Beyond Regulation

From emotional regulation to nervous system resiliency and living fully again

9 min read

There comes a point in life where constantly trying to regulate your nervous system starts to feel like a limitation. 

Where calming down stops being the answer.

A time in your life where ‘safety’ has become the absolute priority in your life. Another breathwork session instead of publishing your bold post, saying Yes to the exciting collaboration opportunity that actually promises to move your business forward. 

Another early night in instead of a let-loose sundown dinner with your girls?

I understand where you’re coming from. You’ve fought hard to claw your way back out of states of anxiety and burnout, and your functioning life depended on radically introducing your methods and practices for regulation. So that you can sleep at night. So that you can show up at work.

You’ve learned to stabilise yourself, to create safety by all means, and in many ways, it works. You built a shelter. 

A shell. A cocoon for your healing. 

And yet you are noticing your life seeming to hover just a little outside of all that carefully created shell, waiting for you to participate, and rather than just carefully following your discipline, your practice, your routine, to start really living again.

As if you’ve learned how to be safe, but sacrificed to be free.

There’s so much more in the cards for you than just regulating your nervous system. 

And at the same time, let’s be clear about something. 

Regulation does matter.

In the time and age we live in our nervous systems are exhausted from the constant struggle of uncertainty in the world and our private lives, our brains fried by the daily bad news. Our bodies craving and screaming for peace in a phase of chaos.

So yes, regulation, soothing is needed, and it’s a big part of my work too. 

We do need to get out of the constant state of fight/flight/freeze, and we do need these little pockets of safety in order to get ourselves back together, especially when things seem to fall apart.

We need Somatic practices, soothing, breathwork, meditation, all the good stuff that gets us down from the state of emergency and into a place of pause.

But here’s the thing that breaks my heart as a Somatic Coach.

When regulation becomes a cage

Too much regulation might just as much suck the life out of us as dys-regulation will.

Yep, here I said it. And I’m saying this with so much love for you, my dear friend. Because I see so many of us going through this, and I know how tricky the whole thing is for you.

Yes, regulation matters.

It helped you survive the times where you lost the ground under your feet. When things fell apart. When sh*t hit the fan. 

Because you really really need this safety of yours. You need your Yoga Nidra sessions. Your quiet evenings wrapped in a blanket with your journal and your manifestation list. Your everyday 10min morning shakeout that gets you ready for the day.

I’ve experienced on my own skin how it’s like to cling to dear life and build a shell of regulation when life around me collapsed. Meditation in the morning, breathwork at midday, Yoga in the evening, energy cleansing before bedtime…I spent more times wrapped in a blanket with my journal than I did going out with friends. 

And those regulation practices are important. They are valid.

And yet as a healthy, lively human that you are, you can not become dependent on them.

Because when regulating the nervous system becomes our one and only goal, when ‘just having a break from everything’ is the only incentive you are holding for your wellbeing, it’s a bit like you are then burdened to constantly hold that heavy door open, and it will fall shut the moment you let go.

Like we only hold open a slither of the potential we could have.

And when you keep clinging to those practices, routines, and instead let real life pass by you, you’ve build yourself a cage, that doesn’t just protect you, but also holds you captive. 

And you can see yourself letting opportunities arise, ideas form, invitations coming your way, but hesitating, waiting… until you feel calm enough, clear enough, ready enough to actually go out and take them. 

To take a risk. To make a move. To leave your routine, just for fun. 

And this is where I’d like to pick you back up and gently re-introduce you to your next phase of nervous system work. A phase of re-opening, that reminds you that despite your past, despite your trauma, despite the protection you needed to build for yourself to regulate and save yourself - there’s still a life to live.

And it’s waiting for you.

Enter Resiliency.

Regulation creates safety. Resiliency creates freedom.

Real safety is not the opposite of freedom. It is what makes freedom possible.

Short-term regulation is a lifesaver.

Long-term freedom needs RESILIENCY.

Resiliency, meaning the ability to not just ‘avoid’ dys-regulation, but being able to bounce back from it, no matter how wild it gets. 

A principle that is inbuilt in our biology, in our nervous system, in our soma, that invites us to open our arms to life as it is, instead of keeping them wrapped around ourselves in protection. 

Because life doesn’t promise to get less turbulent at any point. It follows the same principles as our own bodies, principles of oscillation and balance, accelerating and decelerating, rising up and crashing down.

A life that lives in flow and movement.

As long as you try to just ‘regulate’, as in, stay calm, stay peaceful, stay collected, you are resisting this natural ebb and flow. And you’re building a fort of protection that seems like safety but in reality is a shell.

We start with regulation. Then we move into resiliency.

Regulation creates the moments of safety that serve us as the building blocks to widen our capacity, and to prepare our system for an overall re-organisation. 

Your nervous system was built for movement, not stillness.

Real life wants to move. And so does your nervous system.

A healthy resilient body wants to feel the highs and feel the lows, and not lose its cool over it. A resilient person can dare to join life, take risks, rise high, make mistakes, and still feel the love of it all.

Recover quickly.

Feeling the fear, and doing it anyway.

Feeling anxiety, and learning to ride its wave.

Feeling burnt out, and expecting life to pick you back up.

You see, every stick has two ends. And every life situations has two sides. In order to live without constant fear, we need to be able to see both of them.

Not just the ‘But What if…’ (insert catastrophising thoughts)

Not just the ‘Be careful, or else…’

But also the ‘On the flipside, I can see…’

The ‘I wonder what happens if…’

Do you see the different energy in those? 

One attitude is speaking from fear. The other from curiosity.

Regulation buys us time. Resiliency gets us back in the arena. 

Back to our self-agency.

Back to our independence as a confident human. Back to our freedom as the creators of our lives, our businesses, our relationships. 

And there’s a way to shift your own system from regulation into this kind of resiliency, without giving up your safety. 

Without giving up your freedom, your curiosity, your creativity. 

Maybe you recognise yourself somewhere in this.

Maybe you’ve built safety, but you can feel that you are ready for more.

It’s exactly what I do in my Somatic Resiliency Coaching, a blend of Somatics and Organic Intelligence. Scientifically proven, trauma-safe, and life-attuned.

If you’re curious to explore what’s possible for you, let’s get started with your first session of Resiliency mapping.

The process is simple, but it needs you to say Yes.

Yes to life, yes to living, yes to freedom. 

Let’s dream a little bigger, shall we?
Tell me when you’re ready.  

With so much love,

Elena