How humans get stuck

[This is for the curious, and is not required reading if you just want to have a session.]

Biology 101

There is only one thing stopping us from doing, having, and being everything we want in life. 

And that one thing is us.

But how do we do this? 

And does it have to have it this way?

Here is how we hamstring ourselves:

When we get startled, our brain’s amygdala goes into “fight or flight” mode. And we either attack or run away from the threat.

But, before “fight or flight” kicks in, we enter “freeze” mode, where our unconscious is trying to figure out which one to choose.

Being stuck IS that freeze mode! It’s a high stress state that does not resolve. Often the more we try to push through, the more the amygdala pushes back. 

And it’s super annoying!

That internal stress; the "conscious wanting something, but the unconscious holding ourselves back". This drives our attraction to drugs, alcohol, and other undesirable behaviors. Our biology automatically does this to prevent overwhelm and burnout; it just wants to lower our stress level, and those behaviors do exactly that.

The amygdala’s purpose is to keep us safe when we get an unexpected surprise. This has an advantage from an evolutionary perspective. It’s kept our species alive for at least 6 Million years!

Our amygdala instinctively learns what to be afraid of as we grow up. Unfortunately, some of these learnings may have been traumatic, and those are stored in the amygdala.

However since the amygdala are pretty small, in adults they are the size of an almond, they have a very limited number of memory cells.

So memories that are stored there are extremely basic, and often overgeneralized. This is how our brains can mistake a garden hose for a snake, when we spot it unexpectedly out of the corner of our eye.

All the above is part of a normally functioning human. But not necessarily a happy one! 

Our amygdala wasn’t designed to handle the types and quantity of stressors we encounter today in modern life. It was designed to save us from predatory animals, and for not falling off cliffs.

The good news is that your amygdala memory can be quickly updated so as to not react or freeze unnecessarily.

I guide people through doing just that. Pretty much no one can do it without a guide.

Once a specific amygdala imprint gets updated, it can’t fire. There is no freezing, and no fight or flight!

That garden hose mentioned previously, will forever now be just a garden hose.

There is no homework, and you don’t need to practice anything. It’s just gone! It’s really pretty magical.

Since that block that was stopping you is all gone now, and you can easily move forward unencumbered and unstuck! 

Go thrive.