Modern life throws a lot at us. It's important to understand the effects of chronic stress and how it can change the brain and body, as well as shape our consciousness, health and overall wellbeing.

Trauma is certainly becoming a buzzword these days. Is it for a good reason? I think so.

The problem I do see around the popularization of trauma is, we aren’t on the same page collectively when it comes to the definition of trauma.

When it comes to trauma, people typically think of some major event that occurs in someone’s life like a car accident or a life threatening experience. People also think of things like a soldier returning from war with PTSD. Those people have trauma, but the rest of us don’t.

But research over the last 30 or so years invites into a different lens of trauma, and a different definition for it.

More recently, especially through the work of Dr. Stephen Porges and Polyvagal Theory, we’ve learned that trauma is not in the experience we have, it’s what happens in the body… more specifically in the nervous system.

This means how we respond to an event or series of events or stressors is what produces trauma, not the fact that it happened. This also means two people can experience the exact same thing and come out of it with different outcomes.

What we’ve also learned more deeply is that trauma can occur through everyday overwhelming stressors of our modern life. That is to say, our nervous system can rewire toward unhealthy patterns from experiencing consistent stressors in life.

The end result is what is called nervous system dysregulation. Essentially the nervous system begins doing the wrong things at the wrong time.

This is because our body is designed to handle stress, but only in small doses. When stressors are consistent we move toward allostatic load and our brain and nervous system begin to maladapt causing us to lose our health, vitality, and develop chronic health conditions.

A healthy and regulated nervous system is crucial for optimal health. It ensures our body can maintain homeostasis and have capacity and resilience to show up to everyday life.

Beyond major traumatic events, if we experience too much chronic stress, early childhood adversities, poor diet and nutrition, underlying health conditions, or a poor or toxic environment, we can end up with nervous system dysregulation.

Common signs of nervous system dysregulation (trauma) are feeling overwhelmed or on edge often. Feeling angry, snappy, irritable, or overly reactive. Feeling consistently fatigued and having poor sleep patterns. Experiencing chronic pain or illness. Being very sensitive to external stimuli. Being highly sensitive to other people’s emotional states. Attention or concentration challenges.

Trauma & My Experience

For me, trauma became very loud in my life during a period when I became burnt out. The constant everyday stress of trying to pivot my business through impossible conditions had me on alert every day. I couldn’t relax, my sleep sucked, I put on a few extra pounds and could not get rid of them. I even lost the deep connection to myself I had worked for years to build.

As tough as this experience was, there was immense wisdom in the experience. It sparked a journey to take my knowledge in the healing arts and consciousness to a whole new level.

I’ve spent the last four years studying nervous system health, somatic, and embodiment at a whole new level. Through this, and working with some clients, I’ve come to the belief that all of us have maladapted (to various extents) to exist within our modern world.

That is to say, I believe all of us can benefit from learning about trauma and how our life experience shapes our vitality and ability to thrive. In fact, it feels a necessity to thrive in our existing world until we can collectively re-design our world to produce healthier humans.

Four years ago, I began studying the world of nervous system health, embodiment and trauma with deep inspiration and passion. I learned from many incredible teachers, but one more than all others. That was Irene Lyon.

Below is my latest conversation with Irene as we explore what trauma is, how it gets stuck in our body, and what to do about it. We also explore various sources of trauma from childhood to developmental years as well.