How Overwhelming Experiences Shape Your Life..

A book that I am currently reading “The body keeps the score” by Van Der Kolk explains this topic in depth and basically states how overwhelming experiences affect the development of brain, mind, and body awareness, all of which are closely intertwined. The resulting derailments have a profound impact on the capacity for love and work.

Let's take a closer look ,

The nervous system works to control, regulate, and communicate with all the systems of the body. The nervous system receives signals from the internal and external environment, interprets them, and then decides what is best for the body. In order to understand why our nervous system goes into overdrive let's first understand how it works.

We have two main divisions within the nervous system : parasympathetic and sympathetic. The parasympathetic is “rest and digest” mode while the sympathetic is “fight or flight”. For example, if you were being chased by a lion, the sympathetic would turn on whereas if you were meditating on the beach the parasympathetic would turn on. Both systems are vital to the bodies survival, but should ideally stay mostly in a parasympathetic mode

Unfortunately, the majority of people today are quite the opposite as they are stuck in sympathetic overdrive. Potential symptoms of sympathetic overdrive can include: headaches, anxiety, lowered immune response, irritability, fatigue, etc.

Depression, anxious/self-limiting and negative thoughts can cause neurotransmitters to be released that turn on the sympathetics. Trauma, whether physical/mental/emotional can get stored in the body and affect how we process and interpret other incoming stressors. We are exposed to toxins everyday through our food, water, and air whether it be chemicals, pesticides, harmful electromagnetic frequencies, micro plastics, etc. With more toxins in today’s world than ever seen before, our bodies can’t work fast enough to eliminate them. This puts our body in a constant stressed out state AKA sympathetic overdrive.

Ok, got it Adam ! But what can we do to help regulate our sympathetic nervous system? 

Why not get yourself booked in for a free discovery visit with our team!

Here at Team Peak we can help put your body into a parasympathetic state while also resolving other hidden problems and ultimately move you towards optimal health. Getting consistent care can give your body a break and allow it to be better adapted to deal with all the various stressors.