Post by joyfull1 on Jul 29, 2021 11:11:40 GMT -8
From The Wisdom of Trauma talks on Trauma
Talk by Stephen Porges - Trauma and the Nervous System
We broadcast our feelings and our physiological state in our voice and we express it in our face. We see instantaneously our body responds to another who has suffered trauma. Our nervous systems evolved to detect those features and we have turned off our natural gifts through voice and facial express and we superimposed that the words all the meaning. But words only carry a small aspect of meaning, our voice, intonation and facial expressions are really the cues to tell the other person that we are safe and there to help them co-regulate.
In the world of trauma healing, we know the power of witnessing, the power of listening; our bodies are broadcasting those cues of accessibility to the person who is speaking. Visualize your heart pumping blood through your body in two different states, a state of being accepted and safe and calm or a state of being marginalized and under threat.
If our body is under threat, it determines all the higher brain structures. So when our bodies are mobilized in threat, we are not deep thinkers. We don’t make good decisions. We can’t solve big problems.
We see that our society is one that is under chronic threat and society shapes the physiological state of individuals. Our nervous system is such and integrated unit that it uses the visual to substitute what is missing from the auditory.
(Polyvagal Theory) - our underlying physiological state shifts our perspective of the world. So if our body is in a state of mobilization or fight/flight, we see the world more negatively. If our body is calmer, through vagal regulation of our autonomic nervous system, we see the world optimistically. If we are shutting down, dissociating, immobilized and withdrawing from society, we have no contact with the world.
If you step into the world of trauma, people are dealing with a world that is treating to them, they are literally telling you that their physiology is in a state of threat which it is. A neural retuning of the autonomic nervous system is needed.
You have an agenda and that agenda drives you. Even good agendas result in contradictions in being able to co-regulate with another human being. You have to become very respectful of your reactions to the other and you can’t interpret it from a level of intentionality. The fallacy of our culture is that as soon as we feel bad, we attribute it to someone else. Our narrative says that other person had intended to be hurtful or should have been sensitive to us. We have to become our own parent and say “I’m feeling this way, now how do I manage that within the complexity of a social interaction?”
(When I didn’t get something I really want and I others, don’t take it personally, I’m having a bad day). The potent cues were not my words, potent cues were my ability to be a supportive person in their lives and I was now saying I have an excuse to not be supportive. As parents we have to acknowledge that we are doing this all the time with our children.
I used to interpret the flatness of people’s faces as if they were thoughtful, not dissociative, I was misreading the cues and it took me decades to figure this out. When a persons face is flat and they don’t appear to be there, they are dissociating and it’s often related to a history where there was abuse or some level of chronic stress. I started to see in the people around me, their histories as it was being embedded in their gestures, in their voice, and their facial expressions.
A smile should be in the upper part of the face, not the lower. The lower part of our face, is the aggressive part, it’s for biting. So when people do a false smile, we almost sense that they are being aggressive which they are. The upper part of the face is linked to the nerves that middle ear structures so when we have exuberance in our face, the middle ear structures dampens low frequency predator sounds.
Safety is much more than the absence of threat, safety is the presence of connection. Removal of threat isn’t bad but it’s not sufficient. Our nervous system evolved with the capacity to down regulate threat with cues of safety through voices, gestures, being present, witnessing, shared moments of attention and intimacy. Two bodies co-regulating in space and time, that’s our nature, that’s our biological imperative. Mammals have to co-regulate to survive.
Gabor - In our society the way we are trained to raise children is by constantly cutting off or frustrating the need for connection and the frustration of that need is in itself traumatizing.
Polyvagal theory says that the events are important but the real issue is the bodies reaction, the bodies response. The critical thing is what happens in the body. Does the body shift state into a chronic state of threat? The more adversity, the more autonomically reactive they were. The direct path from trauma to worry, anxiety and depression was dependent on if the autonomic nervous system was retuned. If the autonomic nervous system is already in a state of threat often related to childhood history of trauma, then those are the people who are reacting to the stressful events.
If the autonomic nervous system was already re-tuned creating a vulnerability, then something happens and now they are dis-regulated. They have poor vagal tone. There is an internal connection as well as a social connection. History creates the vulnerability.
When threat system is triggered, the autonomic nervous system goes into defense mode and you get this whole cascade of symptoms but that cascade of symptoms is not the disease, it’s being triggered by the disease. We can intervene to stop that cascade and if we can, the burden of suffering will be greatly relieved but how do we stop the cascade? To turn off threat, we need to direct cues of safety to that nervous system.
Shared across many mammalian species, co-regulation enables self regulation; accept in our society. What we are calling smothering, or mothering or parenting… ask any mother “when you are feeding your child, how do you feel?”
You need an appropriate mammal to co-regulate with, it could be a spouse, a mother, a friend, a dog.
Mobilization without fear, is play. Face to face interactions are so important, to read the cues of safety.
When nervous systems get re-tuned to a chronic state of threat, and the manifestations are both mental health issues but also physical health issues. Our nervous systems are being affected by the chronic demands on many levels. You can become numb to the feelings of others rapidly. Becoming a physician means becoming numb to others and becoming numb to others means becoming numb to ourselves because we are a highly connected species.
What was the world like that I was dropped into? Watching old movies tells you a lot of the treatment of others, the treatment of feelings and especially the treatment of women and people of color. We literally have these documentaries that show us how our society is so biased and violates the principals of what it is to be a human.
(Play, meditation, safe social connection, dancing, singing, yoga, anything that promotes ease and pleasure in the body helps re-wire the nervous system from a sate of fight and flight to rest and/or play.)
We have to have great respect that our human core is quite benevolent and loving. It's the wrapper that we put on to defend against fear and threat. We all want to be accepted and connected. What can we do to enable others to be bold enough to move out of threat and into connection.
