«There’s something wrong with me.»
The story I’ve believed pretty much all my life. Sometimes, I could be bold, courageous, take risks, and access my full potential.
Other times, I was avoiding, shying away, and not taking action, even if that’s what was most needed at the moment.
«Why?» I wondered. «What’s going on?»
Over the years, I tried many approaches. I used self-help tools, read books, attended seminars, and did coaching and therapy. While all these were valuable, they never helped me answer the above question.
I searched for an answer, and couldn’t find one. The story about my wrongness that had haunted me since childhood only got louder. The consistent inconsistency in my results, often made it impossible to trust in my abilities.
That created a lot of tension and uncertainty in my system. The thing is, that the brain feeds on certainty. It doesn’t like not knowing why something occurs. It will, at all costs, find a way to explain what is happening – even if the explanation is false.
It will invent gods, to explain natural phenomena. Heaven and hell will seem real to ease the anxiety of death. Do you think, a brain like that, will care to pinpoint the exact reason, for the lack of consistency in the way I do things?
«Ha!» I can hear it laughing out loud. «Not getting the outcomes he wants? Piece of cake! There must be something wrong with him!»
Boom! The need for certainty was met. At that point, the need for accuracy of the given interpretation seemed irrelevant. The cause justified the means.
Years went by, with me buying into that «truth». Yet, I could sense something inside me asserting, that this theory couldn’t hold true. Stubborn as a mule, I refused to accept it. I never stopped searching.
That’s how I discovered CBT. And days started getting brighter! CBT stands for Cognitive Behavioural Therapy. In CBT there is the dogma:
«Thought – Emotion – Behaviour»
Your thinking creates your feelings, which in turn promotes behavior.
"I think I am worthy, I feel inspired, I get into action."
’‘I think I won’t make it, I feel fear, and either I avoid, or take action in such a way that I fail."
«That’s it! Eureka!» I thought to myself «There’s nothing wrong with me, there never was! it’s my thoughts that were fooling me all along. And I, am not my thoughts.»
I started smiling again. In fact, many times, I was able to change my thinking and affect my results in a spectacular way. It was pure magic when it worked! It didn’t work all the time though.
When I was upset, angry, or sad, reframing was useless. It was like trying to calm a kid having a tantrum by sitting down with them to see how their perspective is distorted! How effective do you imagine that would be? That is what we call top-down regulation. Influencing the "top" (mind) to regulate, i.e. calm down or arouse, the "bottom" (body). In a state of emotional turmoil, this has little effect. As a result, my actions suffered. The inconsistency came back with a vengeance. I lost trust in CBT.
«But why?» I asked. «This again? What’s wrong?»
«I know!» a voice whispered in my ear.«Might there be… something indeed wrong with you?»
«AHHHH!!!!»
Now that I had questioned this story once, I knew this was but a mirage. I suspected there was still something else I wasn’t seeing. Something I didn’t know. Something yet to discover.
Enter Nervous System Mastery (NSM).
NSM is a 5-week cohort-based online course. It is a new approach to personal development and well-being. Understanding and regulating the autonomic nervous system (ANS) is its primary focus.
The ANS is a part of the human nervous system. It controls many of the body’s involuntary functions such as heart rate, digestion, and breathing. It is also responsible for the «fight or flight» response to stress and danger.
NSM helps you become aware of your ANS, by developing «interoception». This is the ability to feel sensations; the language of the body. Communicating with the body in such a way, enables you to give it what it needs from moment to moment. You listen to the kid and care for it, instead of trying to persuade it. This is the only way to make it work for you rather than against you.
By utilizing mindfulness, breathing exercises, and movement, NSM helps you do exactly that. It draws on the principles of Polyvagal Theory developed by Dr. Stephen Porges which suggests that the ANS has three distinct states.
-The Ventral Vagal state (associated with safety and connection)
-The Sympathetic state (associated with fight or flight)
-The Dorsal state (associated with freeze or shutdown).
You can imagine your nervous system as a set of switches that can be in different positions, or "states,". This determines more than anything how you respond to the world around you - like being in a relaxed and social mode, an alert and active mode, or a shut-down and withdrawn mode.
This is where «Bottom–up-regulation» comes in; the main gist of the course. By addressing the body (bottom), and changing your physiology, your thinking (up), shifts. When the arousal you feel either subsides or intensifies your thoughts follow along. As ducklings do their mama duck. New thoughts, equal new behavior.
This new knowledge has changed the CBT dogma, into:
«State – Thought – Emotion – Behaviour»
Thoughts are the stories we tell ourselves. All the theory above can be compressed in a beautiful way in the sentence:
“Story follows state”
"Buuuuuut, something is wrong with me."
”Ahhhhh!”
As an NSM alumnus, I now invite curiosity, exchanging the full stop for a question mark:
«Something is wrong with me?»
