Over the years, Grandmaster William C. C. Chen has never stopped developing. There is a remark of his that I heard him make somewhere in the 1990s and will not easily forget: “After 50 years of practicing Tai Chi, I discovered something.” He would then share this discovery, and we would spend the entire day exploring it in our training, trying to find or apply it ourselves. It is the hallmark of a true master: always remaining a student.

William Chen was always a very practically oriented Tai Chi teacher, with a strong focus on martial applications and boxing. The subject of health was not something he emphasized greatly—that began to change around 2012 and beyond. In 2015 he wrote the article below, which he gave me permission to translate, with assistance from my teacher, Master Laura Stone.

The translated article appeared in TQT Magazine, which no longer exists. I felt it was worth making it available to the public once more. Voilà:

Tai Chi Practice and the Prevention of Heart Disease

The most important steps in preventing heart disease are movement, together with healthy nutrition, healthy sleep, and healthy thinking. Exercise helps to relax the muscles of the rib cage and give the organs sufficient room to function.

Improving the lubrication and oxygenation of the organs is one of the fundamental ways to remove bacteria, viruses, and toxins and contributes to the better functioning and health of all organs—especially to the vitality of the heart.

There is nothing magical about the positive effects of the magical art of Tai Chi practice on heart disease. It is simply a matter of relaxing the muscles of the rib cage while the arms float upward and the elbows move slightly outward to keep the armpits open, thereby increasing the volume of the torso. This helps the organs to function effectively through the enlarged space in the chest cavity. At the same time, deep breathing provides sufficient oxygen to the blood and removes carbon dioxide from the body, allowing us to live long and in good health. This is the primary purpose of the slow tempo of the movements.

Synchronizing the soft, slow movements with deep diaphragmatic breathing is one of the best ways to prevent heart disease. Exhaling calms the nerves and relieves muscular tension. When the muscles of the rib cage are relaxed, the arms float upward and the armpits open slightly. The result is an increase in the volume of the torso, giving the organs more room to function optimally.

Deep diaphragmatic breathing brings more oxygen into the lungs than ordinary breathing. More oxygen-rich blood from the heart stimulates the functioning of the immune system, making it easier for the body to detoxify. We aim to keep the heart functioning well.

The heart is the hub of the organs, pumping oxygen-rich blood (氣血) throughout the body. All major aspects of fitness, health, and life itself depend on the functioning of the heart. The organs depend on the heart for their proper functioning. Every organ, tissue, and cell in the body depends on the blood pumped by the heart for optimal performance.

Although emotional stress is a natural part of life, the excessive and persistent worry, anxiety, and despondency that accompany stress are highly damaging. Stress causes the muscles of the rib cage to contract. The diaphragm rises and the arms fall against the rib cage. This reduces the volume of the torso, impairing blood flow to the organs and potentially overburdening the heart.

A poorly functioning heart pumps less oxygen and nutrients to the organs and removes fewer waste products, toxins, and carbon dioxide from the body. This inevitably leads to tissue poisoning and organ failure, resulting in a number of heart-threatening conditions.

Heart disease is the leading cause of death in the United States, with nearly 2,000 deaths per day. Each year, approximately 720,000 Americans suffer a heart attack—515,000 of them for the first time, and 205,000 having had a previous heart attack. A major cause of heart disease is excessive strain on the organs. Lack of space and poor circulation of the heart gives rise to disease.

The importance of exercise in preventing heart disease has been repeatedly demonstrated by experts in the field. The CDC Division for Heart Disease and Stroke Prevention (DHDSP), for example, states in its summary of risk factors and recommendations that adults are advised to engage in two and a half hours of physical activity per week.

The Ohio State University Medical Center lists fitness as a means of preventing heart disease. Exercise is nature’s medicine—more powerful than any pharmaceutical in restoring and rejuvenating the human heart and organs.

Daily movement is essential for the heart. Researchers have concluded that exercise is a superior method for keeping our hearts healthy, noting that regular gentle movement is better than short, intense, and more strenuous workouts. Exercise helps to loosen overtaxed muscles throughout the body, allowing everything to function more smoothly and efficiently.

The slow-motion practice of Tai Chi Chuan is strongly recommended by physicians. The slow movements calm the nervous system and relieve excessive preoccupation with worry, anxiety, and despondency. The muscles of the rib cage relax and the volume of the torso increases, creating more space and improving organ function.

Enlarging the space of the torso allows the lungs to function better by enabling a full inhalation and exhalation. At the same time, the toes press into the ground and the fingers push against the resistance of the air, generating a powerful flow of energy through the body. This creates a dynamic jetstream wave effect within the torso, capable of flushing out organ impurities. This is comparable to the water jets in a dishwasher, which rinse the dirt from the dishes and leave them clean and ready to be used again.

The same principle applies to the brain cells. Dr. Maiken Nedergaard, a leading neuroscientist, explains in “The Power of Sleep” (Alice Park, Time Magazine, November 9, 2014) how changes in brain cells during sleep create greater opportunity for cerebrospinal fluid to flow. “It is like a dishwasher rinsing away the dirt,” she writes.

The Tai Chi movements support the return of blood from the legs to the heart. When we take a slow step and place the foot down softly so that the calf muscles remain relaxed, blood can pool in the lower leg. As we gradually shift our weight from heel to toe and press the toes into the ground, the calf muscle pumps the blood upward toward the heart, increasing blood supply to the heart.

This supporting action of the calf muscle in pumping blood toward the heart is important for us. Research shows that “it takes only one heartbeat to pump blood from the heart to the lower legs, but several strong heartbeats to pump it back up to the heart.”

The mechanism of stepping and releasing in Tai Chi Chuan is critically important for the return of blood to the heart while simultaneously improving circulation in the legs. This calf muscle pump is sometimes called the second heart of the body.

Physicians advise airline passengers to stand up and walk around regularly during long flights. It stimulates circulation in the legs but also promotes healthier circulation of the organs in the torso. The cramped seats of modern commercial airlines force the arms against the rib cage, limiting the volume of the torso and compressing the organs together. This prevents the heart from functioning normally.

Good health depends on the organs of the body. When the organs are healthy and strong, ailments and diseases will occur less frequently. We should not allow stress to reduce the volume of the torso, restricting organ function and impairing the heart.

Stress is not always harmful. We sometimes need tension to stimulate us. Positive stress brims with life energy. Many martial artists, athletes, and performers know how to channel stress into high-energy performance. Properly directed stress can truly work in our favor. The ambition to succeed is the feeling of our conscious heart that provides the energy to realize our aspirations.

Negative states of fear, worry, and despondency, on the other hand, are the cause of muscular tension. The muscles of the rib cage contract and pull the diaphragm upward, while the upper arms simultaneously fall against the rib cage. The space available for the organs in the torso diminishes, circulation deteriorates, and hazardous conditions develop that can result in serious heart disease.

Mother Nature has bestowed upon us a metabolic process capable of renewing the organs of the body. Our torso is like the interior of a dishwasher, and the organs are like reusable plates. We must cleanse the organs as frequently as possible, even before toxins begin to accumulate. Regularly cleansing the organs to keep them in optimal condition is our priority.

Happy people are healthier and live longer than unhappy people. When we are happy, the muscles of the rib cage relax. When we are sad, worried, or unhappy, the muscles of the rib cage contract. The limited space in the torso makes it harder for the organs to function.

The muscle-free movements of Tai Chi Chuan arise from releasing and activating the flow of energy, generating a powerful energetic wave through the body while the muscles—particularly those surrounding the arteries—remain relaxed, producing vasodilation. This creates a constant flow of nutrients and oxygen-rich blood throughout the entire vascular system. This powerful internal energy flow extends far beyond organ cleansing; it helps to purify everything in the body.

Relaxing the rib muscles is the best care we can offer our organs, as it enables them to increase the volume of the torso. This promotes the cleansing of the organs so that they can perform their work effectively and helps to keep the heart vital and in peak condition.

The concept of heart disease prevention has its origins in an insight from my teacher, the world-renowned Grandmaster Professor Cheng Man-Ching, who observed, “The organs of cats and dogs are healthier than those of humans, because their organs hang freely in the body as they move about. This helps to lubricate and oxygenate the organs to keep them healthy, in contrast to the unhealthy human organs that often jostle against each other in the body.”

The information I have gathered and researched through my daily practice with students over the past sixty years leads me to this positive conviction: cleansing the organs is the foundation of staying healthy. The analogy of “organ cleansing as a dishwasher” is one I have carried with me for many years.

