Once again, an amazing episode-totally full of helpful information!..sometimes I get lost in the deepness of the content, but as usual, Forrest, you brought it all home in the recap! You have such a gift that way! Thank you.
The insight about comfort vs. safety is a good one. It’s especially common nowadays to appeal to safety when really it’s about comfort. I’ve tried to explain this to a therapist before and it just comes off as “I’m selfish.” Because honestly, it oftentimes is selfish. But this explains it a bit better.
Pnes is related to trauma, especially cptsd. It's how the body releases tension from all the stored and incomplete fight/flight responses in the nervous system. It can be scary, but it's a productive thing.
Hey, not blind, we did an episode on self-abandonment that felt thematically similar enough to me that I counted it 😅😂 We've gotten enough requests for a full fawn response/people pleasing episode that we'll likely do it in the near future.
@@ForrestHanson Thank you, Forrest! A full episode would be so fantastic. I'll go and watch that one now though! I'm very grateful for your channel, I only recently found it this past week and it has been helping open me up to the possibility of a future where I have a healthier mind. I actually procrastinate house chores a lot because I need my mind to be stimulated while doing something menial, so listening to these has helped in more ways than one. Dishes are getting done!! These subjects are fantastic and I really love the long-form episodes, I feel like I can settle more into the conversation knowing that it will go on for a little while. I wish I could have my own Elizabeth here in England, I feel like she's the therapist I need for my C-PTSD but don't have access to due to distance. :'D
@@jl3268 I feel that... from the age of 6-7 I've had to fawn around attackers to keep myself alive and untouched. I had to do the same with my parents to avoid the same thing. I'm wondering what another way of responding would even feel like.
@@ForrestHanson Yes please Forrest. While people-pleasing is not my coping mechanism, it seems to be the go-to method of someone i love. Therefore i need to understand it
Dad’s opening comment made me tear up. i’m 44 and for the last 20 years ( first panic attack in 2004) also alcohol abuse from 2001 -2010 I have been stuck in a state of withdrawal, fear, avoidance and then the narrative of beating myself up over it. In the last 6 months I got a therapist to try and better my life in this regard but I really get hung up on time lost and beating myself up for being this way for so long. I’m pretty sure I have been living in flight mode to some degree for a long while and it’s not easy to break from that since I have pretty much just accepted that as who I am.
It's also good for all of us in "the pink zone" to acknowledge that many, not just a few, folks around us (unless we actively avoid them) are actually in a red zone. Living paycheck to paycheck, their shelter dependent on the whims of roommates and landlords, their health too costly or complicated to fully attend. The pink zone is a privilege, not a rule. Not even close. For us "pinkies", challenging comfort by sharing at least excess, if not daily needs, really loosens up that liminal mental space. 🤗😌🤗💖🙏💪
You guys are wise as heck! For me, these Freeze Flight Fawn discussions are an effective handle on the mechanics of insecure attachment sty,es. Thanks.
There's something missing in our comparison of running from tigers and running from emotions. A physical threat is easily objectifiable while an emotional one is not. The outcome of physical injury is also easy to predict - emotional/mental has a much wider potential. In other words, the outside pretty black and white, the inside immeasurable shades of gray. Some people I know like to say your your feelings and emotions won't kill you, but I disagree. "Everything exists on the tip of a wish" (thought). What happens internally has far deeper and wider consequences than does the external. Mental death does exist. We see it every day. So while one's anxiety over making an apology to a friend or boss might look overinflated, the possibility of abandonment is quite real. At least physical death is simple; being stripped of inclusion is a bigger torture and has no finish line to focus on. The best I can come up with for today is the sensitivities I carry are not all my own (most if not all are passed down cellularly due to unresolved family and generational issues) AND if I can reinstate human spirituality, I see that these sensitivities are not burdens as some refer to them, but blessings. They are opportunities to clear up not just my misapprehensions of what it means to exist, but my entire lineage to some degree. These painful or at least awkward symptoms in life are red flags to show me what needs attending; what's important. And when one is not capable of attending to themselves, like when drowning, community does not suggest one learns how to swim, but reaches in and pulls us out with gentle and compassionate hands, because any of us could wind up in the same predicament by different circumstances. Thanks for breakfast again! T
I love all of your episodes, but this one in particular really resonated with me and gave me a new perspective on my own anxieties and behaviors. Thank you!
I have listened to this three times and gleaned new insights each time. But I suffer from random panic attacks and cannot discern how to stop them from occurring out of the blue. I will try to put into practice some of your ideas. Thank you so much for your probing examination of anxiety here.