Instead of buying into it, or trying to identify the cognitive distortions, I am like:
«Hmm, I wonder, what state might this story be coming from… Could something be more true? Does this story, lose its power, when I inhabit another state of the nervous system?»
Let’s see with some real-life examples:
One day, I was out at a social gathering. I needed to socialize and connect so much. At the same time, I could sense something inside me that was afraid and wanted to shy away. I tuned in:
«Aah I can’t! They’re disturbed by my presence. They won’t want to be with me, it’s too hard! What if they reject me?»
Wow, no wonder I was afraid! With all this code running in my software, my first reaction was to flee.
I remembered all I had learned, and caught myself in my reactivity:
«Wait a minute!» I said. «From what state of my nervous system can such thoughts stem? Hmmm, it smells like ‘flight’ – sympathetic activation»
Realizing that, I rushed to a quiet place, closed my eyes, and dropped into my body.
«Yes, I can see I have a lot of anxious energy inside. Of course, I want to run away! It seems dangerous to connect with people now. They feel more like lions than primates!»
Something shifted. I was aware now. And awareness brings choice.
«So, I can either flee or try to regulate. What tool, from the toolkit I acquired during the NSM, has more chances of helping me shift my state?
I picked a combination of protocols and applied them. All it took was three breathing protocols lasting five minutes. Moments later, I found myself talking to and meeting new people. In the past, I would have fled and now I even made two new friends.
Unbelievable!
Another time, I was in a bar. There, in the corner, stood a beautiful young lady. I fell in love with her! I craved to approach and get to know her. My heart was racing, and my mind was like:
«Haha there is no chance in the world she will like you back! It is so fuckin’ dangerous, don’t you dare go over there and speak to her! It is pointless, you are going to get rejected. And, may I remind you how painful it is to deal with rejection?»
Can you imagine what all these stories did to my poor body? They sure sucked the life out of it and kept me frozen and inert. My intention to move had no impact on my actual musculature.
«Hmm, I seem to freeze. Dorsal state it is then. Let’s put some more energy into the system, and see what happens!»
I kid you not, three minutes and one activating breathing protocol later, I was there talking to her. After a little back and forth, I got her number. The rest is history.
If I didn’t have the necessary knowledge and tools, I would have fallen victim to my stress response. None of this would be possible.
Think of this for a moment:
We have all experienced how having alcohol in our bloodstream impairs decision-making. When «fight or flight» is on, it is as if we have gotten drunk on cocktails of adrenaline mixed with cortisol. Our veins will be full of these molecules, and as with alcohol, that will compromise our thinking.
How can your choices in driving your life when your blood is full of stress hormones, be any better, than the choices of a drunk guy driving his car?
As Myles Munroe said:
«Your life is a sum total of the decisions you make every day, and those decisions are determined by your priorities.«
No awareness and influence over the state of your nervous system means your priority will be surviving over thriving.
How can you build and live the life you want when you get hijacked by your threat response most of the time? Where is your agency then?
"Agency over what exactly?", you might ask.
"Over the moment of each decision."
What this refers to, is the point «between stimulus and response». As Victor Frankl says, «This is where your true freedom lies.». By following the practices of NSM, you start becoming more aware of the choice point ahead. Instead of reacting, you pause to check in with yourself. You then use tools to up or down-regulate adding more energy to the system or soothing it. The goal is to shift to a state of Ventral Vagal safety. From that place, you come back to the situation at hand. A sense of empowerment, resourcefulness, and ownership now are available to you.
How much more optimal, do you think, the decision you make will be now? How much more, is the outcome of your actions going to serve you?
Taking the time to regulate, is like an instant sobering up! You get to fool the cop that is life when it stops the vehicle of your body for a BAC test!
Before taking the course, more times than I can remember, I found myself waking up and unable to get out of bed. I’ve spent hours lying there, not having the strength to get up. I have stared for god knows how long, at a blank computer screen. The cursor was flashing for eternity while I was waiting for a miracle to happen. I had no idea what I needed to do.
Thank God now I know. My nervous system required care, but I wasn't aware back then. With the knowledge I have accumulated ever since I can provide what is necessary. Sometimes within minutes, other times within a few hours. What's most important though, is that noI am confident. No matter what’s happening, I can get back up to the level of effectiveness I am capable of on my best days
After NSM I am consistent in being productive. It feels exhilarating!
The best part is I don’t have to push myself to get there. I don’t have to drink three cups of coffee to jolt myself into action or use self-hate and fear to motivate me. I treat my nervous system with kindness. I am more gentle with myself, taking better care of the soft animal of my body. By giving it in a skillful way what it needs, I get to receive more and more of what I want – Agency.
That’s huge! I am grateful to Jonny Miller, the creator of NSM!
Regulating my nervous system is now my number one priority no matter what is going on around me. I viscerally now know, that the outcome of my results has less to do with the conditions of my environment and much more to do with how anchored my nervous system is in a state of Ventral Vagal safety.
“Something is wrong with me”