On a daily basis, we’re triggered by other people and situations, and often, this reaction is based on our amygdala innately and vigorously attempting to protect us from what it perceives as danger.
The amygdala is the oldest part of the human brain concerned with survival. It’s part of the limbic system, and it stores traumatic encoding in its cells.
From the time you were a child, when you first had an experience that your brain determined as unsafe or scary, little antenae-like structures called AMPA receptors formed on the surface of the brain cells of your amygdala.
The job of the amygdala is to constantly scan for threatening stimuli and alert you when it perceives danger. So it makes sense that you might have found that the same types of experiences throughout your life have evoked the same types of feelings and reactions throughout your life.
The past influences your present
We tend to believe the past is the past and we should be able to move past these things now that we’re grown up.
With this mindset, it’s likely that you’ve never really connected the dots from a reaction you have in adulthood to something that happened in childhood.
You might have found that you repeatedly react to certain stimuli (people and experiences) without thinking or consulting the rational part of your brain, the prefrontal cortex. Maybe you feel anger or fear without understanding why your reaction seems bigger than what the situation calls for.
It’s not that you’re weak or bad or can’t control yourself. You, like everyone, are literally wired to perceive “trauma” (and I mean that in the most biological sort of way)!!!
These little AMPA receptors’ only job is to alert you to danger. They don’t reason or rationalize. They alert you to fight, flight, freeze or fawn.
When the amygdala is activated, it’s usually very hard to calm it enough to think clearly and engage the prefrontal cortex, the rational thinking part of your brain that responds to situations with good judgment and an awareness of long-term consequences.
Because traumatic encoding is held in the cells of your amygdala for ever, and these subconscious triggers are always present, it often feels like it’s hopeless to let go of old patterns of reacting and behaving.
I personally have been in therapy for much of my adult life and what I’ve found is that endlessly talking about those past situations that caused the trauma sometimes seems to make me feel worse. Now I know that talking about the traumatic situation and feeling those familiar “bad” feelings, actually triggers the AMPA receptors on the cells of my amygdala to go on alert. Each time this happens, I’m reinforcing these old neural pathways of these brain cells.
HOW TO Stop old subconscious patterns
I’ve found that using Havening Techniques® bridges the gap between feeling triggered and in fight, flight or freeze, to feeling calm and being able to think rationally and problem solve.
Havening is a tool that helps de-traumatize the nervous system by removing or altering the emotional memory of traumatic or stressful life events and their negative effects.
By diffusing or eliminating the intense “charge,” it’s helped me overcome some of my lifelong habitual reactions like feeling unsafe, the need to lash out, and sudden feelings of intense anger — all caused by traumatic or stressful encoding. When the unexpected triggering in mitigated, I can move on to relating to myself and others in a more rational, empathetic way.
The method is equally effective both virtually and in person.
If this is something you’d like to learn more about, email me for more information or to set up a free 15-minute phone consultation or to schedule a first session.