Why the Nervous System Is the Missing Piece in Healing

If you’ve been on a healing journey for a while, this might sound familiar:

You understand your trauma.
You can explain your patterns.
You know why you react the way you do.

And yet you still panic, shut down, dissociate, people‑please, or go numb.

This can feel confusing or discouraging, especially when you’ve done so much inner work. But this experience doesn’t mean you’re doing anything wrong.

It means the mind is only half the picture.

True healing doesn’t happen through insight alone. It happens when the body learns safety — and that process begins with the nervous system.

Understanding the Nervous System

The nervous system is your body’s internal communication and survival network. Its primary job is protection.

Every moment, your nervous system is scanning your internal and external environment and asking one essential question:

“Am I safe right now?”

Based on the answer, it shapes how you feel, think, and behave, often without conscious input.

The Autonomic Nervous System (ANS)

The autonomic nervous system is the part of the nervous system that operates automatically, outside of conscious control. It regulates functions like heart rate, breathing, digestion, and stress responses.

The ANS has two primary branches:

• Sympathetic Nervous System – responsible for mobilization and survival responses (fight and flight)

• Parasympathetic Nervous System – responsible for rest, digestion, and recovery (including both safety and shutdown states)

Modern trauma science often describes three functional nervous system states:

• Fight – activation, anger, irritability, tension, readiness to confront

• Flight – anxiety, restlessness, overthinking, urgency, avoidance

• Freeze – numbness, dissociation, collapse, shutdown, hopelessness

• Fawn – people-pleasing, self-abandonment, conflict avoidance, and hyper-vigilance

Trauma occurs when these survival states are activated and cannot complete or return to safety.

Why the Mind Isn’t Enough

Trauma is not just the experience or a story we remember, it is a physiological experience stored in the body.

When something overwhelming happens, the nervous system responds before the thinking brain can process it. Muscles tighten, breath changes, heart rate shifts, and survival responses activate automatically.

This is why you can logically know you’re safe, but your body still reacts as if you’re not.

Insight helps us understand our experiences. Somatic work helps the body update them.

What Is Somatics (and Somatic Healing)?

Somatics refers to body‑based approaches that focus on internal sensation, movement, breath, posture, and nervous system regulation.

Instead of asking, “What’s wrong with me?” somatic healing asks:

• What is my body sensing right now?

• What survival response is present?

• What does my nervous system need to feel safer?

Somatic healing helps by:

• Completing interrupted survival responses

• Releasing stored tension and activation

• Expanding nervous system capacity

• Rebuilding trust between mind and body

Rather than reliving trauma, somatic work gently teaches the body that the threat has passed. It also equips you , as well as the understanding “I can handle difficult experiences if they occur in the future.”

Somatic Practices for Survival Responses

Fight Response

Fight energy shows up as anger, irritability, jaw or fist clenching, and tension. The body wants to push, protect, or defend.

Try this:

• Press your palms firmly into a wall or table

• Exhale through the mouth with sound

• Slowly engage large muscles (wall push‑ups or slow squats)

Why it helps:
Fight responses need containment and completion, not suppression.

Flight Response

Flight often shows up as anxiety, racing thoughts, restlessness, and an urge to escape or stay busy.

Try this:

• Place a hand on your chest or belly and breath deeply into the belly. Lengthen your exhale (ex. In for 4, out for 6).

• Ground through the senses: slowly look around your space and notice all of the items that spark peace or positivity (maybe your favorite plant, your pet, your favorite decor pieces, etc). 

Why it helps:
Flight resolves through slowing, grounding, and orienting to the present moment.

Freeze Response

Freeze can feel like numbness, dissociation, heaviness, or inability to act. This is a protective response, not a failure.

Try this:

• Start with micro‑movements (wiggle fingers or toes)

• Gently rock or sway

• Use warmth (blanket, tea, hand‑over‑heart)

• Name objects in the room to orient

Why it helps:
Freeze resolves through gentle reactivation, not force.

FAWN RESPONSE

The fawn response is a trauma-adapted survival strategy where safety was found through appeasing, pleasing, or prioritizing others.

Try This:

• Orient back to yourself: place your hands on your body (ex. chest and belly), take a deep breath, and ask your body “what do you need right now?” Notice sensations before words.

• Lean-back practice: From a seated position, gently lean back a few inches. Notice any impulse to lean forward, apologize, or explain.

  • Why it helps: Fawning often lives in forward energy. Leaning back restores boundary.

• Contained anger practice: Start by gently pressing your hands together or into a pillow. Allow a quiet growl or exhale. Increase pressure if desired.

  • Why it helps: Fawning suppresses fight energy. Small doses help restore balance.

Healing Happens When the Body Feels Safe

Healing is not about fixing yourself. It’s about expanding your nervous system’s capacity to experience safety, connection, and choice. When the body learns that it no longer has to live in survival, the mind naturally follows. This is why working with the nervous system is essential.

The body remembers.
And with the right support, the body knows how to heal.

✨ Root & Ritual

Somatic healing rooted in nervous system science, intuition, and compassion.