you know, curiosity is um a quality of of ventral,
of that state of regulation, safety and connection. So when
I can feel up just a drop of curiosity when
something catches my intention, I go, huh right, then I know,
oh my ventral is just you know, come to life
a bit um. Compassion and self compassion are need far

(38:42):
more ventral energy to to access and that's fascinating. So
which is technically scientifically harder? M it's not just emotionally
or mentally, no, it's it's harder to get to compassion,
self compassion, cury pocity is is always where I want
to start. And you know, with my with my clients,

(39:04):
it was like, you know, can we can we be compassionate?
Why would I want to be compassionate about you know,
this person that that has hurt me, right, I agree you. No,
we're not going there now. We may never get there,
and that's okay. This is about you anchoring and regulations
so that you can feel some well being, physical and

(39:25):
psychological well being, and then curiosity just organically emerges. You
organically felt curious because you came to some central regulation.
It just happens. This is so great and this, you know,
it just reminds me of so many people that long ago,

(39:45):
before there was the science we have now that we're
saying things like this. One of my favorite people is
Dr Edmund Jacobson. In my early anxiety recovery, one of
the first things I did because my anxiety was showing
up is this phobia flying. I took a Fear of
Flying course and we were introduced to progressive muscle relaxation

(40:05):
and a psychiatrist taught the course, and he said, we
have to start here with our bodies. Then it will
give us the you know, probably all this was poly
bagel theory. It will be able to um get the
mind ready to intellectually think about what we're gonna do
about our fears of flying. But Edmund Jacobson. Dr Edmund

(40:27):
Jacobson came up with progressive muscle relaxation. In the thirties,
he wrote a book called You Must Relax, and back
then a lot of people were going out drinking after
work to relax, and he kept telling people your mind
will follow if you actually relax the muscles in your body,
and people just did not listen because that doesn't sound

(40:48):
as fun as going up for a drink, and and uh,
you know it. To me, it's the most important thing.
And everyone in these days talks about meditation, which is great,
but it almost seems like if you don't meditate, you're
gonna die. You know, you're going to um your life.
You're not gonna be able to extend. Your life is long,
and you're not gonna be able to change your neural
pathways if you don't meditate. And I always see the

(41:11):
people who asked me just start with progressive muslin relaxation.
Listen to a guided thing, stiff and relax your muscles.
It has been the most profound thing and simple thing
of my life. And I didn't realize then that it
was all to do with everything that you're talking about now.
And I love what you're saying because it's it's simple
and yet profound, and that's what we're looking for. Because

(41:34):
you know, for for me, even I'll use myself as
an example. If I need to meditate a half hour
to day, or even meditate ten minutes a day to
become healthy, I can't do it. You know, it's too
great a challenge for my nervous system. My nervous system
can't stay in that state. I get, I get anxious,
and then I disconnect. I just go to go to

(41:54):
I'm not really here, and the meditation can happen, but
I'm not here doing it, right, that's my pattern. Right.
But if I know that doing small things over and
over reshapes my nervous system, I'm good. Right, Like, if
I can find three glimmers a day, then I'm going
to start looking for more and it begins to accumulate.

(42:15):
It's not simply this micro moment. It's a micro moment
that finds a way in and then there's another and another,
And it's helpful for people to understand that. Yes, for
some people, meditation is wonderful, breath practices are wonderful. If
that is not for you, that's okay. Your nervous system
will help you find the thing that is right for you. Right,

(42:35):
progressive muscle relaxation might be the thing that's right for you.
Right looking out at nature might be the thing. They're
all sorts of things. So whenever anybody says, you know,
I used to get things at the beginning of the pandemic,
we got things in our mailboxes. Five things to do
to whatever right, ten things that will keep you. And
I started thinking, Wow, none of those work for me.

