Feeling Stuck? How to Regulate Your Nervous System to Feel Safe in Your Body

Days blend into each other, your energy flat, your mind restless, and a quiet frustration settles in, a sense that you feel lost in life, should be further along, doing more, being more, but something invisible keeps holding you back. You long for a sense of feeling safe in your own body and mind, yet it feels just out of reach.

It’s exhausting and lonely, and yet, at the same time, it feels impossible to put into words other than you feel stuck, rigid or burnt out. In other words, a dysregulated nervous system is not in flow.

You feel it in your chest, in the tension lingering in your shoulders. Your body remembers what your mind forgets, carrying traces of stress and unease long after the moments have passed. This is how your nervous system communicates.

Paying attention to these subtle signals is the first step in learning how to regulate your nervous system, helping you ease the patterns that keep you stuck and move through life with more calm, clarity, and ease.

The goal is to be able to feel what you are experiencing without needing to surface-level "fix" it. This is capacity – to hold and stay connected with the discomfort without collapsing.

What is Nervous System Regulation

The nervous system is never still, always sensing, constantly scanning for safety, adjusting, and responding to your environment. It's signals what it needs to respond to life. It is our body’s internal guide, carrying the history of every experience, every stress, and every moment of safety, shaping how we move, feel, and react in the world. When it feels threatened, overwhelmed, or activated—even subconsciously—it reacts automatically, usually without your awareness, shaping our emotions.

For those intellectuals here ready to tackle their nervous system head-on, I have one thing to say: slow down—it doesn’t work that way. For this, we need to step out of our heads and into our bodies.

I know this can be uncomfortable or even foreign to some of you, but simply noticing what is happening inside you; your tension, your breath, the subtle shifts in energy, is the doorway to nervous system regulation and the first step toward feeling safe in your own body.

Trust the process.

Awareness alone, without trying to fix or control anything, is the first step toward somatic regulation of your nervous system, with ‘somatic’ referring to a body-based approach.

Awareness is the language, but listening and responding in ways that restore energy and balance is what moves you into somatic regulation.

Regulating your nervous system is not about control or forcing anything to happen. It is about noticing your body’s signals, giving yourself space, and gradually teaching your body that it can settle, respond, and recover, with steadiness.

Nervous system regulation is essentially the process of helping your body return to a state of balance and calm after stress or activation, through subtle sensations, small shifts in posture, breath, and the gentle noticing of what is alive in the body.

Even small awareness of these signals is enough to start, and every pause matters.

How to Repair Your Autonomic Nervous System

Tiny shifts in your body can arrive without warning, including your heart beat, digestion, body temperature and subtle sensations you might barely notice at first. This automatic orchestration is managed by your autonomic nervous system, which quietly balances two forces: the sympathetic system, which gears you up to respond to stress and survival, and the parasympathetic system, which helps you rest, recover, and restore.

Your Autonomic Nervous System (ANS) is your body on autopilot, working behind the scenes without your conscious awareness. Its primary objective is to keep you feeling safe.

Depending on what it senses, your nervous system can shift into different states; sometimes mobilized, ready for action in fight-or-flight, and other times immobilized, slowing down into rest, recovery, or freeze (shut down).

These states aren’t “wrong” or broken. They’re your body’s way of responding to protect you. Understanding them is the first step toward learning how to guide yourself back to balance and feeling safe.

Energy vs Capacity

Energy is the “fuel” your system has, and capacity is how much it can handle effectively.

The more flexible your nervous system is in shifting smoothly between states, the more resilient your energy becomes and the greater your capacity to stay present and grounded.

I hope that as you learn to repair your autonomic nervous system, this knowledge deepens your self-compassion and guides you toward healing the parts of you that need attention, restoring your energy and capacity.

The Sympathetic Nervous System

Even small stressors; a tense conversation, a sudden deadline, or an unexpected task, can tip the balance. Your sympathetic (activated) system sends your body into alert: heart rate rises, muscles tighten, and stress chemicals circulate, preparing you to act even if there’s no immediate physical danger.