This article is part of my lifelong dedication to Tai Chi practitioners. The inner practice of Tai Chi Chuan is like cleansing the body from within. Regularly cleansing the organs, cells, arteries, veins, and tissues of the body is of vital importance to the health of the heart. Cleansing through Tai Chi movements can also help to prevent kidney and liver disease, as well as cancer. It is undeniably helpful in reducing other ailments, diseases, and stress.

Daily practice of Tai Chi Chuan, with heart and mind attuned to feeling the flow of energy pulsing through the body, will keep the doctors at bay. Consistent daily practice of these slow movements is particularly helpful in reducing the burden on hospital staff and physicians.

Dutch article: Tai Chi en het voorkomen van hartaandoeningen

4.73MB ∙ PDF file

Download

Download

Colofon:

Written by Yang Style T’ai Chi Ch’uan Grandmaster William C. C. Chen. Original publication: Spring 2015, International Magazine of Tai Chi Chuan, Vol. 39, No. 1. Translation: Ronald de Caluwé, with assistance from Laura Stone. Previously published in TQT Magazine, Vol. 3, No. 10, June 2015.

If you found this article worth reading and (not yet) feel like getting a paid subscription, you can always treat me to a cappuccino!

OK, I'll buy you a cappuccino!

In the final session of a mindfulness or compassion training, there is always attention for what comes next. Because once you’re on your own after eight weeks of intensive practice, choices have to be made. Recently I wrote about how you might continue after your training. This piece is about a very common stumbling block in meditation.

When practice stalls

Eventually every practitioner encounters it: meditation quietly slips into the background for a while. A busy period at work, worries at home, a trip away—there are plenty of reasons why practice falls by the wayside. Or perhaps simply a break after all those weeks of training.

For me, the practice dip very often falls in the holiday season. And that’s where I learned an important lesson.

Good intentions

When I first felt, years ago, that meditation was truly something for me—that I was benefiting from it and that it had found a permanent place in my life—I wanted to hold onto that feeling at all costs. So I resolved to take my meditation cushion on holiday. So I wouldn’t lose ‘the feeling.’

At that time we went every year to the island of Ameland in our old caravan. A wonderful island, with plenty of time to read and meditate. The cushion was the first thing packed when we loaded the caravan.

Three weeks later, when we got home, it was the last thing to come back out.

Lost everything?

It had been an incredible holiday, as it almost always is on the Wadden Islands. Wonderfully relaxed, books read, hours enjoyed on the beach and at various terraces and beach pavilions. But meditate? Not once.

Despite the lovely holiday, I felt genuinely disappointed. A familiar inner voice made itself heard: now I’ve lost everything, I’ll have to start from scratch; it was all for nothing.

I heard similar things from former participants I spoke with afterward: once the motivation is gone, there’s no point anymore. Too late. You might as well stop. And then comes the self-criticism: Useless. You can’t even keep that up.

When I recognized that in myself, I finally understood just how powerful that mechanism is.

But wait a moment…

Because—what is meditation actually about? What is the essence that all those famous teachers whose books I had studied keep pointing to?

Is meditation really an achievement you build up and can then lose again? Do past results guarantee future ones?

No—meditation is precisely about sitting down each time as if it were the first time. That is precisely the beginner’s mind we want to cultivate. When that truly landed for me, I realized nothing had been lost, and a weight lifted from my shoulders.

What do you actually lose when your practice stalls for a while? And is there a better option than simply starting again, picking up where you left off? No—more than that: it was always the only option you ever had: just begin again.

Make music

If you haven’t played the piano for a while—a metaphor I like to use, and one I’ll work out fully in an article someday—your fingers may feel a little stiff. There may be resistance to lifting the lid again. You might conclude that there’s no point anymore. But you wouldn’t throw away years of piano lessons, would you?

A pianist sits down and plays. And soon notices that the stiffness fades, often sooner than expected. After enough practice, the music lives in you; you pick it up quickly again—your fingers seem to know it too.

Meditation works no differently. You can stop, or you can simply begin again. Whether the last time was yesterday or three months ago. That is the heart of it: beginning again, always. Without seeking a result, without expecting progress, without demanding calm or a quiet mind. And then being surprised to find that the meditation is still there in you.

Welcome back

So: if your practice has lost its momentum and you’re suffering under the illusion that it’s too late—rest assured. You can let go of the self-criticism and simply begin again. Just as every other practitioner does every day, including those whose practice just happens not to have lapsed right now.

In meditation, there is always another chance. With every breath, even.

Or, as the Sufi mystic Rumi wrote:

Come, come, whoever you are!
Wanderer, worshipper, lover of leaving.
It doesn’t matter.

This is not a caravan of despair.

Come, come.
Even if you have broken your vows a thousand times.
Come,
come again,
come!

If you found this article worth reading and (not yet) feel like getting a paid subscription, you can always treat me to a cappuccino!

OK, I'll buy you a cappuccino!

There is something paradoxical about meditation: the more you think about it, the further you drift from its essence.

Most people who sit on a meditation cushion for the first time arrive with an expectation. Sometimes that expectation is “relaxation,” sometimes something like “coming back to yourself,” and sometimes “silence”—inner silence. All of that sounds perfectly fitting and adequate, and yet there tends to be an underlying assumption that the brain has a kind of volume knob that you can turn down to zero once you master the right technique.

But the brain “thinks” otherwise. Thoughts simply arise—whether you want them to or not. You might conclude that you’re doing it wrong, but you could also “see” them as evidence that you are alive. The real question is not how to stop your thoughts, but what you “do” in the moment you notice them. That moment is brief, almost invisible; before you “know” it, it has passed. You were briefly caught up in a thought, and now you’re back. That is the entire “work.” Not an empty head, but that fraction of a second in which you return—without fuss, or at least without judgment about the fuss.

Sharon Salzberg calls this a different relationship with thoughts. The word “relationship” deserves attention. It implies that there are two parties who don’t always agree. That can be true of you and your thoughts as well. You don’t have to like your thoughts. You don’t have to believe them either. They are there, they come and they go, they move—and you can be the one who watches, who “registers” them as “things” that exist and with which you need do nothing.

There is, then, a difference between being inside a thought and seeing a thought. The first is what many people consider normal, and in that state they are likely to merge with their thoughts entirely. There is no longer a thought and someone in whom that thought exists—instead, you become the thought; you are the worry about tomorrow, you are the replay of yesterday’s conversation. Seeing a thought asks nothing more than a small measure of distance. The distance that brings clarity. In ACT therapy, the term “defusion” has been coined for this—a felicitous find: becoming disentangled from thoughts.

The space that Salzberg speaks of, which she describes as both peace and freedom, is not something you need to “create.” It is more that you uncover it—because it was already there. Beneath the layers of interpretations, judgments, reactivity, and stories that the thinking mind continuously produces, there is something that simply … is. Without drama or fuss, simply present.

For some people, this is a startling discovery in meditation: that stillness is not reached by overcoming thought but by no longer being completely swept away by it. As I sometimes say, it’s not about being free from thoughts but about becoming free with your thoughts.

You don’t need to be a good meditator. In fact, that’s not really possible. All you need to do is begin—and when you’ve drifted away, which will often happen, simply begin again. That’s it. Beginning again and again. That is where you find peace and freedom.

If you found this article worth reading and (not yet) feel like getting a paid subscription, you can always treat me to a cappuccino!

OK, I'll buy you a cappuccino!

A new wave of messages has recently surfaced, claiming that polyvagal theory (PVT) has been scientifically debunked. The trigger is an article by Paul Grossman titled Why the Polyvagal Theory Is Untenable. Despite an adequate response from Stephen Porges, the piece has left a number of therapists and psychologists in doubt. But when you place the criticism alongside the theory itself, a striking pattern emerges: Grossman is once again—and still—largely arguing against a version of PVT that its founder, Stephen Porges, never actually described.

Alongside the work I am doing on several in-depth articles on the subject, I came across a video by Justin Sunseri this week in which he clearly explains several key points. I decided to write a summary about it.

The Vagal Paradox: Two Different Questions

Polyvagal theory begins with a neurological puzzle that Stephen Porges called the vagal paradox. His question was concrete: how can one and the same nerve—the vagus nerve—be both life-protecting and life-threatening? If RSA (respiratory sinus arrhythmia) is understood as a marker of healthy vagal regulation, how do we explain that other vagal responses—such as bradycardia (a slow heart rate) and apnea (cessation of breathing) in premature infants—are associated with life-threatening dysregulation? This paradox formed the basis for Porges’ hypothesis that the vagal system is divided into distinct functional units.