(42:58):
What's wrong with me? Because that's where we go. And
then I came to oh, my nervous system says no,
thank you. Let's find something that does work for me.
And there are plenty of things that work for me.
But I'm not going to tell you that there are
the five things you need to do right right. I'm
gonna invite you to explore and find what are the
five things you want to do. We'll continue the interview

(43:22):
on the flip side of a quick message from our sponsors.
We'll getting into the trauma connection. You know, at the
beginning of the interview, I made this note because you
were talking about how the nervous system is in our
body and it signals to the brain what we're going

(43:43):
to make of this sensation, And I know. I talked
to you, um Dr Lisa Feldman Barrett, who's a neuroscientist,
and she explained the process of you know, like let's say, um,
beginning to have a panic attack on an airplane, that
your brain is just trying to predict what's happeneding based
on your body's cues. And if your body is just
freaking out for no reason, your brain is going to

(44:04):
take a minute. And it's in that moment that we
can either latch onto the weird things our brain is
telling us or we can know better. But that takes practice.
And so I'm thinking about again another buzzword. We hear
the mind body connection, and I feel again that culture
makes us think that the mind body connection means it
starts in our mind and we can control our bodies

(44:27):
and blah blah blah. And it's really body to brain
connection right again, It starts with regulating the body, then
it can move up to the brain. Is there am
I saying that? Right? Yeah? It's interesting. Is in therapy
we talked about bottom up and top down. I've never
heard that, yeah, And so what we really want is

(44:47):
we want bottom up to meet talk down because really
we are an integrated system. Right, what we we are
not a brain and a body. We are one system
and the communication pathways go with both directions. Right. The
body to brain pathway is powerful. And so when my
heart starts beating faster, when my breath changes, and that

(45:11):
gets sent up to my brain, and my brain is
used to anxiety or panic, it's going to go there,
right because it knows that's the pathway. It's traveled so often. Right,
And some of the work with trauma survivors is to
notice when your heart rates needs up and your breath changes.
You know, can we consider excitement right instead of anxiety
because it's the same body experience, but the brain makes

(45:35):
up a different story. So we want to encourage the
brain to to look at you know, what are all
the options for stories? Right? So you know it oftentimes
we think if we say something different, we'll have a
different experience. That that's the top down, totally talk down.

(45:55):
Like just changing the belief when we're working against the
body is a no win situation. Right. If your brain
and your body are in a disagreement and and your
body feels very strongly about it is going to win
that argument all the time. Okay, So so trying to
change your thoughts while your body is not, it's not

(46:19):
going to work. It's like throwing I don't know, I
don't know what. It's like tape that's not stick anymore.
It's not going to stick, right, It's it's when it's
when we first feel the change beginning to happen, before
we've gone fully into the survival response, that we can,
you know, recruit our brain to help us, because the

(46:41):
brain is still working prefrontal cortex is still there working
online with us. So when I first begin to feel
my heart beginning to beat faster, I can be curious
because I haven't left that regulated state and gone to survival.
But if I now in sympathetic anxiety survival, my brain

(47:03):
is is no longer. It doesn't come along for the ride,
so to speak, so it's not there to help me.
So this is my silly analogy. I live in New York,
so I'm running for the subway. The doors are open,
that's my window right to get in there and tell
my brain a different story. And if I don't make it,
the doors shut, train is off, it is gone. And
so I guess that's why this stuff takes practice, right,

(47:26):
Because you have to keep experiencing your body about to
go into full survival mode in that little window. If
you can do that mind work right there, um great,
and then keep practicing that. But you might miss the
window sometimes, which is obviously fine. Yes, we we all
missed them indow sometimes I'm now going to have that
image in my in my head of the doors are closing,

(47:47):
right and do I make it or not? Right? And
and yeah, the thing that we want to do in
our work, with our own experience when something is happening
is to slow it down. Right. As we slow it down,
we bring because all of these experiences are what we
call implicit experiences, right, all of this body stuff, all

(48:08):
of the nervous system stuff is happening below the level
of our conscious awareness. We have to bring it into
conscious awareness. And when we do that, and like we
did the turn toward and look at it, we can
slow it down so the door won't close quite so quickly.
That's really what we're we're trying to do, right, Give
us more time. And when you're working with trauma survivors,

(48:31):
doesn't matter what the trauma is. I mean, if they um,
you know, had sexual abuse, if they had mental abuse
or even if they were a baby that I mean,
I've heard this too. This is always very hard for
me to comprehend, but I'm sure you can explain it.
I'm always like, what, how is a baby that you know,