I have been listening to many of your videos since March and I have to say, there are pieces of wisdom within these conversations between you and your dad that are incredibly insightful and articulated in ways not normally said on typical podcasts. Perhaps it's the gentle and authentic father/son dynamic that makes these conversations more engaging. Either way, they have really helped me with reframing the way I view the world around me and break free from states of mind that were created due to my upbringing and conditioning from life experiences thus far. Amazing work 😊
Hey @Forrest I've generally thought I'm a "freezer" but listening to this episode I'm leaning more to a "flighter" (flyer). You mentioned on the episode something about freeze being a primitive flight response, if I heard that correctly. My question is: what is the difference between flight and freeze response? And, probably the more important question, are there substantially different ways to address each?
I think for freezing situations the answer is to get to the point of actually deciding what to do vs in flying situations it‘s more to reflect if flying is necessary or just comforting. You can be both in different situations, all of us have all 4 modes programmed theoretically
Here's the situation. I'm at home and have nothing scheduled. I feel like or theoretically want to say do a productive task like clean my place. For whatever reason, I'm not able to make myself do it, either coming up with excuses or doing behaviours like phone scrolling, watch TV etc. etc. Is this flight or freeze?
@@gfyourself688 It‘s a freeze response. Flight would for example be something like going out aimlessly to not needing to be home. If your situation is very bad I would ask a doctor if it‘s maybe even a dissociative disorder… dissociation is a more extreme version of the freeze response, and gets only used by the brain if fight, flight, freeze and fawn all failed to keep you safe (in the past).
I've listened to this one and the freeze response episode. I really love the feeling of peace, compassion and encouragement you guys bring to these issues. I feel in myself and i see around me a lot of shame and rejection of these stress responses as animal behaviours that are subhuman. I know a lot of people who feel they should be above these responses and i feel you guys bring the dialog to a much more honest and humble place. And from that place i feel there is a lot of possibility to take positive action and actually make significant changes. Thank you again for another great episode.
Thank you Forrest and Dr Rick. You really laid anxiety out so it’s very visible in a functional way. I have already used the information in my sessions with my psychologist to get in, around and underneath some issues I’ve been struggling with. Very appreciative 🙏
Such a helpful talk, which took some time for me to watch as I could feel a good amount of inner resistance! I grew up being systematically being mocked for being afraid and for failing when trying to do something, procrastination and avoidance have become my strategies of choice and on the long term it has become a real handicap. Among the other videos I've watched about the topic, most approach it with an emphasis on how harmful avoidance is but offer little advice other than just not to engage in it, "feel the fear and do it anyway" style, which often lead to this sudden jump in the deep end that you described. Your in-depth and compassionate exploration of the topic was really an eye opener for me, I can finally see how I can deal with it in a sustainable way. Thank you!
Great dad and son, love this show. Both my parents were young narcissists with addictions who neglected and abandoned their children and ruined the siblings relationships with triangulation and gaslighting. I'm exploited to this day and finally seeing a light at the end of the tunnel.
Do you have the sense of being strong, enduring, and possess the grit and calm to deal with the perceived threat? A meaningful question when feeling the impulse to flee….
Autistic and stuck in self-sabotage when it comes to social interaction. I don't think I can escape it, and it's better for me to be as antisocial as possible so as to not bother others.
As a fellow autistic, I feel you. But chances are your friends miss you, they worry about you, you are not a bother but instead a gift to be around. I'm stuck in a similar cycle (but a little to the left) and fighting to break it. There are people who will love you for who you are, not the curated version that you've created to not be a bother. It will get better!
When my flight kicks in and very bad anxiety comes up in me, i am trying to avoid the realization that the situation is hopeless, that it is bad, worse than i thought it was and there is in fact no way out. I had never realized that this is what was at play in me. I know where it comes from: my abusive mother always made sure i knew that there was no hope and no way out of the abuse and that if i tried to fix it or fight for myself or siblings, i would as a result end up in an even worse situation, that would torture and then kill me. But now i know this, what do i do?
That fear of things that go bump in the night can definitely be the residual effect of a diminished or rejected part. In the heat of the moment, and this takes practice to arrive at, doing something that challenges the lack of self worth or the victim label, can help. Reaching out to someone we know who is already struggling. Doing something, even at 3am like writing a letter, baking muffins or fixing a fresh batch of spaghetti - for the benefit of another - can take our minds off ourselves. Even creating a song list for a person that expresses how we feel about them. It's a challenge at first to even remember there's another way. Whenever I happen upon a new relationship with a more learned human that I, my question is "How do we create the want to want to change?". Robina Courtin, a Buddhist nun, has responded to that and other enquiries with, "Practice". It's a bummer but true. Everything exists on the tip of a wish.