Grossman reformulates this question and turns it into a measurement problem: RSA is simply an imprecise measure of vagal cardiac tone, and that explains the apparent contradiction. But in doing so, he answers a different question than the one Porges was asking. Porges was not asking whether RSA is a reliable measurement instrument. He was asking why the same nerve produces opposing survival outcomes. That is a neurobiological question, not a methodological one.

This distinction matters. The vagal paradox was the driving force behind Porges’ research into the brainstem, which ultimately led to the identification of two anatomically distinct vagal pathways arising from different brainstem nuclei and serving fundamentally different functions. Grossman does not address the vagal paradox in the form Porges posed it, nor does he engage with the anatomical distinction between different vagal circuits that Porges proposed as its explanation.

RSA as a Measurement Tool, Not a Foundation

A large part of Grossman’s article is devoted to the shortcomings of RSA as an index of vagal cardiac tone. If RSA is unreliable, the reasoning seems to go, then the entire theoretical edifice of PVT collapses. But this misrepresents what Porges himself has written about RSA.

In a 2023 publication, Porges explicitly states that RSA is a window onto the function of the ventral vagus—a measurement tool for testing polyvagal-informed hypotheses—but not a foundation of the theory itself. The comparison to a thermometer is illuminating here: if a fever thermometer measures inaccurately under certain conditions, it does not follow that fever as a criterion for infection is untenable. Criticism of the instrument does not touch the underlying reality it is trying to measure.

Grossman cites the relevant 2023 article by Porges. He is therefore aware of it. Why he nonetheless treats RSA as the pivot around which the entire theory turns remains unclear.

Freeze and Shutdown: Two Different States

Another point of criticism concerns the relationship between bradycardia and the freeze response. Grossman argues that bradycardia does not occur during freeze and uses this as an argument against the theory. But in polyvagal theory, freeze and shutdown are described as two distinct states.

Shutdown is a dorsal vagal response: a limp, passive collapse—think of a mouse going limp in a cat’s mouth. Bradycardia fits within this as a physiological response. Freeze, by contrast, is a combined state: immobility resulting from the simultaneous activation of the dorsal vagal system and the sympathetic nervous system. The body is still, but internally under high tension—comparable to a panic attack in which someone freezes. In that combined state of activation, bradycardia is precisely what one would not expect.

So bradycardia does indeed not occur during freeze—exactly as both Grossman and PVT assert.

Admittedly, the terminology around freeze, shutdown, and collapse is not always consistent in the literature; this is an area where confusion regularly arises. Grossman does not make this distinction either, which considerably weakens his argument on this point.

Myelinated Nerves in Non-Mammals

Grossman points to research showing that non-mammals—sharks, fish, and reptiles—also possess fast-acting myelinated nerves capable of directly influencing heart rate. His conclusion: if this anatomy is not exclusive to mammals, it cannot represent a special mammalian innovation for social engagement.

But polyvagal theory never claimed otherwise. Porges has clarified this point repeatedly: the theory is not about whether fast-acting vagal nerves are exclusive to mammals. It is about the evolutionary relocation of the brainstem nucleus from which those nerves originate. In mammals, a so-called ventral shift is described: an evolutionary reorganization of vagal control, in which—alongside the older projections from the nucleus dorsalis motorius (hence the dorsal vagus)—a prominent role emerges for vagal pathways originating in the nucleus ambiguus, located more ventrally in the brainstem (hence the ventral vagus).

This organization is functionally crucial, because the nucleus ambiguus is closely connected to nuclei involved in facial expression, vocalization, and auditory processing. This gives rise to an integrated system in which cardiac regulation and social communication are intertwined. That is the evolutionary claim of PVT—not that fast vagal nerves are uniquely mammalian.

Social Behavior in Reptiles

Grossman notes that modern reptiles display far more complex social behavior than was long assumed: long-term pair bonding, shared parental care, and social learning. As an argument against polyvagal theory, this misses the mark—and Porges has responded accordingly.

PVT is not concerned with the social behavior of modern reptiles as such, but with the specific evolutionary transition from a common extinct ancestor to mammals. Whatever modern reptiles have developed since then follows a separate evolutionary trajectory. To the extent that similarities in social behavior exist, these can be understood as examples of convergent evolution, in which comparable behaviors arise via different underlying biological systems.

Moreover, the theory describes a very specific integration: the coupling of cardiac regulation to facial expression, voice, and hearing, such that social signals—a warm tone of voice, eye contact, a smile—can bring about physiological calming in others (co-regulation). That is something quite different from the social behavior Grossman describes in reptiles.

For Whom Did Grossman Write His Article?

Beyond the substantive objections, something about the article’s design stands out. The abstract and introduction are explicitly directed at therapists and other practitioners who use PVT in their work. The final three of the twelve conclusions address psychology and treatment and encourage care professionals to abandon the theory.

That is remarkable, because the article contains no new arguments against PVT. Grossman is repeating positions he has been publishing for years, to which Porges has responded on multiple occasions. The article presents itself in scientific terms while simultaneously targeting readers who do not systematically follow the primary literature.

That makes it harmful to a fair assessment of PVT: those unfamiliar with the theory’s original formulations have little basis for evaluating the criticism on its merits. The gap between what Grossman argues against and what Porges actually claims only becomes visible when you place theory and critique side by side. The effect is already apparent: therapists and various popular psychology channels have adopted the conclusions without checking whether the criticism described actually corresponds to the theory.

Since this is not the first time Grossman has applied this strategy, it is difficult to characterize it as an innocent mistake.

Work to Be Done

That does not mean Grossman has no valid points. The question of how ventral vagal activity can be measured reliably remains open, even setting aside RSA as a foundation of the theory. The phylogenetic claims—concerning the evolutionary reorganization of vagal circuits in the transition to mammals—are plausible but less robustly supported than the anatomical part of the theory. And the terminology around freeze, shutdown and collapse is not always consistent within the PVT community itself, which complicates comparative research. These are real issues, and they deserve more serious attention than they have so far received.

Conclusion

Scientific criticism is valuable, and polyvagal theory is not immune to questions or refinement. There are legitimate debates about the degree to which RSA is useful as a proxy for ventral vagal activity, about how robust the evolutionary claims are, and about the precise anatomical boundaries of the social engagement system.

But Grossman’s article is largely not about any of that. It argues against a vagal paradox that Porges never formulated, treats RSA as a foundation that Porges himself has explicitly relativized, conflates freeze with shutdown, and misses the evolutionary core of the theory concerning the nucleus ambiguus. When you place the sources side by side, it becomes clear that the heart of the criticism does not connect with the heart of the theory.

Polyvagal theory is not dead. It is the subject of an ongoing scientific debate, and that is precisely where it belongs—only, that debate ought to concern different questions than the ones Grossman is asking.

If you found this article worth reading and (not yet) feel like getting a paid subscription, you can always treat me to a cappuccino!

OK, I'll buy you a cappuccino!

Introduction

In a compelling interview, Dr. Bessel van der Kolk—one of the most influential psychiatrists of our time—shares his insights on trauma and its lasting effects on body, brain, and mind. His work, expressed most powerfully in the bestseller The Body Keeps the Score, has transformed the way the world understands psychological distress and trauma. Rather than viewing trauma as a mental problem, he emphasizes that it is above all a bodily and relational wound—a disruption in the way we experience ourselves and others.

The interview—with the populist title “The Body Trauma Expert: This Eye Movement Trick Can Fix Your Trauma! The Body Keeps the Score!”—runs for two hours. It was well worth watching, and I have written this summary article about it—though it has grown rather long—with a link to the interview at the bottom.

Trauma Is Not a Memory, But a Reliving

One of Van der Kolk’s most striking claims is that trauma does not unfold only in the mind but literally becomes lodged in the body. It is not a bad memory but an experience that is relived over and over again as if it is happening in the here and now. This is visible in brain scans: when people re-experience a traumatic event, the rational part of the brain shuts down while the emotional networks become overactive. The sense of time dissolves. What factually belongs to the past feels as though it is happening now.

This also explains why talking about trauma does not always help. “Trauma is a speechless terror,” says Van der Kolk. “You cannot reason people out of their pain, because in that moment their brain is not functioning rationally.” This makes traditional approaches like cognitive behavioral therapy often insufficient. They focus on ‘correcting’ thought patterns, while trauma disrupts the neurological structures that lie far beneath conscious thought.