(48:51):
I don't know, was sick when they were born and
they were maybe an incubators and they didn't have a
lot of that human touch. I mean, I get it,
but I don't how does someone so young who's not
even experience seeing something quote emotional yet and then ends
up having very loving parents, Like, how does that traumas
day in the body? So we come into the world
expecting we have a biological expectation that we will be

(49:13):
met by another person who has a regulated nervous system
because coregulation. We don't survive without that coregulation, right, And
and actually that need for coregulation lasts until the day
we die. But as we come into the world, it
is truly a life or death situation. So for the
little ones who end up premature and in an incubator,

(49:37):
you know, not connected to their caregiver, that is a
biological affront to their system, right. They need that connection,
and so instead of mother holding they're they're in a
incubator with tubes and wires and noises and all of

(49:57):
this stuff assaulting their system, and so that gets it's
a you know, their neural seption is one of danger, right,
So when neuro seption begins to create those pathways those
patterns then and that's one of the reasons why skin
to skin contact kangaroo care has become so popular even

(50:18):
you know, so as soon as a tiny premius is
able to be outside the incubator skin to skin contact
because they're trying to create that that sense of safety
and coregulation, and then that does that stay in their
body until there older Well, it's a neural pathway that
gets created. Right, the nervous system is missing what it

(50:42):
needs and so it has to compensate in some other way.
So we build pathways of connection and pathways of protection.
And so if we grew up in a in a
home where the world was was dangerous, it doesn't really
matter in what way it was dangerous. So what we
say in this kind and the work is it doesn't
matter so much what happened to you. It matters how

(51:04):
your nervous system responded to what happened to you. So
for some people growing up in a dangerous home, they
become very sympathetically charged. They might get very big and
acting out, or they might have that huge anxiety where
they need to manage everything to make sure it stays okay,
so that's sympathetic. Or they might go to the dorsal

(51:25):
place where they try to become invisible, fly into the radar,
not be seen, not be heard. Those are the creative
ways the nervous system is helping them survive. And we
carry those patterns into our adulthood even after we are
no longer in those experiences, right, And that's why we
need to then go back and look at those in

(51:45):
in rewire and re story, because otherwise we're simply acting
out of those familiar cues that our nervous system took
in and learned how to respond to creatively to keep
us alive. So let's say you grew up in a
traumatic hosthold of I don't know, there's whatever it was,
instability in any form from the littlest thing all the

(52:07):
way up to alcoholic parent. There's violence. So that person
who's carrying that in their nervous system and they've developed
all these neuropathways of protection, how might that come up,
like obviously if they're met with the same thing that
could come up, But could it be even a little
thing like a friend says something that they take the

(52:29):
wrong way. I mean, is that where it comes out
exactly that That's where you know, NEU reception feels a
familiar flavor of a queue of danger, and all of
a sudden we're having this this response. Right, it's like, oh,
I don't want to be friends with that person anymore,
or or you know, I don't want to do this job,
or it becomes something big, and it starts from a

(52:51):
familiar queue of danger, right. And the cues are again
the embodied cues, the environment mental cues, and the relational cue.
So those are the three pathways. So even the environment,
you know, my my my work environment might have a
familiar queue of danger from my past and I end

(53:13):
up leaving that job, and I am going my brain's
gonna give me a story about why I left. It's
not going to be oh, that the environment had that
queue of danger, right, And when the environment has the
queue of danger, you're not saying necessarily that the environment
is dangerous and they should have left. It was a
So going back to me, my COVID test person, It's

(53:33):
it's really an overreaction to something that reminds you like
the danger could just be like whatever it is you
you think your boss doesn't appreciate your workers something right,
And it can be something as simple as as you know,
I can't work in an office with no windows, got it?
And other people feel very comfortable in an office with
no windows. It either feels it can feel cozy, or

(53:56):
it can feel trapped. And you know, if I don't,
if I simply just keep leaving jobs but don't understand why,
I'm following what my nervous system is is telling me
to do, but I don't understand it. And that's why
I think when we understand we can work with right.
I'm probably never gonna want to work in a in
an office with no windows still, but if I understand it,

