There is something in nature that forms patterns.
We, as part of nature, also form patterns.
The mind is like the wind and the body like the sand.
If you want to know how the wind is blowing, look at the sand.
– Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen, 1993
Natural Self-Regulation and Fight, Flight, Freeze
Your body never lies. Your thoughts, emotions, and spirit gather in intelligent collusion to organize themselves as the physical nuances of your body, much like iron filings organize to a magnet. Your body is your biography. Your body tells your life story, past and present.
As an intelligent system, your body can maintain perfect homeostasis. It can do so with little more than sunshine, water, fresh air and good food. The body’s tendency toward homeostasis is called “self-regulation.” The foundation for self-regulation is a healthy nervous system that’s in constant rhythm between contraction and expansion. Just as the heart must contract and expand, the nervous system must alternate between sympathetic activation & contraction (fight or flight) and parasympathetic activation & expansion (rest and digest) to maintain your body’s balance.
When you have encountered stresses that disrupt this natural rhythm, imbalance may manifest in your body. This disruption causes symptoms that persist despite your best efforts to address them. Paradoxically, symptoms are also your body’s intelligence attempting to create a pathway for expression and healing. Embedded in repetitive patterns and symptom sensations is the body’s wisdom searching for completion of a stressful event. The nervous system is expressing a need to complete one of the instinctual survival responses known as Fight, Flight, and Freeze.
As self-protective, the normal expression of survival responses is a high energy state. Because it is such an intensely power filled and primal state, we often inhibit it. When we fail to discharge the high energy of these normal responses, they remain biologically trapped and compressed in our neuromuscular and central nervous systems. This wreaks havoc on the health of the body and mind. It is this biologically trapped energy that can develop into a constellation of recurring symptoms, including pain, anxiety, anger, depression, digestive and sleep disturbances, allergies, chronic illness and feeling stuck or disconnected. Recurring symptoms signal the body’s attempt to manage, contain and dicharge this trapped energy.
In Somatic Experiencing® clients are guided to utilize movement and awareness of body sensations to safely discharge trapped and frozen biological energy. This releases stuck nervous system loops from past experience, resulting in the obvious reduction or disappearance of chronic symptoms.
The essence of healing all things visible and invisible is dependent upon the willingness to deepen your internal communication within the body-mind. In choosing to listen to the intelligent patterns of your body, you may discover how the wind is blowing, and can recover meaningful connection and deeper enjoyment in life.
