Your Brain Has Two Rooms
Hello! 👋
Lately, I’ve been running a lot of what I loosely define as “resilience” training, although really, what we’re exploring is stress, EQ, and neuroscience.
One of the things I’m really interested in, is that people don’t always notice when they’re becoming dysregulated, that is, when their body is slipping into fight, flight, or freeze mode.
Confession- I didn't used to notice either! I used to walk around at work, rubbing a tight knot in my left shoulder, wondering what the hell was wrong with it. My Fitbit even thought I was cycling on my commute home because my heart rate was so high.
It wasn’t until I burned out that I finally realised that I wasn’t injured, I was stressed and stuck in survival mode.
Now, every session I deliver starts with understanding what stress actually does to our body and brain. Because when we can spot the signs early, we can interrupt the pattern, before it hijacks us completely.
I use this metaphor-
Your Brain Has Two Rooms!
One is the living room (real or imagined). This is your safe space. Its a room thats decorated to your choosing. You go here to relax. You have friends over, and you chat, or debate, and laugh and connect. Communication is easy. You might learn in this room, create things, develop yourself or generally be at ease. Growth is possible here. You might nap occasionally, because you’re so comfortable.
The other room is the panic room. Think of any action movie you’ve ever seen with a panic room- what are its features? Steel box of a room, right? No windows, limited communication with the outside world, small, uncomfortable, with basic resources that will help you survive, but not flourish. This one’s built for emergencies. Logic shuts down and creativity vanishes. All that matters is survival.
These rooms represent your intellectual brain and your primitive brain.
Every time something triggers a stress response, could be a difficult meeting, a packed inbox, a missed train, or another deadline; your brain ushers you into the panic room for safety.
Popping in and out of our panic room is normal, btw. We might argue that humans aren't “meant” to live such stressful lives, but that's the topic for another newsletter! Our primitive brain response to perceived threats IS normal. And under “normal” conditions, we’ll come right back out of the panic room, rationalise and get on with things.
The issues arise when we’re popping in more and more. When it takes longer and longer to come back out. When we’ve popped in at the start of the day, and then get laden down with one stressful event after another and our brain starts telling us it's not safe to leave our panic room at all anymore….
Lets Think About Your Team
If you’re managing staff in a high-pressure environment, it’s worth asking:
How many of your team might be working from their panic rooms?
When people are stuck in there, they won’t be doing their best thinking. They can’t innovate, problem-solve, or perform at their peak, because their brain is focused on survival, not success.
What it might look like is disengagement, defensiveness, or poor performance, but it’s actually dysregulation.
How can we get back into the Living Room?
My Burnout Mentor is always saying “you can’t think your way out of burnout” and this applies here too. Logic has been bypassed, so we can’t expect rational thought to win the day. Instead, we need to tune into the body, which is why I talk so much about self awareness, and paying attention to the physical signs of fight, flight or freeze.
Some of the easy steps I share include:
Notice your early warning signs.
Tight jaw? Racing heart? Irritability? Your body is communicating the only way it knows how!Regulate your heartrate- breathe.
Breathing. Its so under-rated! Try long, slow breaths, in through your nose, out through your mouth, until your body feels a little calmer.Reconnect
Do something that tells your body its safe- move, stretch, laugh, go outside, talk to someone you like.
Look, we all visit our panic rooms sometimes. The key is not to decorate and move in!
If you’d like to help your team spend more time in their living rooms, that's exactly what my training is designed to do.
Give me a shout. I got you.