The Impact of Early Childhood

In his clinical practice, Van der Kolk sees time and again how devastating childhood trauma can be—and how common it is. Around 90% of his patients struggle with the consequences of a difficult childhood. But trauma need not always have been visible or violent. The deepest scars often arise from neglect, belittlement, or the feeling of being unwanted. Children who are consistently made to feel they are not relevant develop a fundamental sense of unsafety. “You become how you are seen,” he says. “If no one really sees you, you essentially do not exist.”

It is precisely these so-called ‘small-t ’traumas’—critical remarks, subtle rejections, emotional absence—that embed themselves deep within identity. Children often draw the conclusion that something is wrong with themselves because their environment has taught them this implicitly or explicitly. That self-image travels with them into adulthood. So these ‘small-t traumas’ are not so small after all…

The Body as Gateway to Healing

Because trauma affects the body so fundamentally, Van der Kolk has advocated for body-oriented therapies for decades. Qigong, dance, massage, and theatre—these are not alternative whims, he argues, but direct pathways to help the body rediscover itself as a safe place. Many people with trauma have (unconsciously) left their body because feeling was too painful. Recovery begins with daring to be present again in one’s own body.

EMDR

EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing) has also proven remarkably effective. By combining the reliving of a trauma with back-and-forth eye movements, the brain is enabled to recognize the experience as ‘past’ rather than ‘present.’ Van der Kolk calls EMDR his “gateway drug” into the world of effective treatments—a first step that taught him trauma can indeed be transformed, provided you work at the right level. In the interview he gives a brief demonstration with the host.

What Happens in the Brain During EMDR?

During an EMDR session, a person consciously brings a traumatic memory to mind, including the images, feelings, sounds, and physical sensations associated with it. At the same time, the eyes follow a rhythmically moving object—often the therapist’s fingers or a light—from left to right. This bilateral stimulation activates brain pathways that are not normally active simultaneously.

Van der Kolk explains that these eye movements likely activate certain networks between the temporoparietal junction (the area where we locate our ‘self’ in time and space) and the insula (the center of bodily awareness). This enables the brain to stop experiencing the memory as ‘present’ and to classify it as something that happened in the past.

“Your brain is able to say, ‘Oh, this is what happened to me, but that happened in the past.”

This is essential: trauma is not a memory but a re-living. In the moment of traumatic activation, the brain makes no distinction between then and now. EMDR appears to help restore this distinction by literally moving the brain across the midline—from left to right hemisphere.

Van der Kolk’s own research confirmed the effectiveness: in 78% of adults with single-incident trauma (such as assault or a car accident), EMDR led to complete symptom relief. Complex childhood traumas are more stubborn, but even there EMDR can be a powerful tool, provided it is embedded within a broader, safe therapeutic relationship.

The Body Knows the Way to Healing

That the body and movement are central to trauma recovery became even clearer to Van der Kolk during a visit to China in the 1990s. The country was just emerging from the Cultural Revolution—a period of suppression, violence, and collective silence. In conversations with residents, he was struck by how little people openly spoke about what had happened. Regarding the Tiananmen protest, for example, people simply said, “That never happened.”

And yet he saw something different in the public parks: hundreds of people practicing Tai Chi and qigong together each morning. Slow, flowing movements. Body and breath in a rhythm. No words. No explanations. But something is working deeply on the nervous system.

For Van der Kolk, this was a revelation. “This is how they survive,” he thought. Where the West focuses on talking, analyzing, and taking medication, he discovered a different gateway to recovery: regulation through rhythm, movement, and synchronization. Not through the head, but through the body. Not alone, but together.

It set him thinking about how different cultures cope with pain and dysregulation. In the West, we invest in ‘understanding’—in ’talking about trauma. But what if you have no words for it? What if language disappears, as it does for so many people with deep trauma? Then the body—in movement, in repetition, in rhythm—can open a new path.

Since then he has argued ever more explicitly for recovery through physical processes. Not as a replacement for, but in collaboration with, more conventional approaches. Whether yoga, qigong, dance, breathwork, or martial arts, the path to yourself runs through your body. And often through another person as well.

How Trauma Changes Perception Itself

During his work with traumatized war veterans, Van der Kolk began to explore how trauma affects not only feelings and behavior but literally alters the way people perceive reality. One of the most revealing discoveries came through the use of the classic Rorschach test—the well-known inkblots that invite people to describe what they see.

What Van der Kolk and his team discovered was that traumatized people consistently saw different images than non-traumatized individuals. Where some recognized abstract shapes or animals, war veterans saw blood, mutilated bodies, or violence. Women with a history of sexual abuse saw torn bodies or threatening figures. What was identical on paper was interpreted in entirely different ways internally.

These observations confirmed something Van der Kolk had long suspected: we do not all live in the same reality. Trauma essentially programs a different ‘filter’ into the brain—a lens through which the world is constantly scanned for danger, loss, or betrayal. Even when nothing appears to be wrong, the body remains in a heightened state of readiness. “We all live in different worlds,” he says, “shaped by what we have previously experienced, often without our awareness.”

This insight has far-reaching implications for therapy. It means that healing begins not with persuasion, but with restructuring the sensory and emotional foundations of a person’s reality. Only when the body learns it is safe can the brain begin to rewrite its story.

What Trauma Does to the Brain

Van der Kolk’s work is distinguished in part by its focus on the neurobiological traces of trauma. Using brain scans, he demonstrates that traumatic memories are not merely ‘stories we recall’ but deeply ingrained physical responses in specific brain regions. When someone relives a traumatic experience, the brain responds in a characteristic way.

It begins at the most primitive core: the periaqueductal gray, deep in the brainstem—what Van der Kolk calls the “cockroach center” of our brain. This area, once danger is perceived, directly activates the body in a reflexive fight, flight, or freeze response. In people with trauma, this alarm continues to sound faintly, even without direct cause. The result is a constant state of tense vigilance, as if something is always threatening1.

Above this sits the amygdala, the brain’s ‘smoke detector.’ At traumatic triggers—a smell, a sound, a glance—this area reacts with lightning speed. It recognizes threat patterns based on past experience, often before the rest of the brain has time to think logically. In traumatized people the amygdala is frequently overactive, causing even harmless situations to feel threatening.

At the same time, the prefrontal cortex—the rational brain—is deactivated. This region, particularly the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, is responsible for overview, sense of time, self-reflection, and the ability to contextualize. When this area ‘goes offline,’ the awareness that something belongs to the past disappears. What remains is the immediate, overwhelming experience as if the trauma is happening again right now.

Another crucial player is the insula, the brain region that links body and feeling. It is through the insula that we feel what we feel: heartbeat, tension, breathing, and goosebumps. In people with trauma, this connection is often disrupted. Some can barely feel their body at all—as if it has been ‘switched off’—while others are hypersensitive to every internal sensation. In both cases the relationship with one’s own body is fundamentally dysregulated.

What all this makes clear is that trauma is not a psychological weakness but a state of being—above all, a state of the brain. You are not ‘emotionally unstable’ or ‘oversensitive’—your brain has adapted to unsafety. And that also points the direction for recovery: if the brain has adapted, it can also learn to attune itself again—provided you find the right entry points and involve the body.

Psychedelics: A New Revolution

Recently Van der Kolk has also turned his attention to psychedelic therapy, including treatments with MDMA, ketamine, and psilocybin. The results from clinical studies are astonishing: people with chronic PTSD, who had previously derived no benefit from conventional therapies over many years, experience profound breakthroughs. Not only do symptoms diminish, but people rediscover compassion for themselves, feel reconnected with their body and surroundings, and can finally recognize the past as past.

Van der Kolk himself underwent an MDMA session as part of his research. To his own surprise, not pleasure or euphoria arose, but deep grief—a confrontation with the thousands of traumas he had heard as a clinician over the years. “I became a sadder but also wiser person,” he says. This underscores for him how essential the right setting is: safety, guidance, and human presence make the difference between healing and retraumatization.

Healing Requires Community

At least as important as therapy is connection with others. According to Van der Kolk, isolation is one of the most destructive factors in trauma-related conditions. People heal in relationships—through shared experiences, rhythm, and synchronicity. Sport, theatre, music, and dance: these are, in his view, age-old forms of collective regulation that are at risk of disappearing in our modern, digital society. Yet it is precisely there that recovery begins.

He describes how young people in criminal gangs often seek precisely that sense of belonging—the “band of brothers” they never had at home. Or how soldiers, through marching, singing, and training together, restructure themselves into a functioning unit. It is not the talking that heals them, but moving together, existing together.

