It's that time of year to set resolutions. Or maybe you're more of a "flow with the seasons" person and will be focusing on making change at the spring equinox.
Either way, CHANGE is on many of our minds.
I hope the resolutions you're making:
spark joy
are rooted in your values
are for YOU, and not for someone else or society's made up expectations
come from a place of love and devotion, not guilt and shame
are realistic, and rooted in tons of self compassion
So what keeps us from following through on making change? What keeps some of us from even starting? And what stops us from even allowing ourselves to want something different?
It's our brain. Or rather, the ways our brains have so ingeniously adapted to our past trauma and neglect.
I know there's so much research out there on change. Great books on the how to make change like Atomic Habits give lots of tips, but so many of these guides and books don't take into account the person who is healing from trauma.
Because trauma changes the way our brains and our nervous systems work. We can become more rigid or stuck in our ways than someone who hasn't been through it. This is called becoming wired for protection. Even though some of the ways we've been thinking and behaving suck, they have kept us alive until this moment.
For example, patterns like people pleasing or dissociating (and all the subsequent trouble that inevitably follows for us from those patterns) are ways our brains have adapted to trauma. These are sometimes called "trauma responses" or "survival patterns."
And that's the part of our brains we need to address first. No "how to" or list of "tips for a New Year, New You!" is going to work unless we address the underlying patterns rooted in our past traumas.
While this is a long, winding, non-linear practice, I can confidently share with you the most important thing you've got to focus on first if you're healing from past wounds and want to make change:
Learn how to cultivate safety for yourself & in your life. The safer you feel, the easier it will be or your brain to let go of those old survival patterns and try some new behaviors.
This is SO much easier said than done, and we all have different levels of privilege and agency to create safety in our lives. For example, someone who is blind and does not have appropriate accommodations and supports will feel less safe in the world than someone who is not disabled. Someone who is BIPOC in the US will feel generally less safe than a white bodied person if they get stopped by the police.
Yet there are still things we can control, change, and set some boundaries around to feel more safe.
I tell clients there are two parts to this:
Internal safety. Which is mainly nervous system regulation and improves as we increase. . .
External safety. Surrounding yourself with healthy secure relationships, leaving a toxic work environment, decreasing the amount of time you go home for the holidays with your hyper critical father and passive aggressive mother, maybe even changing your living situation.
I acknowledge these things take time and resources, strategy and careful planning. But if you are being yelled at when you're at work, coming home to criticism and contempt, have a big health issue looming you keep putting off getting needed lab work done. . . it's going to be difficult for your brain and nervous system to want to let go of people pleasing and dissociating (as my example today) as those behaviors help you survive.
Here's some action steps you can take to help you start creating more safety in your life:
Do a safety assessment.
Where do you feel unsafe in your life? Relationships? Work? Your home environment? If you're having difficulty, perhaps take a week to notice how you feel in your body around different people and environments. Where do you feel relaxed and peaceful vs. tight, anxious, on alert, or checked out? Your body is communicating with you all the time about how safe or unsafe it feels.
Noticing and naming the state of your nervous system is an exercise I give my clients in our first 2 weeks of working together, and every single one of them notice they feel like they're in "protection" (dysregulation) mode much more often than "connection" (regulation) throughout the day. So if you notice your shoulders or your hips are often tight, there is no shame! Your body is doing a great job of staying in protection mode based off your very real past lived experience.
Then be curious about what it would take for you to feel safe?
Hiding in a cave on a mountain or running away to a convent (both ideas I've had in the past) don't count! But also let yourself dream about what it would be like to work in a better place, or set boundaries with your parents. With the right support, anything is possible.
Remember, the safer you feel, the easier it is to change. And this also means, we can't change alone. Find a coach, therapist, trusted friend, faith leader, self help group, etc. to help you along the way.
And for my astro friends: yes I am writing this just after Mars retrograded back into Cancer-reminding us to look at what actions we need to take to care for ourselves and create (emotional) safety.
Let me know if this was helpful for you!
With Compassion,
Cassandra Peterson-Solano
PS: Want to get voice notes with healing stories and support from me weekly? Join my new free channel on IG: Notes on Becoming
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