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Over the past few months I really internalized some phenomena with my nervous system that have helped me understand my relationship with it more deeply.
I am not a nervous system expert and don’t claim to be. I just wanted to share a few of the experiences here that have impacted my own understanding in case it’s helpful.
As a background, I’ve been regularly practicing various forms of somatic experiencing for about 5 years. The unifying factor amongst all the different modalities is directing your attention to feeling and meeting whatever is arising in the space where your body is.
I usually do this as a part of some form of subconscious exploration and transformation process. An example of this would be noticing my unhealthy patterns through my response to life and then bringing my reaction as an entry point into contemplative practice.
My favorite practice is one I learned through RenXue. It mirrors the high level memory reconsolidation sequence which is the only scientifically verified process for permanent transformation.
Here’s an outline of the memory reconsolidation sequence from the book Unlocking The Emotional Brain.
First you access the subconscious through recalling the situation or memory while shifting the attention to sensations in your body. Maintaining gentle awareness on any prominent sensation or tension, you welcome whatever information or sensations emerge.
When our nervous system feels safe (parasympathetic dominant), there is a greater capacity to meet these experiences. This supports the transformation process.
When the nervous system doesn’t feel safe, it stifles the transformation process.
Either your protective mechanisms kick in preventing you from fully accessing an experience or you’re only able to access a certain depth of the underlying energy associated with it. You can think of depth like layers an onion. When it comes to healing unsupportive inner material, the deeper the layer, the greater the healing.
Below are a few things I’ve really internalized lately that seem to create a greater sense of safety and more conducive environment to transformation.
Human Coregulation
One thing that’s become more clear over time is that I seem to be able to go deeper into my feelings and inner space in the presence of working with a facilitator. I kind of sensed this working with my teacher over the years, but impact of working with another human on the nervous system was never emphasized in the RenXue teachings.
It wasn’t until I started to familiarize myself with Aletheia that I started to see this phenomenon is actually well known. In this system, they acknowledge that the presence of another nervous system can help attune yours to be in a state of safety. This aids the depth and ease of the transformation process.
In our current scientific model, this broad phenomenon is mostly categorized as "interpersonal neural synchronization" or "neural coupling. Early research around centers around emotional contagion, physiological coregulation, and social coherence. Props to my friend Jonny Miller from Nervous System Mastery for sharing theses studies. He is definitely who I recommend for all things nervous system.
I think as we move into a more bio-electrical view of health and the world that views the nervous system as a source of energetic perception, we’ll see a lot more interesting research here.
Acknowledgement of this phenomenon has a couple interesting implications.
In the world of A.I. and robo-therapists, it seems like good ol’ fashion human connection may offer a depth of experience hard to replicate with technology.
It also points to some the dynamics to be aware of if you only perform these type of practices in isolation. I’m hesitant to say limitations because clearly there have been people in history who’ve went very deep places without somatic facilitators.
The bigger picture in my opinion is how this relates to humans gradually becoming more aware of their innate capacity to help heal themselves and others. Though holding space to regulate the nervous system seems like a small thing, all of these unacknowledged components of natural human abilities start to paint a much more powerful picture than what the predominant narrative tells us today.