Attachment: You Become Who Sees You

According to Van der Kolk, psychological well-being does not begin with reason or behavior, but with relationship—from the very first moments of life. He emphasizes that secure attachment to a caring parent or caregiver literally forms the blueprint for how a child experiences itself, others, and the world.

“You become how people see you,” he says. That sounds simple, but the implication is profound. When a child is consistently seen as valuable, loved, and welcome, it grows up with the sense that it is worthwhile. But when it encounters unpredictability, emotional distance, or rejection, that experience becomes a fundamental part of the personality. “If no one truly sees you, you essentially do not exist.”

He gives the example that children do not consciously ask themselves whether they are safe—they become safety, or they become fear. When a mother says, “You are too difficult; that’s why your father started drinking,” that is not merely a hurtful remark but a message that becomes lodged in body and self-image. Subtler forms of misrecognition—a parent who persistently tells the child it is ‘overreacting’ or ‘shouldn’t feel that ’way’—can also have deep consequences. The child then learns not to understand itself but to distrust itself.

Secure attachment does not mean parents are perfect. It means, above all, that there is consistency, availability, affection, and repair when something goes wrong. That a child knows, “When I am frightened, someone comes. When I fall, I am picked up. When I am confused, I am not shamed but understood.” That is the soil in which resilience grows.

Van der Kolk draws an important social conclusion from this. In a culture where parents often stand alone, where childcare and schools are under pressure, and where connection is giving way to screen time, children sometimes lose the mirroring that helps them construct a sense of self. Attachment is not a luxury, he argues, but a neurobiological necessity.

And just as with trauma, so too here: it is never too late to restore connection. People can still learn to experience themselves—and others—as safe. But it requires attention, a body, and a relationship.

From Burden to Baggage

Van der Kolk also points to an important paradox: although early wounds can leave deep scars, they can also become a source of strength. Those who have had to survive at a young age sometimes develop their own ways of overcoming obstacles. “It is often the people who have had to endure something,” he says, “who later come up with solutions others would never even consider.” Early struggle can kindle creativity and problem-solving capacity—not despite, but precisely because of the necessity to adapt.

Yet this is not available to everyone. Much depends on the environment, the possibilities for recovery, and the support network that happens to be present. For every success story of a ‘resilient survivor,’ there are countless others who have become quietly stuck. Van der Kolk therefore emphasizes that we must be careful about labeling trauma too positively: it can shape people but also break them—and usually does both at once.

How Do You Avoid Traumatizing Your Children?

On the question of how parents can protect their children from trauma, Van der Kolk is clear: make sure you do not do it alone. Children are not only harmed by abuse or mistreatment but also by emotional isolation, unpredictability, and the lack of safe co-regulation. And parents—however well-intentioned—inevitably carry their pain and patterns with them. Parents raising children alone, therefore, risk burdening their child with their own unconscious wounds simply because there is no other perspective in the household.

His advice is therefore radically simple: build a network. Ensure your child has multiple adults around them who are available, calm, and engaged—so that the child learns that safety is not accidental but reproducible. That father is sometimes strict, but grandmother is gentle. That the neighbor is patient when mother is stressed. In this way a child learns: my world is larger than one person’s mood. And I am safe, even when someone else temporarily is not.

Ultimately, says Van der Kolk, raising a non-traumatized child is not about doing everything perfectly but about being present, predictable, and attuned. And about letting the child feel: if you are overwhelmed, someone will come who stays.

Van der Kolk shares a particularly personal moment that moves him to this day. During a visit from his parents, his three-year-old daughter asserted herself at home in the way that is perfectly natural for a toddler. His mother reacted with irritation and said he should discipline her. He immediately felt that reflex rise—the impulse to intervene, to correct her, to repeat the patterns of his childhood. He had even risen to walk towards his daughter when suddenly the realization struck him: “I am about to become like my parents were.”

At that moment he consciously chose differently. He turned to his mother and said, “No, she can go to the bathroom.” For him this was a liberating moment—not only a choice in favor of his daughter but also a release from unconscious loyalty to his parents. It was, as he says, the first time he truly felt ownership of his parenthood and of himself.

Yet he also calls this a painful moment. Because breaking patterns often means leaving one’s ‘tribe’—the group one belonged to, even if it caused harm. “We want to belong somewhere,” he says, “that is deeply human. But when you truly change, you leave something behind. And that can be lonely.” It is a theme he frequently sees in patients: the desire for healing often collides with the implicit fear of being cast out. “You leave your tribe,” he says. “And then you must learn to find a new one.”

In therapy—or in parenting—it is therefore not only about healing but also about choosing: who do I want to be when I am no longer driven by fear, guilt, or old reflexes?

Both Agitated and Numb

One of the most confusing and exhausting consequences of trauma is what Van der Kolk describes as “being agitated and numbed out at the same time.” You feel driven, irritable, and alert—as if something is constantly wrong—and at the same time you are inwardly numb, empty, or shut down. Your body is taut with tension, but you feel nothing that provides direction. Van der Kolk calls this a characteristic state in people with a traumatized nervous system: the body is in a state of threat, while the feeling system has partially shut itself down to avoid being flooded. You can barely tolerate anything, yet at the same time you feel dull and far removed from yourself.

That paradoxical field of tension—hypersensitivity and numbness in one—makes life unpredictable and difficult to navigate. You do not know whether you are going to explode or collapse. It also makes it so difficult for the outside world to understand what is going on: you appear ‘flat’ or ‘disinterested,’ while inwardly you are flooded. Van der Kolk emphasizes that this state is not a character flaw but a neurological defense strategy of the body. And that from it—slowly, through safety, rhythm, and body work—one can emerge.

Mirror Neurons and Co-Regulation: How We Influence Each Other’s Nervous Systems

During the conversation, Van der Kolk points to the existence of mirror neurons—brain cells that become active when we see someone else do, feel, or undergo something. These neurons cause us to resonate with the other person, even when we ourselves are doing nothing. They form the neurological basis for empathy, attunement, and intuitive understanding. “We pick up each other’s energy,” says Van der Kolk, “often without noticing.”

This aligns seamlessly with the polyvagal theory of professor of psychiatry and neuroscientist Stephen Porges, in which the concept of co-regulation is central. According to this theory, our autonomic nervous system is not only attuned to internal signals (such as breathing or heart rate) but is constantly scanning the environment for social signals: voice intonation, facial expression, rhythm, and proximity. When we feel safe with another person—because their voice is calm, their face soft, and their breathing quiet—our own nervous system calms in turn.

In other words, we regulate each other. Not through words, but through eye contact, body language, voice, and rhythm. Van der Kolk and Porges describe, each in their own way, the same thing: that trauma is not a purely individual problem and that recovery rarely takes place in isolation. You cannot ‘talk yourself out of hyperarousal,’ but another person can—by being present, attuned, and safe—help your system to come to rest.

This is why Van der Kolk advocates for therapeutic approaches in which not only talking occurs, but where rhythm, proximity, and bodily attunement also have a place: from psychodrama to dance, from qigong or yoga to shared breathing. The body only learns to feel safe in the proximity of another body that radiates safety.

What Screens Take From Us

Precisely in light of these deeply relational processes, Van der Kolk is concerned about the advance of screen culture. Instead of bodily proximity, shared rhythms, and sensory attunement, we are spending ever more time in virtual worlds. Screens provide information, but not regulation. They offer stimulation, but not safety. “You get a small dopamine spike,” he says, “but you do not learn how to truly connect—with yourself or with others.”

The result is a society in which people increasingly live alone, fragmented, and disconnected from their bodies. Even young children grow up with less physical touch, fewer live facial expressions, and fewer shared rituals. In doing so they lose something fundamental: the capacity to attune their inner world to another. And that, warns Van der Kolk, makes us more vulnerable than ever to dysregulation, stress, and loneliness2.

Love as a Neurological Experience

For Van der Kolk, love is not a poetic side note to life—it clearly has a neurological foundation. “Love,” he says, “does not reside only in words, but in glances, touches, rhythms—in the subtle coordination of two nervous systems learning to trust each other. Someone says, I am here for you. And your body believes it.”

In his work with war veterans, he saw how deep, life-saving bonds can form under the most terrible circumstances. “Combat taught me more about male love than anything else,” he says. Real love arises where people protect, mirror, and carry one another—especially when it is difficult. Not the absence of danger makes love possible, but the experience that someone stays with you when you are afraid.

This is why healing is never a purely individual journey. We are wounded in relation to others—and we heal in relation too. Whoever is seen lovingly, touched, or held can gradually learn that the world may not, after all, be only unsafe. And that the body—in which the pain had lodged itself so tenaciously—can also become a place of homecoming.