The Parasympathetic Nervous System

The parasympathetic (recovery) system is what brings you back down. It slows your heart, supports digestion, and restores energy. When these systems are out of balance, even ordinary moments can feel exhausting, sharp, or overwhelming.

Stuck In States of Survival

If your body has been wired to link achieving success and growth with doing more, pushing harder, or trying to control everything, stepping into an embodied life and living authentically can feel unfamiliar. Even though your mind knows it feels safe, your body may still sense it as risky, and your inner critic can make it feel even harder to step into ease.

That’s why you can feel stuck in survival, and that’s okay.

Your nervous system is simply learning a new way to move, one that doesn’t rely on force or struggle.

Even myself, as a life coach, I have to remind myself often to pause, notice my body, and tune into softening instead of pushing harder or "chasing" my goals. In fact, this tiny nervous regulation technique may seem almost too simple, but it doesn’t cost a cent and saves you a lot of heartache and stress.

Dysregulated Nervous System:

Emotions and Triggers

For most of us, it’s easy to think of a time when something small tipped us over the edge. A comment, an unexpected message, or a sudden rush of responsibility. Maybe you reacted poorly or abrasively and later felt regret, wondering, “Why do I do this?”

You don’t want to react this way. You know you shouldn’t. But your reflex outweighs the pause you know you should have taken to speak differently or simply stay present. That’s your nervous system reacting, not you failing — a sign of a dysregulated nervous system.

Why Triggers Happen

When we feel unsafe, our need for protection kicks in, getting triggered and turning emotional regulation on its head. This is the amygdala, the brain’s threat detector, stepping in and overriding the prefrontal cortex, the part responsible for logic and empathy, before it has time to engage. The triggered reaction is about protection, not connection. Safety collapses, the emotional impact lingers, and the disconnection deepens.

Common triggers include:

• A tense conversation

• An unexpected message or email

• Sudden deadlines or responsibilities

Every time survival mode wins, connection loses. The fight response can show up as hypervigilance, defensiveness, or impulsive reactions, often linked to old wounds or trauma, sometimes rooted in early childhood experiences.

Fight, Flight, Shut Down (Freeze), Fawn

Your nervous system reacts automatically to protect you. Whether it’s mobilizing for action (fight/flight) or slowing down into freeze (shutdown), these responses are not wrong—they are your body’s way of keeping you safe. Understanding them is the first step toward learning how to guide yourself back to balance and feeling safe in your body.

The Role of Neuroplasticity

Here’s the good news: with neuroplasticity, your nervous system can rewire with regulation, repair, and repetition. Each time you pause before reacting, notice your body, or practice somatic techniques, you strengthen your window of tolerance—your capacity to experience intensity without being overwhelmed.

Over time, the brain learns, “I can experience intensity and still stay connected.” Connected to yourself, and to your partner, co-worker, family member, or friend.

Emotions as Your Guide, Not Your Enemy

You don’t have to master your emotions to regulate your nervous system. Spoiler alert, nobody actually does. All you need is a tiny moment to notice what’s happening in your body before it blows up, enough to hit the “pause button” on the chaos.

Regulation isn’t about control, it’s about noticing, breathing, and showing up for yourself, and practicing acceptance of what is.  Every little pause stacks up over time, like tiny wins you didn’t even have to try for.

Holding onto emotions comes at a cost to your body and your relationships, and even your self-esteem. Ignoring or silencing them doesn’t make them disappear. That temporary calm only delays the impact, and emotions can resurface later or get stored in the body.

Because of this, most people, including myself, tend to live in sympathetic dominance, meaning we default into a chronically activated state.

Feeling Safe Within

Years ago, I stumbled upon a surprisingly simple and effective tool that helps me reset when I am experiencing anxiety whereby I can't take a full breath: yawning. It’s a natural way to release tension with a dysregulated nervous system, signaling to the brain that it’s feels safe to soften, opening up space for a fuller, easier breath.

Over time, by integrating practices that work for you, learning how to regulate your nervous system strengthens your ability to move through life without being hijacked by automatic responses. This internal sense of safety becomes your home, your peace and your place of comfort over time.