(54:19):
then I at least know what it is I can
ask for or I'm looking for. That's so great. And
so to anyone out there who suffered any kind of
trauma and they're looking for a therapist, it really sounds
like they need to find someone that understands this work.
Because if we just keep approaching it from because I've
seen this in life. I've seen therapists try to jump

(54:43):
to let's create different neural pathways with thoughts, and the
body is never addressed. Um, it's making sense now that
that just doesn't work. What should people look for in
a therapist if they want to work through some trauma?
And I think there are lots of therapies that you
know are going to bring the body in to the process.

(55:06):
And so you know, I probably for for me when
people ask me, I say, why don't you, um ask
the therapist? I think we should all shock for therapists,
I think, you know, we should do a meet and greet.
And for me, it's like, does your nervous system feel
as though this might be a fit? Right? So when

(55:27):
you talk to somebody, do you get the sense that, oh,
you know, I'd like to talk to this person again,
or or no? And if it's if your nervous system
says no, move on, right, because you will find somebody
who feels like a fit. If this feels like a fit,
then you could talk to them and say, so do
you how do you work with the body, How do
you think about the nervous system, how do you think

(55:49):
about healing? Trauma. Do you, you know, work from the
brain down or do you focus more on the body
or do you do both? And you know, sort of
ask those questions to interview. You want to interview with
therapists and find out, you know, what does this feel like? Right?
How does my nervous system, my nervous system say yes, no?

(56:10):
Or maybe? If your nervous system says yes, keep talking.
If it says no, say thank you very much. As
it says maybe, I'd keep talking and see, you know,
explore right, and can we trust that? You know, if
someone hasn't done this kind of work and you know
they're they're maybe still in that mode where they just
keep avoiding things that can you trust your quote got
in that moment um, your nervous system won't betray you

(56:33):
in that way? Um, I guess. In other words, it might,
it might betray you. Wanna on a note, I don't know,
is there what's it? It's interesting because there can be
a mismatch happening within the person's nervous system. When I
meet a client for the first time, I know that
it's my job to be regulated and to offer that

(56:55):
autonomic regulation of safety and and a welcome through through
my nervous system to that person and see what happens. Right,
and it's and it can be challenging. And yet the power,
I guess I'd like to say this as well, the
power of ventral is pretty astounding. Right as I am

(57:18):
regulated and in connecting with a client for the first time,
their nervous system is getting a different experience off of
an experience of someone who is safe and regulated and predictable.
And no matter what they say, I just say, I
stay regulated and curious. Right. And then if you're a

(57:38):
nervous system, if you and I are having this conversation
and your nervous system feels, oh, I can't do this.
What it's telling you is it doesn't feel safe enough
yet to dive into this, And that I think is
is wisdom, right, And then you know, we have to
make it safe enough. That's really smart because I'm thinking

(57:58):
about anyone going in there be for any reason. If
your therapist comes in, they're late, they've got a coffee.
Now I come so sorry traffic that is, they cannot
do that, right, Like they've got to fix that and
come in regulated and and not and and that is
it may seem so like oh, it's fine, I get it.

(58:21):
You know, it's crazy city out there, but they really like, no,
you're not getting your needs met on this biological level
and you cannot accept that, right. Is that like a
deal breaker? Well, you know it's interesting because for me
that's a deal breaker. Right. And and in the therapist
I trained, I would hope they would never come in
that way. But if they do, you know, and I've

(58:42):
had many messy mornings, right, and they're probably been mornings
when I have entered a session not fully regulated. I
name that with my clients, say, oh, you know, this
was one of those messy mornings. I'm going to take
a moment. Let's just arrive together and and find our
way to regulation. Right, Because if I try to fake
it till I make it, the through neuroception, the other

(59:06):
person's nervous system gets it. And for many trauma survivors,
their experience has been that that they've been told what
they feel isn't true, or what they're seeing isn't happening.
And so to be able to say, yep, a little
bit is regulated. Give me a moment so we can
anchor here together and arrive. Then the nervous the client's
nervous system says, Oh, I was right on a first meeting.