The Culture of Loneliness

Beneath everything Van der Kolk says—about brains, attachment, rhythm, love, and recovery—lies a simmering warning: we live in a world that is slowly unraveling us from one another. A world in which screens replace faces, voices are filtered through earbuds, and physical proximity is increasingly experienced as uncomfortable. “The average American,” he cites, “now has zero people they can turn to in a crisis. Twenty years ago that number was three.”

It is as if society is being increasingly organized around autonomy, self-reliance, and productivity—but not around connection. And so we become ever more efficient, but also ever lonelier. We seek safety in information, distraction in pixels, and recognition in algorithms—but our bodies continue to long for something else: rhythm, touch, proximity, and togetherness.

Three Steps Toward Healing According to Bessel van der Kolk

Rather than beginning with a diagnosis or problem description, Van der Kolk starts his treatments with a simple but deeply personal question: “Tell me who you are.”

This question forms the beginning of a three-part approach he sketches in the interview3:

1. Self-inquiry: Who are you? What works? What blocks? Therapy begins with curiosity, not labels. Van der Kolk wants to know who someone is, what gives them energy, what gets stuck, what has helped before, and what has not. Not “How ill are you?” but “What does your inner world look like?” This first phase revolves around meaning-making, self-knowledge, and building a respectful therapeutic relationship.

2. Bodily regulation: first calm the nervous system. Only when the body feels safe is there space for processing. Many people with trauma are constantly flooded or numbed, or both at once. Van der Kolk uses techniques such as yoga, neurofeedback, breathwork, massage, or EMDR to help stabilize the nervous system. “If you are overwhelmed, don’t start with talking,” he says, “but with moving, feeling, and regulating.”

3. Processing the core experience: gently touching the trauma. Only once sufficient safety is established is the core experience itself approached. This can occur through EMDR, psychedelic therapy, psychodrama, or other experiential methods. The memory is relived, but this time from the here and now, in a controlled, guided context in which the brain learns to feel the difference between then and now. Central is not digging in the past but reprogramming the senses and the nervous system.
   
   “That was then. And now it is safe.”

Trauma Is Never One Story

Gabor Maté, another prominent voice in the trauma field, argues that ADHD, addiction, and many forms of psychological suffering can very often be traced back to early childhood trauma or stress. Van der Kolk recognizes himself partly in this view but also emphasizes that reality is more complex. Not everything is trauma—and not everyone develops difficulties from the same origin.

“Almost all traumatized children meet the criteria for ADHD,” he says, “but that does not mean everyone with ADHD necessarily has a trauma.” He points to multiple causes: genetics, neurodiversity, environmental factors, and toxins during pregnancy—all can contribute. Psychological symptoms are, in his view, often the tip of the iceberg; what lies beneath varies from person to person.

The nuance he introduces is essential: it is not about imposing trauma as the explanation but about remaining curious with each person about the story beneath the symptoms—whether that is trauma, temperament, or chance. Healing does not begin with a label, but with listening.

A System That Falls Short

Van der Kolk makes no bones about it: the current psychiatric diagnostic system—as codified in the DSM (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders)—falls seriously short. “It totally sucks,” he says bluntly. Not because psychological distress is not real, but because the system categorizes symptoms without looking at the context from which they arise. Whether someone is anxious, withdrawn, aggressive, or addicted—the DSM does not ask, “What happened to you?”

According to Van der Kolk, this leads to treatments that focus on managing behavior rather than understanding causes. And this suits a society more interested in productivity than in healing. Instead of helping people recover, their suffering is medically translated into ‘disorders’—often ’with an accompanying prescription, but without genuine contact.

“The focus is not on healing, but on keeping the system running.”

What he proposes is no simple alternative, but a radically different approach: listening, slowing down, and looking at the whole story—body, brain, relationships, and history. Not: What is wrong with you? But what happened to you?

No Scientific Foundation

According to Van der Kolk, most psychiatric diagnoses are not based on hard science but on consensus agreements between experts—often reached in meeting rooms, not in laboratories. There is little to no biological grounding, and most categories are superficial descriptions of behavior, not of causes.

“They’re just very primitive ways of categorizing the human mind.”

An exception, in his view, is PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder), which does have brain scans, neurobiological patterns, and clinical research as its foundation. Not coincidentally, Van der Kolk himself was involved in introducing PTSD into the DSM in the 1980s. But even there he sees limitations: PTSD focuses primarily on single-incident trauma (such as accidents or violence), while early childhood, relational trauma—which leaves deep traces in the brain and in attachment patterns—is barely recognized within official diagnostics.

In short, the system gives names but no insight. It describes symptoms but does not ask about the origin. For Van der Kolk, this is unacceptable. Psychological pain deserves more than a label—it deserves a context, a story, a human being.

A Message of Hope

Despite the weight of the subject, Van der Kolk is emphatically hopeful. “Everything that has been disrupted can be set in motion again.” Trauma is persistent, yes—but not unchangeable. The key lies in taking bodily and relational processes seriously, in daring to experiment with new forms of therapy, and in cherishing genuine connection.

His message is clear: we must stop treating people as symptoms and learn again to listen to their story—with heart, mind, and body.

That movement is not a straight line. It requires time, attention, and proximity—and sometimes new forms of therapy that do not proceed only through language but through touch, rhythm, breath, and space. And above all, it requires something that costs nothing but has become rare: genuine presence. People who stay. People who look without judgment. People who say, I see you. I am not going anywhere; I will stay with you.

Based on the interview with Dr. Bessel van der Kolk, The Diary of a CEO, March 2025.

If you found this article worth reading and (not yet) feel like getting a paid subscription, you can always treat me to a cappuccino!

OK, I'll buy you a cappuccino!

Introduction

Recently I have become increasingly aware of the possible effects of word choice and language use. Partly through my interest in how journalism shapes the way we experience the news. But also because years of working as a mindfulness and resilience trainer have taught me a great deal about the impact of language on what someone learns—or what insight arises—during a training day. And writing articles, which I have been practicing for some years now, has been its own teacher.

Even so, one of the most formative experiences of the past few years was an article I read about how perpetrators and victims are ‘handled’ in news reporting—and how this has a profound effect on the way society treats victims.

When I recently watched a TED talk about how the language you speak influences how you describe a bridge, I decided the time had come for an article about language and grammar. So here we go.

Guilt or Accident

Imagine you witness an accident. Someone knocks over a vase—in a museum, no less, so it is almost certainly valuable. In English, you would probably describe it as “He knocked over the vase.” In Spanish, you would be more likely to say, “Se cayó el jarrón”—the vase fell. In that second sentence there is no ‘perpetrator,’ no personal pronoun. The falling of the vase was simply an event, nothing more.

This apparently minor grammatical difference has surprisingly large consequences. Cognitive linguist Lera Boroditsky showed in her research that English speakers later remembered more clearly who knocked over the vase, while Spanish speakers more readily remembered that it was an accident. Two people witness the same event, yet remember different things—because their language has ‘trained’ them to attend to different aspects. And it goes beyond memory: when the same scene is shown to English and Spanish speakers and the English-speaking half describe what happened using ‘he did it’ while the Spanish-speaking half write ‘it happened,’ the first group assigns significantly more blame to the person involved—more than chance alone would predict. Language steers not only our memory but also our judgment.

Lera Boroditsky’s TED talk can be found at the bottom of this article.

The Grammar of Disappearance

In her book Speaking Freely1, linguist Julia Penelope describes a mechanism she called the grammar of non-agency. She showed how sentences about violence are gradually reworded and how, with each step, the perpetrator fades further out of view2 while the victim undergoes a peculiar grammatical journey.

An article I read on this subject made a deep impression on me. Follow the progression of the sentences below:

1. John hits Mary. A factual description of what happened. John is the agent—the one acting. Mary is the object: the one to whom something is done. The sentence describes an act and names a perpetrator (the ‘agent’ in the grammar of non-agency). It is an active sentence3.

2. Mary was hit by John. Also accurate, but something subtle has happened: Mary has been pushed forward and becomes the grammatical subject. She is ‘promoted’—but not to agent. She becomes the subject of something that happens to her. John is ‘demoted’ to an adverbial phrase, a tag at the end of the sentence—and grammatically optional at that. Notice how naturally the next step follows:

3. Mary was hit. John has left the building. Mary is still the subject, but now of a non-agency sentence—a sentence without a perpetrator. Only one condition remains. Something happened to her, but who was involved? No idea.

