by Ruth Milsten
I had the opportunity to visit The San Diego Zoo recently and see the absolute beauty of a massive tiger. He was lounging and resting and then quickly got up and started pacing. As he walked in a circle, over and over, his beautiful orange fur rubbed up against the pane of glass that stood be
tween him and the humans on the other side. It struck me that this is why we have such a finely tuned nervous system, that can go from being calm (ventral vagal), to fight or flight (sympathetic) or freeze, submit or fawn (dorsal vagal.)
We were only safe because we were in a zoo, but if we had met this tiger on a Sunday hike, our nervous system would have jumped into action. This movement into different states of our nervous system is happening all of the time, like when a car cuts us off in traffic, an alarm goes off or our partner, child, coworker or friend is grumpy. Without an obvious danger like a tiger, our mind creates a story that usually sounds something like this, "What's wrong with me? Why am I getting so upset?" "I should just calm down, my partner is just having a bad day." "I'm so anxious all the time over nothing!"
By understanding our nervous system and what's happening beneath the surface, we can offer ourselves compassion rather than judgment, kindness rather than criticism and work with our nervous system to get back to ventral vagal and feeling safe and connected. This is part of what Somatic Therapy offers, as well as healthy ways to discharge stuck energy from your body and release the story that somehow there's something wrong with you.
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