Talk by Stephen Porges - Trauma and the Nervous System
We broadcast our feelings and our physiological state in our voice and we express it in our face. We see instantaneously our body responds to another who has suffered trauma. Our nervous systems evolved to detect those features and we have turned off our natural gifts through voice and facial express and we superimposed that the words all the meaning. But words only carry a small aspect of meaning, our voice, intonation and facial expressions are really the cues to tell the other person that we are safe and there to help them co-regulate.
In the world of trauma healing, we know the power of witnessing, the power of listening; our bodies are broadcasting those cues of accessibility to the person who is speaking. Visualize your heart pumping blood through your body in two different states, a state of being accepted and safe and calm or a state of being marginalized and under threat.
If our body is under threat, it determines all the higher brain structures. So when our bodies are mobilized in threat, we are not deep thinkers. We don’t make good decisions. We can’t solve big problems.
We see that our society is one that is under chronic threat and society shapes the physiological state of individuals. Our nervous system is such and integrated unit that it uses the visual to substitute what is missing from the auditory.
(Polyvagal Theory) - our underlying physiological state shifts our perspective of the world. So if our body is in a state of mobilization or fight/flight, we see the world more negatively. If our body is calmer, through vagal regulation of our autonomic nervous system, we see the world optimistically. If we are shutting down, dissociating, immobilized and withdrawing from society, we have no contact with the world.
If you step into the world of trauma, people are dealing with a world that is treating to them, they are literally telling you that their physiology is in a state of threat which it is. A neural retuning of the autonomic nervous system is needed.
You have an agenda and that agenda drives you. Even good agendas result in contradictions in being able to co-regulate with another human being. You have to become very respectful of your reactions to the other and you can’t interpret it from a level of intentionality. The fallacy of our culture is that as soon as we feel bad, we attribute it to someone else. Our narrative says that other person had intended to be hurtful or should have been sensitive to us. We have to become our own parent and say “I’m feeling this way, now how do I manage that within the complexity of a social interaction?”
(When I didn’t get something I really want and I others, don’t take it personally, I’m having a bad day). The potent cues were not my words, potent cues were my ability to be a supportive person in their lives and I was now saying I have an excuse to not be supportive. As parents we have to acknowledge that we are doing this all the time with our children.
I used to interpret the flatness of people’s faces as if they were thoughtful, not dissociative, I was misreading the cues and it took me decades to figure this out. When a persons face is flat and they don’t appear to be there, they are dissociating and it’s often related to a history where there was abuse or some level of chronic stress. I started to see in the people around me, their histories as it was being embedded in their gestures, in their voice, and their facial expressions.
A smile should be in the upper part of the face, not the lower. The lower part of our face, is the aggressive part, it’s for biting. So when people do a false smile, we almost sense that they are being aggressive which they are. The upper part of the face is linked to the nerves that middle ear structures so when we have exuberance in our face, the middle ear structures dampens low frequency predator sounds.
Safety is much more than the absence of threat, safety is the presence of connection. Removal of threat isn’t bad but it’s not sufficient. Our nervous system evolved with the capacity to down regulate threat with cues of safety through voices, gestures, being present, witnessing, shared moments of attention and intimacy. Two bodies co-regulating in space and time, that’s our nature, that’s our biological imperative. Mammals have to co-regulate to survive.
Gabor - In our society the way we are trained to raise children is by constantly cutting off or frustrating the need for connection and the frustration of that need is in itself traumatizing.
Polyvagal theory says that the events are important but the real issue is the bodies reaction, the bodies response. The critical thing is what happens in the body. Does the body shift state into a chronic state of threat? The more adversity, the more autonomically reactive they were. The direct path from trauma to worry, anxiety and depression was dependent on if the autonomic nervous system was retuned. If the autonomic nervous system is already in a state of threat often related to childhood history of trauma, then those are the people who are reacting to the stressful events.
If the autonomic nervous system was already re-tuned creating a vulnerability, then something happens and now they are dis-regulated. They have poor vagal tone. There is an internal connection as well as a social connection. History creates the vulnerability.
When threat system is triggered, the autonomic nervous system goes into defense mode and you get this whole cascade of symptoms but that cascade of symptoms is not the disease, it’s being triggered by the disease. We can intervene to stop that cascade and if we can, the burden of suffering will be greatly relieved but how do we stop the cascade? To turn off threat, we need to direct cues of safety to that nervous system.
Shared across many mammalian species, co-regulation enables self regulation; accept in our society. What we are calling smothering, or mothering or parenting… ask any mother “when you are feeding your child, how do you feel?”
You need an appropriate mammal to co-regulate with, it could be a spouse, a mother, a friend, a dog.
Mobilization without fear, is play. Face to face interactions are so important, to read the cues of safety.
When nervous systems get re-tuned to a chronic state of threat, and the manifestations are both mental health issues but also physical health issues. Our nervous systems are being affected by the chronic demands on many levels. You can become numb to the feelings of others rapidly. Becoming a physician means becoming numb to others and becoming numb to others means becoming numb to ourselves because we are a highly connected species.
What was the world like that I was dropped into? Watching old movies tells you a lot of the treatment of others, the treatment of feelings and especially the treatment of women and people of color. We literally have these documentaries that show us how our society is so biased and violates the principals of what it is to be a human.
(Play, meditation, safe social connection, dancing, singing, yoga, anything that promotes ease and pleasure in the body helps re-wire the nervous system from a sate of fight and flight to rest and/or play.)
We have to have great respect that our human core is quite benevolent and loving. It's the wrapper that we put on to defend against fear and threat. We all want to be accepted and connected. What can we do to enable others to be bold enough to move out of threat and into connection.