^{A's to your Q's}

The answer to both of these questions has to do with our capacity (which simply means our ability to stay present with what is happening), and discovering how much capacity we actually have is often a learning process in and of itself.

Often we may think we have capacity for something when we are actually unconsciously employing some kind of auto-regulating coping mechanism in order to manage the experience.

So that’s the first step — learning to discern what our capacity actually is, and whether we are finding the  safety so we can survive: a process that this program will help you with.

Once we can start to get a feel for our capacity, then we can start to figure out the answers to these questions above. As a general rule of thumb, we want to simply be with whatever experience is happening and learn how to allow it to express through the body up until the point that we start to become overwhelmed — which means we are going past our capacity.

At this point we want to go to our healthy auto-regulators/anchors of safety, or familiar coping mechanisms if we haven’t yet developed those healthy auto-regulators, so that we can come down.

This is a process that takes time to learn and even longer to master. Ideally, we want to gently push ourselves just to the edge of our capacity and then use a healthy internal or external anchor of safety to settle the system.

By doing this, we increase our capacity until eventually we can simply stay present with our activation until it reaches its natural ‘set point’ and then deactivates naturally without us having to do anything at all, like a thermostat that clicks off once the room reaches the right temperature.

Again, this takes time and practice and the right tools – which you will get in this program.

So yes, we can over use our anchors of safety, even healthy ones, if it means we are keeping ourselves from exploring those uncomfortable or unknown edges.

When we do that, when we over-resource, those anchors can turn into coping mechanisms. We also don’t want to push ourselves to the point of overwhelm.

So, learning when to find the safety resource and when not to is a bit of a dance, and a big learning process in and of itself, and takes time to master.

I find nothing else more powerful to regulate the nervous system than nature. 

Our nervous system is the product of natural evolution. When we return to nature, there's a profound recognition and a sense of coming home and support. We are part of nature and disconnection from nature is traumatic for our nervous system. Like removing a baby from his/her mother.

So, if you don't feel safe relating to your body, turn your attention to nature first. 

Create a relationship with mother nature. She tells a very powerful story; one of constantly moving through seasons, shedding & rebirth; as do we. 

Start simple, and even just for a few moments each day ask yourself:

What does the sun's light/warmth feel like?

What flowers are blooming? What do they smell like? 

What’s it like to feel the shade of trees, and to touch their bark? 

How does the wind feel on your skin? 

What birds are in the area? 

Spend time with your bare feet on the grass or dirt, which facilitates beneficial electron (energy) exchange. These are very positive and predicable co-regulators, and are the kinds of things we evolved perceiving and relating to for hundreds of thousands of years, and so they inherently support well-being, and offer co-regulation on the path to building capacity for internal safety. 

Also, connect to other bodies that feel safe. So any people/animals/natural elements you feel settled with and soothed by. Avoid as much as possible any and all people who are predictably co-dysreguating, especially if they are family members who have a powerful energetic and biological influence.

Finally, continue to do the inner work that you are learning about in this curriculum so that you can increase your capacity and resiliency in the face of feeling higher states of stress/fear. 

This will support you to gradually pay attention to your internal world, and aid in continuing to refine the practice of internally finding the safety.

This may sound over-simplistic, but it’s true that really it just comes with practice. Keep practicing the practices in the course, particularly the Orienting practice, Follow Your Impulse, and being aware of finding the safety.

hen we have lived with unresolved trauma for a long time it takes time, practice, and the right tools to communicate new information to our system.