Feeling safe in your body comes from releasing the stuck energy your nervous system has held onto. Feeling safe isn’t just something you create for yourself. It’s also about being with others who feel safe to hold space for you.

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Learning How to Regulate Your Nervous System

Chronic stress or trauma, can keep us stuck in survival mode. Many of us adopt adaptive strategies like food, work, alcohol, drugs, hobbies, or sex, that provide temporary relief but don’t address the underlying tension.

Over time, these habits can become a source of frustration or conflict themselves, even though they started simply as ways to cope. I see it all the time in my coaching practice.

This is where learning how to regulate your nervous system through somatic regulation becomes your anchor for personal growth, showing up even when it’s uncomfortable.

Here's how to start feeling safe in your body:

Begin by taking a pause whenever you can. That’s often the hardest part, remembering to do it. Pause before you want to react emotionally, noticing any discomfort that arises; clenched fists, a tight chest, or a racing heartbeat. Feeling where this emotion or sensation lives in your body is the awareness you are looking for. From there, stay with yourself a little longer, then gently shift your attention to something else. Create space for the emotion to dissipate, allowing your nervous system to be felt without needing to fix or escape it.

Nervous System Regulation Techniques

I’ve selected five key practices to help regulate your nervous system, and each one of these integrations brings together several different techniques you can experiment with. Think of this as your integration toolbox. The goal is to start exploring experiential practices, notice what feels good for you, and create a feeling of safety so you can heal.

Mindfulness Practices

Mindfulness is noticing what is happening inside and around you without judgment. Mindfulness gives your nervous system a pause and helps you step out of automatic reactions.

Nervous System Regulation Techniques

• Body scanning (noticing tension areas)

• Pausing and labeling emotions (“I feel X in my body”)

• Mindful walking (notice your surroundings)

• Visualization of a place that feels safe or a comforting image

Somatic Practices

Somatic (from the Greek word sōma, meaning “body.”) practices are body-centered therapies that help release stored traumas and tension. Somatic breathing and other somatic exercises for nervous system regulation guides feeling your body's sensations as a way through stress rather than trying to force calm.

Nervous System Regulation Techniques

• Deep diaphragmatic breathing

• Progressive muscle relaxation

• Shaking or tremoring to release tension

• Gentle rocking or swaying

Movement-Based Practices

Movement reminds your nervous system it is safe to act and release. Gentle intuitive movements softens muscles and restores rhythm to your body, helping to regulate a dysregulated nervous system.

Nervous System Regulation Techniques

• Gentle stretching

• Stretch-and-release yoga movements

• Yoga sequences that focus on fluid motion

• Walking with intentional awareness of movement and posture

Physiological Techniques

Vagus nerve activation stimulates the vagus nerve, which runs from the brain through the body and helps regulate heart rate, digestion, and stress responses. These techniques engage this nerve, supporting calm and nervous system regulation.

Nervous System Regulation Techniques

• Yawning intentionally

• Prioritize healthy sleep habits

• Humming, chanting, or singing

• Alternate nostril breathing

• Box breathing (inhale-hold-exhale-hold)

• Slow, intentional exhalations (longer than inhalations)

• Cold exposure (face splash or shower)

Grounding Practices

Grounding practices such as sensory awareness and deep pressure stimulation are simple yet settles your nervous system and cultivates presence.

Nervous System Regulation Techniques

• Co-regulation (connecting with a calm person)

• Grounding with bare feet on the floor/grass

• Self-hug or applying gentle pressure to the body

• Sensory focus (touching textures, smelling scents)

Closing Thought

Imagine a storm rolling in. You can’t stop the rain, no matter how hard you try, but you can find shelter and wait for it to ease. This is how emotions and stress work in your body. You can’t control the surge, but you can create space to ride it out safely.

Once you notice the storm, it becomes your responsibility and an act of personal accountability to take the steps needed to navigate it, because staying stuck in survival patterns only prolongs the chaos.

Book Your Free Call

It takes immense courage to acknowledge the areas where we need support. If you are ready to unravel the layers of limiting beliefs and unhelpful patterns that are keeping you stuck in dysregulation. I invite you to apply for a free discovery call. Let’s explore what’s possible together.

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