Hello, happy Friday. I was literally just talking to the screen. I didn't hit start, so I was talking to myself for a while and wondering where -- what I was doing here and why the red wasn't popping up. But it's Friday, so here we are. And I know that I've been loving this weather in Minneapolis. It's been quite the shift in tone, more fall-esque vibes, so hey, Jacqueline or Jocelyn, I apologize if I'm saying that incorrectly. But nice to see you on here. Hope you're enjoying your September. I know that I have really been embracing the transition into fall.
I know we still have like, I think it's like the 22nd or something that summer still is actually going, but nonetheless. Here we are, September. And I love this month's topic. Safety! Hey, Andy Mack. I love seeing you on here every week. Love it. Safety. Particularly in our bodies. That's how I want to start off today or at least start off the month since we have a lot of great topics to dive into, really. I 'm curious if either one of you or if you're watching this later, if there's like a way you know that you're not safe in your body or a sensation that you get when you just feel like something's off, you feel unsettled and it causes you to take a step back.
Curious if there is anything that speaks to you. I know for myself, hey, hey, Andy Mack, I know for myself when I am feeling off or all of a sudden I'll get this like bolt of this like blood of like, I can't really describe the sensation aside from my heart rate starts to go up and my thoughts start to erase a little bit. I am always very in tune to my, what's up, Nikki? Ooh, tight chest. Yeah, perfect. That's a great example, Andy Mack. Thank you for saying that. Yeah, my heart, I feel it in my heart, like the buzz.
I feel just a little like, and that's actually really good that our body is telling us that it's our body's survival mechanism telling us that we are possibly threatened. Now, we live in a relatively like, we're not living like we did 2000 years ago, right? Like, heaven forbid, we all have shelter. Thank God we do, right? And so we're not always like looking out for active threat. But part of our brain is still stuck in like that kind of like reptilian portion. And so it's always kind of scanning.
And I've learned through my life and through my trauma work that I, it's in my best responsibility to retrain my brain and to calm my nervous system down. And so I'd love to share with you kind of some steps and a little bit of my journey on how to get there. So, you know, as I dove into really working with my body, because I was unaware that I was constantly in sympathetic fight, flight, just overdrive with my nervous system, because I didn't feel safe in my body. I grew up with a lot of different caregivers tossing around a lot.
And I never got to really hang out with kids much. I also except for like a school of course. And just all sorts of other different things where I just didn't feel I was always doing something and I couldn't sit still so much so that I didn't do well in school initially. And of course I got diagnosed with ADHD and all that. But a lot of that I've learned is that I, my nervous system was just unregulated. And I didn't feel safe in my body. I didn't love my body at the time. I was just racing to try to get out of whatever was uncomfortable all the time.
And at the more that I dove into it, the more I practiced relaxation practices, the more I did meditation, the more therapy and coaching that I did with some amazing mentors and some amazing professionals. You can never go wrong with that. The more I realized that I have to notice these sensations. So step one to become being more safe in your body is to notice your sensations. Part of that is orienting yourself to the room. So you feel safe enough to kind of go in and look, right? Sometimes it's very hard to close our eyes and go inward and notice like, wow, what is this tingling in my hip?
Like, or there's this like fluttering or this tightness or the this temperature that's arising all of a sudden, all of that stuff is is coming up to be released. Because in the past, we couldn't let it go or couldn't handle it. And noticing it is and letting it go is is really hard. It is so hard. And it's like always a practice. You always have to be doing it. So it 's very frustrating. But noticing is is the first step. I like to take a deep breath when I notice I was like, okay, what's going on in here now?
And just taking a deep breath is definitely going to immediately help. Shaking a deep breath will also lead you to relaxing . So there's that the saying the psychological sigh where you just and just like truly let it go and truly just like make that weird audible noise and like unclench your jaw. I know that I sometimes will shake it out. Hey, speak wonder. Is there any other things that you guys do to just like when you notice your like tight and tense or feeling a little on edge? Like, what do you do to to kind of soften or melt your body?
Mine is mine is taking a deep breath right away. The other thing is I will also try to relax my pelvic floor, like my hip musculature. If I'm like holding in tight and tense in, there's this muscle called the psoas in your body that connects your hips, your hip flexors and your lumb ar spine. It's like the deepest one in there. They call it the muscle of the soul fun fact. And I 'll notice that like my hip musculature is super tight when I don't feel right, right? Like we're all just, you know, and not because I'm trying to put on a skinny pair of jeans.
No, no, because I 'm just like living and feeling uncomfortable because something's happening in front of me. And now I feel like I might need to cross the street or I might need to get go a little faster to my car. What have you? Either way, I try to breathe, relax, and go go through that that moment. Relax ation is the antidote to resistance. When you are relaxed, you can be clearer, you can be calmer, and you allow yourself to grow into a deeper possibility because you're coming from a clearer space.
After we've relaxed a little bit, even though I would argue it's always a work in progress, the final thing I like to do is to affirm. I am safe right now. It is safe to be me. I feel safe in my body. My body protects me. I am protected. I am safe. Whatever it might be, whatever you need to affirm, we're going to say the same thing. Like, I am safe . I am safe. I feel safe. I am in safety, whatever you need to say. Affirming will help, you know, create those new neural pathways, and retrain our brains and nervous system to calm down.
As a yogi, I know I shared the chakras in the codersphere a few days ago, and I came across it, and I was just like, "Yes, that is when I realized getting into my energy and noticing my tight chest, noticing my hips get all tense and tough, and my shoulders coming up. It is this like, our breath moves our energy. It calms our energy, so it helps us clear it out. I have found such a great success with that. I hope you find great success with that. If there's something else you do that helps you feel safer in your body, please share in the chat.
I would love to hear it. I do want to just recap that. To feel safe in your body, it's great to notice. Notice inward you can close your eyes if you feel safe to do so, right? Sometimes they're out in the world and we feel unsafe, and that's a little bit different. That's next week or the week after. It's coming. So notice what's happening inside. You can orient your body to whatever room you're in. Second is to relax. Soften. Melt your muscles. Let go of your jaw, shoulders, your lower back. You can even hang out in a forward fold and just like, truly let yourself go.
I sometimes will just lay in a big star on the ground in this posture of surrender to just really feel held by the earth, our home, our second home. I would say our body is our first, second earth. Finally, a firm. I'm safe and I hope you are safe. And safety is such a gift and it is not always given. And feeling gratitude for our safety that we're blessed to live in a place where we're safe because that is not the case in this world that we live in. And so, let's honor that and honor the people that aren't feeling safe by cherishing that we do have this and when we feel safe, we can send out those good vibrations so that they feel safe.
And so I know I took a yogi path today, but safety really in the body is this energetic thing and this physical and mental and emotional thing. It's all encompassing. And so, if you can, try to notice, relax and affirm. Set yourself free and be safe in yourself in who you truly are. So, that's what I have for you today. Thank you so much all for hopping on here . Good to see you, Andy Mack. Good to see you, Nikki, Speak Wonder, Jocelyn. I appreciate you, share any other tricks that you guys do to feel safe in your body.
Otherwise, take this to practice this weekend and let me know how it goes. I would love to hear it, but I will exit with the safety dance. You know, I'm just kidding. I can't do the safety dance, but I might go listen to it because it's a very, very on topic, very on point. So, hope you all have a great rest of your day and your weekend. And so good to see you! Bye!
