Sharon Draper | Local business
Sharon Draper
Phone: +61 452 575 598
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25.01.2022 Polyvagal theory teaches us that being mindfully present in nature for just 5 min can help regulate our nervous system back into a calm state. Even watching a video of nature can help.... This beautiful video of a bee in a lotus flower in Durban, South Africa was created by my good friend @duvenagemarcel
24.01.2022 Regulating means learning ways to manage your emotions so they don’t take control. If parents don’t know how to regulate their own emotions, how will they be able to teach their child how to regulate theirs? The good news is, it’s never too late to learn what your sensitivities are and to identify resources that help manage your overwhelming emotions, even as adults.... Emotional healing is the ability to know what your nervous system needs when it feels overwhelmed. Remember, this is always a work in progress but if you look at yourself with openness, curiosity and mindful awareness, you will learn to listen for what your nervous system needs to reach homeostasis. Ask yourself, what does my body/nervous system/ heart need right now?
23.01.2022 When we’re in the tornado of emotions, it can be difficult to think of things we can do to help us. Having a visual toolkit that’s easily accessible can be extremely helpful in times like these but not if it becomes another form of control where you tick them off a list to prove that you have self cared or as a way to avoid actually feeling the emotions. Self-care is about letting go, slowing down and being in the moment more than about controlling your time with things to tick off (even if the activities are self-care related).
23.01.2022 Relationships do need compromise but if you find you’re often not able to express your emotional boundaries, then you’ll build resentment. We tolerate until we can’t anymore and usually explosively react in current feelings but also with feelings related to past triggers that we didn’t face. Our message now gets convoluted and caught up in a tornado of reactive emotions so never really gets heard and received. This has been a challenge for me personally, especially with ‘good... girl’ conditioning where I’ve convinced myself that I’m easy going and therefore don’t mind these things happening. What I find helpful is experimenting with expressing your feelings about something that isn’t too overwhelming. You’ll start to feel more confident with this process which will prepare you for when you need to speak about something that is really important to you.
22.01.2022 The safety setting of our nervous system is the foundation of how we feel, act and think. It’s important to understand what it needs for emotional wellbeing so that we can healthily continue living meaningful lives. I’ll be integrating more information from Polyvagal Theory in my posts from now on.
20.01.2022 Parenting doesn’t come naturally Of course, we all have a drive to survive and protect our young from harm but we are also emotional beings and need emotional attunement and support. If we aren’t aware of and have been working on resolving our own childhood trauma and neglect (and we all have childhood emotional neglect) then we won’t be able to mitigate this from being passed onto our children.... Helpful books for parents by Dan Siegel and Tina Payne: The Whole Brain Child The Power of Showing Up The Yes Brain Child No Drama Discipline Brainstorm
20.01.2022 If someone is reacting to you implementing a boundary for yourself, it may be because they’re not used to you having boundaries or it challenges them in their own way (they’re taking it personally). This doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be putting healthy boundaries in place, it just means you need to be prepared for some people to react out of their own unresolved trauma. Keep using your resources to tolerate this distress.
18.01.2022 I’ve always been grateful for my sight, for my hearing, for being able to move but I’m learning to be grateful to feel. We often wish we didn’t feel so much because we fear we’ll never be able to come out of it when we feel so deeply. This isn’t true. When we become grateful to feel, we accept it. When we allow ourselves to feel, we’re able to heal.
17.01.2022 Our Nervous system craves familiarity because familiarity feels certain and therefore feels safe. Even if something might be better for me but is new and uncertain (unfamiliar) it will be easier (seemingly safer) for me to stay where I currently am. It takes courage and conscious effort to forge a new, unfamiliar pathway. The way to do this is to learn how to regulate your nervous system so you don’t react from a survival, protective state. I’ll explain this more in the upcoming posts.
15.01.2022 The way to process our stories is to feel them in our body. If we can learn to stay present with what’s going on inside, we create discernment. Discernment (ability to judge well) allows you the chance to feel the feeling of the memory or story but identifying it as just that, a memory or a story. It’s not who we are and it’s not happening right now. Modulating the stress that emerges (by practicing deep breathing) while exploring the story as a narrative, as well as feeling it in your body allows you to reorganise memories that weren’t initially integrated into your system.
13.01.2022 Boundaries create sustainability in relationships, friendships, my ability to work with others, even in my relationship with myself. If I don’t let people know what I need in order to regulate myself, I’ll easily burnout due to others inadvertently imposing their needs onto me.
10.01.2022 Journal your responses to help you gain insight on what you’re needing.
09.01.2022 Wanting to be loved and loving another initially require two different things. We crave being loved because we don’t have to let down our armour for that to happen. We fear falling in love because we have to remove our armour and show vulnerability to be able to do this. If we don’t invest in a relationship, we believe we won’t get hurt. The reality is, you’re hurting yourself by not investing in a relationship.
09.01.2022 We are a meaning-making species. Our brain works in a story format. We makes sense of stories that have a beginning, a middle and an end. So, when something happens to us, we start creating a story around it to make sense of it. When we tell ourselves a story, our brain automatically looks for a way to conclude that story.... If there’s a gap in our knowledge, i.e we aren’t sure how something is going to play out, our brain tries to fill in that gap with a conclusion (usually from our individual insecurities) in order for us to feel less out of control, even if the conclusion isn’t factual. Any ending is better than no ending. Having a conclusion makes us feel certain, it makes us feel safe and we carry on with our life, not necessarily living by factual truth but living by a sense of certainty. Try to become more aware of the story you’re telling yourself. Is this story factual or could it be influenced by an insecurity?
05.01.2022 Let go of the story you’re telling yourself. Let go of the tension you carry in your body. Let go of controlling everything around you so you soften the rigidity. It can start with a purposeful sigh. Exhale as much air out as possible. Then notice your nervous system naturally take the next deep inhalation. Practice noticing how it feels to allow yourself to take deep breaths rather than trying to control taking deep breaths.... Letting go of that controlled breath can start the process.
04.01.2022 When we feel stressed as a child, our first response is to reach out to connect to receive help and to learn that we’re not alone. If we receive the attunement of a caring parent, we strengthen our ability to self-regulate through this co-regulation between child and parent. We build resilience and are able to navigate the world with confidence. If no one responds, we move into a survival response which is called the Sympathetic state. In this state, we get energised with anx...ious energy, crying out, reacting, hyper-vigilant while listening for sounds, hoping someone will notice. If we still receive no help, we slip into the oldest survival state where we disconnect, dissociate and shut down to preserve ourselves. If we didn’t receive the attunement we needed as a child, we learn that we are alone and then struggle to move out of these survival states. The way through this as an adult is to engage with ourselves (gain insight into why we think, feel and behave a certain way as well as learn how to self-regulate) and engage with others (to build corrective attachment experiences and learn how to co-regulate).
