by Kayleigh Roberts and Christine Harris
What if I told you it’s not your fault? That time you froze up instead of doing something, anything, was an automatic biological response outside of your conscious control?
It’s time to forgive yourself for unfavorable, fear based reactions, and move forward.
Guilt and shame are not serving you. Replace them and take control of your fears.
When we come from a place of compassion for ourselves and those around us, we are our best selves. Cutting ourselves down for our past traps us. To move forward we must forgive ourselves, and work to a better future.
How we react to negative people or situations usually comes about in a few different ways. When we face danger or perceived danger we respond with:
Fight- attack the conflict head on
Flight- run away, escape the situation
Freeze- shut down, pretend or believe this isn’t happening
Fight, flight or freeze turn out to be more complicated than previously thought, for humans anyway.
In many ways this o’possum self defense methods allow us to excel and form stronger bonds and collaborate with new stimuli in our environment that could be perceived as a threat. However, freezing like fainting or passing out is not always safe or ideal. When exposed to trauma this is often the case. People’s body automatically freeze without making a conscious decision, thinking, or having a proper chat with your brain and body to double check that it’s a proper good idea.
Adverts and politicians use this method to scare people into buying into their products because they can’t afford not to!!! Fear overrides our nervous system, which encourages us to make rash actions rather than intelligent choices. Think about it. If someone is screaming or using fear-based arguments, do you think they really have your best interests at heart? Calm discussions may not be as overwhelmingly exciting as an infomercial, but they tend to present more sound, clear information.
Understanding more of the physiology of these responses will help us to calm our reactions as we’ll explain below.
Take the example of the freeze response. Our vagus nerve is a dual feedback loop. The most major of the cranial nerves, the vagus nerve goes from the back of the brain down into all our major organs including the heart and stomach. This means that the brain is talking to our organs and our organs are talking back to the brain. Emergencies are felt by the heart and the stomach, for example, and then a signal is sent to the brain resulting in a freeze response.
Rather than running or fighting constantly, ‘toning’ the vagus nerve via a breathing technique allows us to slow down and use diplomacy and conflict resolution. (Vagus Toning Technique: Inhale for 4 counts and exhale for 6 counts...and repeat as much as you want.)
When we get scared, we breathe quickly, our senses heighten so the barely audible sound of a creaky floor can put us on edge. Pain intensifies and our hearing becomes sharp as a defense mechanism to escape predators, which is advantageous for survival in life-threatening situations. Sometimes our body gets mixed messages and overreacts when we aren’t in a dangerous situation, which causes problems and unnecessary oversensitivity to pain. Thankfully, we can practice breathing methods and calm our mind, body, and nervous system.
Let’s forgive ourselves for being duped by these tactics. Scare tactics are tried and true ways to get people off guard, making them susceptible to anything. Though it may make one feel daft to be bamboozled by such cons, it’s merely human nature. Once you understand why scare tactics are effective at achieving fear based reactions, you can learn to stay in control.
Turn Fear into Forgiveness. Forgiveness allows us to learn from our mistakes, or in some cases to forgive ourselves for situations outside of our control. We can accept and love ourselves, and move forward with a greater knowledge of why our mind and body react erratically under pressure. Focus on solving the problem by calming your nervous system through breathing and identifying patterns that cause this fear response.
If you notice people around you are tearing people down rather than building them up, it’s time to do some soul searching and set clear boundaries to create a better environment for yourself.
Hacks for rewiring your brain:
Breathing
Meditation
Yoga
Breathe when you get angry or upset to calm your mind and body and to make better rational decisions.
Build Your Strength
Practice the Vagus Toning Technique. Do this 10 times each day. You can do it when you wake up, make breakfast, get into a car, before bed. The key is to find a cue to prompt you to practice, which could be grabbing your keys to leave the house!