4. Mary is a battered woman. The final step is the most definitive. Mary is no longer the subject of an event; she has become a noun. She has merged with what was done to her. The violence John committed is now part of her identity. She wears it as a label.

What happens across these four sentences is, to my mind, shocking. Mary has undergone a grammatical transformation: from object to subject of the sentence. But in reality, she has been set up. She is no longer someone John hit—she is someone who has a problem because she is a battered woman.

You may recognize how often you see headlines in the media about people who ‘have a problem,’ without the perpetrator ever being named. I have included a few examples further on.

Activist, author, and filmmaker Jackson Katz used the same example in his widely viewed TED talk (which I only saw for the first time recently) to show how deeply this mechanism runs through the way media, courts, and public opinion speak about domestic violence. We do not ask, ‘Why does John hit?’ We ask, ‘Why does Mary stay with him?’ Grammar has, quietly and subtly, steered us towards victim blaming.

Katz added another observation: even the term ‘violence against women’ is grammatically a passive construction. There is no acting subject. It is something that happens to women—not something men do.

Every Day in the News

As Johan Cruyff once said, “You’ll only see it once you understand it.” Once you understand it, you start recognizing this mechanism more and more often. You find it every day in the newspaper and on news websites—for example, in coverage of road accidents.

A motorist hits a cyclist. That is what happens. But follow how the reporting unfolds and pay attention to the grammatical position of each of the two people involved:

1. Motorist hits cyclist. The motorist is the subject, the agent. The cyclist is the object. Clear, direct, honest, and as factually accurate as can be.

2. Cyclist hit by motorist. The diabolical reversal: the cyclist moves forward and becomes the grammatical subject. But just like Marie/Mary, it is a false promotion—the cyclist is the subject of something that happens to him. The motorist has been pushed back to an adverbial phrase at the end—grammatically marginal, almost a footnote. He can slip offstage through the wings.

3. Cyclist hit by car. And there goes the driver. This could well be the headline we read in the paper4. The vehicle has replaced the driver. It was not a person who decided, drove too fast, or failed to look—a thing was in motion. The human element has been erased; all that remains is mechanics.

4. Cyclist hit. The car has gone too. All that remains is a cyclist who has a problem and has been ‘hit’—by no one, by nothing, apparently out of nowhere. Fate that befell him.

In four steps the cyclist has made the same grammatical journey as Mary: from object to subject of the sentence. But here too, it is a trap. As the grammatical subject of a passive sentence without a perpetrator, he is no longer someone to whom something happened through the actions of another—he is someone who apparently lives in a world where this sort of thing simply occurs. And in that world we inevitably begin to ask, was he wearing a helmet? Was he visible enough? Was he on the correct side of the road? The motorist—along with his actions and his responsibility—has long since disappeared from view.

This is rarely a deliberate conspiracy in newsrooms (I hope). It is the natural gravitational pull of the passive voice, which in news language is especially strong because it sounds concise and neutral—while being anything but.

Staying Power and a Thick Skin

Of all the so-called social media, I now only use LinkedIn. There I have been following Zoë Papaikonomou for some time—a journalist focused on diversity, inclusion, and equality who investigates, above all, the workings of power. Almost daily I come across a post from her correcting a newspaper headline or news title.

What I also read, incidentally, is that journalists like Papaikonomou regularly receive hate mail. It appears that putting your head above the parapet provokes a reaction. For me, that is an extra reason to support and follow journalists with this mission5—because the headlines you sometimes encounter are just horrible, and it is genuinely necessary that established media are held to account for them.

Three More Sets

In the workplace:

1. The manager groped the employee.

2. The employee was groped by the manager.

3. The employee was groped. Manager gone.

4. There was an inappropriate situation between two colleagues.

In the history books:

1. The Netherlands colonized Indonesia, plundered it, and held it by force6.

2. Indonesia was colonized by the Netherlands. The diabolical reversal.

3. Indonesia was colonized. The Netherlands is out of sight.

4. Indonesia experienced a colonial period. Colonialism has been converted into a historical era—something that simply happened to Indonesia, like an ice age or a dry summer. No perpetrator, no decision, no responsibility.

In the current news:

1. The Israeli army bombed a refugee camp, killing hundreds of civilians. Clear (and deeply distressing).

2. Hundreds of people were killed in bombings at a refugee camp in Gaza.

3. Dozens more dead in Gaza. No army, no bombs, no decision. People fell as leaves fall.

4. The conflict in the Middle East claims victims once again. — Two parties, one abstract conflict7.

Is the bridge feminine or masculine? It matters.

The effect of language on thought does not stop at violence and blame. Boroditsky also investigated the influence of grammatical gender—the property of many languages that assigns every noun a gender.

Take the word bridge. In German, die Brücke is feminine. In Spanish, el puente is masculine. When Boroditsky asked German speakers to describe a bridge, they more often chose words like “beautiful,” “elegant,” and “slender”—words typically associated with feminine qualities. Spanish speakers more often chose “strong,” “sturdy,” and “towering”—words generally associated with masculine qualities. The same bridge. Different grammatical gender. Different image.

A comparable pattern emerges with the word key: in Spanish, it's feminine (la llave); in German, masculine (der Schlüssel). German speakers described keys as hard, heavy, and metallic; Spanish speakers as small, glittering, and handy. The grammatical gender of a word colors the associations people attach to it, without their being aware of this at all.

This means that the language you speak partly determines how the world around you feels, which properties catch your eye, and which qualities you attribute to the things you encounter. And if that is already true for bridges and keys, it is probably also true for words like “victim” or “perpetrator.”

Seven Thousand Ways of Standing in Reality

Boroditsky’s research indicates that these are not fringe phenomena. Language determines how people orient themselves in space, how they visualize time, how they distinguish colors, how they understand numbers—and even whether abstract mathematics is thinkable at all. The Kuuk Thaayorre, an indigenous people living in northeastern Australia, have no words for “left” and “right” and use only the cardinal directions. They consistently prove better at spatial orientation than people from Western cultures, even in unfamiliar landscapes. A five-year-old child from this community knows exactly where north is. The averagely brilliant university student from Europe or America has no idea.

There are approximately seven thousand languages in the world. Those are seven thousand ways of standing in reality, of naming and experiencing it. Boroditsky calls this the beauty of linguistic diversity: it shows how inventive and flexible the human mind is. But it has a shadow side—we lose roughly one language every week, and with each language, a unique way of looking at the world disappears.

As you have read, Boroditsky demonstrated that language determines what we remember, whom we blame, and whom we punish. If a generation grows up on reporting in which Palestinian deaths fall grammatically from nowhere, while Israeli deaths always have a perpetrator, that shapes a worldview. It becomes a form of cultural programming with the hallmarks of propaganda—but unintentional, carried by words and sentences that seemed neutral.

Grammar does not only decide who is the perpetrator and who is the victim. It decides, subtly and stubbornly, whom we see as a full human being and whom we see as someone to whom an event happens.

The Illusion of Neutrality

Journalists, editors, and editors-in-chief will say that they report neutrally. That they present facts and do not judge. That they take no sides. But what linguistics shows us is that grammatical neutrality does not exist. Every sentence is a choice. Who stands at the front, who at the back, and who disappears? These are not stylistic preferences—they are political decisions, even when they are made unconsciously.

An editor who writes “cyclist hit” is not choosing neutrality. He is choosing a formulation that removes the motorist from view. A reporter who writes “there was an inappropriate situation” is not choosing care and caution. He is choosing a formulation that erases the power dynamic. A history book that writes “Indonesia experienced a colonial period” is not choosing objectivity. It is choosing a perspective in which the colonizer may remain invisible.

The French philosopher Roland Barthes called this mechanism mythologization: the way in which cultural and political choices are disguised as natural, self-evident facts. No conscious choice is made anymore—who stands at the front of the sentence, who vanishes, which word is chosen—and the resulting habit partly shapes our reality. Language pretends to describe how things simply are. And that is precisely the moment at which it is most dangerous: not when language lies, but when it sounds so self-evident that nobody asks whether it could have been otherwise.

Language or Grammar?

The distinction between these two matters, because grammar8 typically works less consciously than word choice. You notice immediately when someone uses a loaded word—victim, terrorist, illegal. Words carry their charge audibly. You can point to words, challenge them, and replace them. But when a sentence is constructed in the passive, it slides in the way a familiar proverb does: unquestioned, with the authority of the obvious. Nobody protests against a passive sentence. No editor marks it as tendentious. No reader feels resistance. And quietly the sentence does its insidious work.

