The Myth of Calm - why being calm isn't the holy grail of healing

I recently had something activating to deal with. Previously in my life I would have either done:

• Ignore said activation entirely because I was disconnected from my body (y’know, the kind of ‘ignoring’ that happens due to the capacity to fragment ourselves...but that means you’re still owned an by that activation anyway (you just don’t know it so much).

• Told myself that what was needed was simply to ‘calm down’....(which isn’t entirely untrue it’s just not that helpful either)....

And so, if I had done anything in response to this activation, it would have been things around trying to relax myself...

Of course - sometimes this might work.

But a lot of the time it didn’t. 

I’d be really activated, charged up inside and racy and then I’d tell myself I needed to calm down but whatever I did to enable that often was not the remedy my body needed.

I see all the time folks thinking that the thing they really need to do, the thing that would solve all their problems, the thing that would heal their nervous system...

is being able to relax.

And then they focus on tools and practices aimed solely at one thing: 

Relaxation. 

This isn't bad or wrong. But I want to talk to you about why so much of healing is not simply and only about being able to relax. 

I often see relaxation as an outcome of healing rather than as a primary focus of it.

And a term I like to use more than just relaxation is easy responsiveness. Which means I can be calm and energised at the same time. I can meet the unfolding situations of my life with the right level of energy required. Rather than coming in at 110% to a situation that's 40%. This is how so many of us live - in state of excessive responsiveness. Which is in truth, not very responsive because it is based on living within states of protection and survival that mean we simply cannot resonate with life...And response-ability is always based on a capacity to resonate with, to feel, to be open energetically.

You know...

Maybe relaxing isn’t the primary thing you need. 

Maybe what you need is:

To be able to stay with intensity without moving into a collapse response? 

To be able to connect to all of your nervous system states and resource them skillfully?

To hold the charge of your anger, the depth of your sadness, the movement of your frustration -- without labelling them as DANGEROUS.

To feel safe in your body.

To feel connected to your boundaries and your capacity to honour NO.

Maybe more than simply and only relaxing, you need to find safe ways to discharge the excessive activation in your nervous system.

To connect to your power without always submitting.

To shift out of that sense of helplessness that you’ve been carrying too long. 

To learn how to feel your body and feel your stress at the very same time without stress hijacking you away from yourself.

Maybe...as necessary as relaxation is... it is not the one shiny golden apple of healing. 

And maybe, just maybe, you’ll be able to relax more once you’ve begun to address those things? 

What our nervous system often needs in time’s of activation and stress is for us to resource that stress by giving ourselves permission to land more safely in it...

Rather than the kind of bypassing that often happens when we seek to only ‘relax’.

In this recent story what I did in that moment was to intentionally and consciously resource that activation by helping my body to meet it and discharge it from my system...

So I...

Growled. 

I hissed.

I showed my teeth.

I pulled my hands up into claws and stuck my tongue out as I squeezed my thighs.

I engaged my boundary muscles and felt the strength in my legs.

(It was a beautiful sight - no but really!).

And then....

My system began to settle naturally...to discharge some of that survival stress because I gave myself permission to consciously meet it and resource ... 

I got safely into my primal fight flight response in a way that was deeply permissive, powerful and grounding...

And then... 

As I settled more I was able to meet that natural settling with some more resourcing that looked very different...

Bilateral movement, longer exhales, sighing.

I told this story because it is really reflective of how, as we learn the language of our nervous systems and we learn a more nuanced approach to resourcing ourselves and moving through our emotions...

We can meet ourselves more deeply exactly where we are at with a level of nuance and skill that we don’t get to do when we lack that deeper awareness and embodiment.

So I just want to remind you that maybe you do need to relax... maybe meditation is what you need...

But also... 

maybe what you need is to learn the language of your nervous system so that you can meet yourself where you actually are instead of all that energy you use to bypass ourselves in the name of always being calm.

Because not only can the the lack of permission and capacity to meet that activation can be major cause of illness, stuckness and suffering...

But it can also be the block to experiencing the kind of settled inner stability and emotional safety that we are seeking.

Being calm certainly is a superpower. Being able to relax and settle in the here and now is what we are need in order to live a purposeful and pleasurable life. However the road to getting there often requires that we learn how to befriend our nervous system and it's different states. It requires that we become more skilful stewards of our inner world and that we learn how to slow down enough to catch up with our nervous system...and meet ourselves from there.