How Your Body Learns To Feel Safe

Why you can't talk yourself into feeling safe.

Have you ever been in a situation where you felt really nervous and uneasy or anxious?

But you know,

There's no reason to be.

It might be a social situation.

It might be a feeling of dread you have when you wake up in the morning.

You really want to be able to say to yourself,

Don't be nervous.

Don't feel anxious.

Everything's fine.

You're safe.

Because you are.

But your body continues to respond with anxiety.

Your heart is racing.

That feeling of dread can be a bracing in your muscles,

A tension in your body,

Your tummy may feel all churned up.

And those words aren't landing,

They're not making a difference to that physical state of dysregulation and anxiety.

Why is that?

Because your body is something that feels.

And it's not being guided by a belief you have or words you or anyone else says.

It has to have a felt sense of things like steadiness.

Slowing down.

That racing feeling inside.

Or coming back down to Earth.

From that brain fog,

Confusing,

Floating feeling that can come with not feeling safe.

Our intelligence system is always wanting to keep us safe.

It's always scanning for safety.

And when you're feeling anxiety,

A really useful thing to say to yourself is.

.

.

My body is actually not telling me I'm not safe,

But asking.

Am I safe?

Am I safe?

And until it has a felt experience of safety,

It will keep asking that question.

There'll still be that low level question.

Nervous feeling,

That edginess.

And that's where our body-based practice is.

Really come into play.

We give ourselves a felt sense of our feet.

Pressing into the ground.

Of where we're sitting,

Our body actually releasing and feeling the chair underneath us.

We have breathing techniques that slow down that racing heart.

We have ways of connecting with ourselves and our body through soothing touch that do that job of bringing safety and regulation to our system.

And so many other practices.

And once your body has a felt sense of safety,

It can turn off that dial,

That emergency button,

That sense of threat.

That's why we practice embodied safety.

And even if you're using words like,

I'm safe,

I'm grounded,

I'm at home.

It's really important to do something for your body which allows it to make that its truth.