(59:29):
It's probably not a good sign. We'll be right back. Hey, Hey,
it's me again. I hope that you had a great
and relaxing time listening to my interview with dab Dana.
Let's go over some of the takeaways that we got

(59:52):
from talking with Deb now. These takeaways are always available
on my website, Jen Kirkman dot com Anxiety Bites. You
can find the link to my website in the show notes.
You can find a link to deb Dana's work and
her book as well in the show notes. And once again,

(01:00:14):
um if you want to tweet at me, it's at
Jen Kirkman and at Instagram at Instagram at Jen Kirkman
on Instagram, and you can let me know how much
you love the episode. I love to hear feedback. You
may feel like, oh she knows, I don't. I love
to hear it. So thank you, and you can always
send an email to Anxiety Bites Weekly at gmail dot com.
We are coming to the last episodes of the series

(01:00:37):
and so get your emails in soon. Okay, So let's
talk about the takeaways from this episode. The nervous system
is the common denominator in the human experience. The ventral
vagel state is the rest and digest state. It's our
state of safety and homeostasis. The dorsal vagel state is

(01:00:58):
one of shutdown, when we are pulled away from connection
and into a state of self protection. Part of our
human responsibility is to understand why am I behaving this way,
responding this way, thinking this way. The brain isn't running
the show of our human experience. What happens in the
nervous system is and then that information travels through pathways

(01:01:20):
to the brain, and from there the brain tries to
make a story of what's happening in the body. Neuroception
is the process of how our nervous system listens inside
of our body. People's nervous systems determine if another person
is safe by noticing the tone of their voice through
their eyes, their head movements through their ears. In other words,

(01:01:43):
how we take in information. It's not the words someone says,
but how they're saying them. The cues that are nervous
system sends us about. Another person's nervous system is shaped
by our lived experience. If your sympathetic nervous system is
in activation. You can turn to it with curiosity. It's

(01:02:05):
a discernment question about the level of response needed. We
can partner with our nervous system when it's putting us
in high alert by being aware that it's alerting us
to a pattern and deciding how we want to respond
to help us anchor into ventral regulation. People with a
chaotic energy need not only to self regulate, but it

(01:02:29):
helps if the people in their life can co regulate
with them, which brings the nervous system back to a
ventral state. The three states of polyvagal theory are ventral, sympathetic,
and dorsal. It is normal to move throughout these states
many times a day. The goal isn't just to stay
in ventral. That's not realistic. The goal is to be

(01:02:51):
able to regulate. Trauma survivors often need to just have
a glimmer during the day. Did they hear a song
they love, see a son set, anything that gives a
few moments of joy. Curiosity is a much more realistic
state to expect yourself to move into than compassion, and

(01:03:11):
no one should pressure themselves to feel compassion when they're
recovering from trauma. When we are born, we have a
biological expectation that we will be met by another person
who has a regulated nervous system that we can co
regulate with, and that need lasts until the day we die.

(01:03:33):
If a newborn doesn't receive that, a neuropathway is created
because the nervous system is missing what it needs and
it has to compensate in some other way. People who
grew up in a chaotic home may become very sympathetically
charged as they're kind of default state and act out often.
It doesn't always matter what exact trauma happened to you,

(01:03:55):
but how your nervous system responded to what happened to you.
The job of a therapist is to create an environment
that is safe to corregulate in, and they should make
sure that they are properly regulated before an appointment. If not,
this can and maybe should be a deal breaker for clients.

(01:04:17):
That is all for this episode. Please keep listening. We've
got a few episodes left, a lot of great stuff
coming up. Next week. I am talking to former politician
and former soldier Jason Candor about his new book and
his experience getting help for his PTSD eleven years after

(01:04:42):
he first developed it and what his journey was like
and why he wants to help other people start getting
the help they need a lot faster than he did.
So thanks again for listening to anxiety Bites and yes,
anxiety bites, but you're in control. Mmmm. For more podcasts

(01:05:06):
for my heart Radio, visit the I heart Radio app,
Apple podcast, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.