That is also what makes grammar so effective as a political instrument: it operates below the radar of conscious judgment. We are trained to attend to what is said. We are barely trained to notice how the sentence is constructed—who is named first, who comes last, and who has been silently omitted. That becomes simply ‘the way things are normally written.’

Boroditsky’s research indicates that this is not an innocent phenomenon. Test subjects given an identical description of the same event—the only difference being sentence construction, active or passive—arrived at different judgments about guilt and responsibility. They had the same facts but different grammar. And that grammar steered their thinking, without their noticing.

That is the strange and unsettling quality of grammatical influence: it leaves no traces in memory. You remember the conclusion—it was an accident, it was a conflict, it was a tragic situation—but not the sentence that led you there. Grammar has done its work and vanished. What remains is a thought that feels like your own conviction.

Media as Mirror and Mould

Media do not simply report on reality—they partly shape how we understand it. When news media write year after year about women who are abused, cyclists who are hit, and communities that have been plundered, this gradually seeps into how readers perceive the world. It is probably not deliberate manipulation but a slow sedimentation of a particular worldview: a world in which things happen, in which things befall people, and in which responsibility is a diffuse and elusive concept.

Boroditsky’s research strongly suggests that language does not only describe what we think—it partly determines what we are capable of thinking. Someone who never hears or reads sentences in which a perpetrator appears as an acting subject will find it harder to develop the cognitive framework to see agency clearly at all. Grammar shapes thought, and thought shapes what we consider just, normal, or inevitable.

That is what makes the choice between active and passive language not merely a stylistic matter, but an ethical one. Anyone who writes, teaches, reports, or publishes—and in an age when everyone has a blog, that is all of us—is constantly faced with the question: who do I place at the front of the sentence? Who do I let disappear? And what reality do I create in doing so, sentence by sentence, day after day?

See for Yourself

Journalists who have understood this:

Jackson Katz, TEDxFiDiWomen, “Violence against women — it’s a men’s issue”

Lera Boroditsky, TED2018, “How language shapes the way we think”

If you found this article worth reading and (not yet) feel like getting a paid subscription, you can always treat me to a cappuccino!

OK, I'll buy you a cappuccino!

1 Julia Penelope, Speaking Freely: Unlearning the Lies of the Fathers’ Tongues (1990).

2 The grammar of non-agency thus describes the full range of linguistic mechanisms by which the capacity to act [= someone doing something] disappears from a sentence.

3 In an active sentence, the grammatical subject is the acting person: The motorist hit the cyclist. The order is logical and transparent — who did what to whom. In a passive sentence, the object is moved to the front while the acting person is pushed to the back or disappears from the sentence entirely: The cyclist was hit by the motorist, or further still: The cyclist was hit. In English, the passive is formed with a form of to be plus a past participle. Passive sentences are not inherently wrong: sometimes the acting person is unknown, unimportant, or the emphasis is deliberately on what happened to someone. But as this article shows, the choice between active and passive always affects who is visible and who is not — and therefore who we hold responsible.

4 I am curious whether anyone can show me an example of ‘Motorist hits cyclist’ in a newspaper or on a news website.

5 Another journalist well worth following is Fréderike Geerdink. Her essay “All Journalism Is Activism” is highly recommended.

6 “Plundered” is not rhetorical exaggeration; it describes an economic model of exploitation deliberately designed to channel wealth from the colony to the mother country, at the expense of the local population.

7 Compare this with how those same media report on violence from the Palestinian side: Hamas killed, Hamas fired, Hamas abducted. Always an acting subject. Always a perpetrator in the sentence. The asymmetry is systematic and consistent — and that is no coincidence, because coincidence does not produce patterns that hold for decades. Language does something here that goes beyond concealing agency. It dehumanises in two ways simultaneously. Palestinian deaths fall — a verb without a cause, without a responsible party, almost meteorological. Palestinian survivors shelter, flee, are struck — passive, motionless, objects of forces greater than themselves. They are never the subject of their own history. They endure it. This is precisely what Penelope described: the grammatical promotion that is in fact a trap. Gaza “experiences a conflict.” Gazans “are displaced.” They have been given a label — refugee, victim, human shield — while the acting party that made them so has been pushed ever further to the edge of the sentence, and ultimately disappeared from it altogether.

8 Grammar is the system of rules and principles for writing, speaking and understanding a language.

This article is part of “The Polyvagal World” on RelaxMore.net and is intended as an accessible starting point for anyone who is new to polyvagal theory. Additional articles on RelaxMore.net and in the Relaxicon explore specific themes such as neuroception, co-regulation, and fawning in greater depth. Questions are welcome in the comments.

Introduction

Polyvagal theory is about the communication between the brain and the body. It describes how internal and external signals—largely outside our conscious awareness—influence our sense of safety and guide our behavior. The theory offers insight into the intelligence of our evolutionary heritage: over millions of years, that heritage has shaped our nervous system with one purpose in mind: to protect us and enable us to function optimally within our environment.

The theory touches on several disciplines at once: psychology, physiology, evolutionary biology, and neurology. This synthesis sometimes complicates it, but also especially valuable—it connects what mainstream medicine still too often treats in isolation.

Are you a therapist or healthcare provider interested in this material?

I have developed a two-day training program (in Dutch): “Polyvagal Theory and Trauma Responses” — in-depth theory with practical application.

Check deze training

The Science of the Feeling of Connection and Safety

It is remarkable that William James already sensed in 1914 how decisive our nervous system is for our well-being. Exactly eighty years later, Stephen Porges gave this scientific grounding in polyvagal theory. Safety—or rather, the inner experience of safety—plays a central role:

What Is Polyvagal Theory About?

The autonomic nervous system—the part that unconsciously regulates all kinds of bodily functions—turns out to be more than just a control system for our physiology. It also contains the core structures that allow us to experience safety or threat. Polyvagal theory describes what one might call the language of our autonomic nervous system.

Professor of psychiatry and neuroscientist Stephen Porges published the theory in 1994. He shows how the evolution of our autonomic nervous system explains why we respond to stress, threat, and social contact the way we do. In doing so, he draws connections between autonomic dysregulation and a broad range of physical and mental complaints.

Polyvagal theory is increasingly concerned with connection and love: with the factors that make connection possible, and with what happens when that connection is absent. In this way, it also offers guidance for broader social questions: how do we make the world a safer place?

Polyvagal theory is about how our body responds to the various challenges of life. These responses are rooted in the evolution of our autonomic nervous system. Throughout our evolutionary history as vertebrates, that autonomic nervous system has gradually changed. In the process, new pathways or circuits have emerged. These circuits function in a hierarchy; the newer circuits inhibit the older ones. Those older circuits are the defense or protection circuits. In medicine and various therapies, we are now gaining greater insight into the role that a dysregulated autonomic nervous system plays in many diseases, especially chronic ones. The autonomic nervous system also exerts a significant influence on mental health.

A poorly regulated autonomic nervous system—in other words, one that is dysregulated, or out of balance—may, according to polyvagal theory (PVT), help explain several gastrointestinal complaints (including constipation, irritable bowel syndrome, and spastic colon), most post-traumatic symptoms, sensory hypersensitivity, and some features associated with autistic traits.

What is particularly valuable about Porges’ work is that he not only developed a theory but also foresaw its practical implications. He proposes alternative, more body-oriented treatment options, which have already produced good results. Recently, Porges has devoted increasing attention in his work to the practical implications of polyvagal theory.

Polyvagal theory is increasingly about love and connection. The theory sheds light on the factors that make connection possible, but also on the factors that play a role when we miss or lose connection. Through this new science, we can learn what in our society will help make the world a more loving place.

What Does ‘Polyvagal’ Mean?

Poly means ‘multiple’; vagal refers to the vagus nerve, one of the most important cranial nerves in our body. Polyvagal therefore, means ‘multiple vagal pathways.’ The impression may arise that the theory is only about the vagus nerve, but that is not the case. Four other cranial nerves also play a role, and the theory describes the entire autonomic nervous system as an integrated whole.

How Does Polyvagal Theory Stand Scientifically?

Polyvagal theory has found broad acceptance in clinical practice—in trauma care, body-oriented therapy, and developmental psychology. Pioneers such as Peter Levine (Somatic Experiencing®), Bessel van der Kolk, and Pat Ogden recognized in Porges’ work the neurobiological explanation they had been searching for—the one that confirmed what they had been observing in the treatment room for years: the path to trauma healing runs through the body.

At the same time, there is scientific debate. The most prominent criticism comes from researchers Grossman and Taylor, who raised questions about a number of anatomical and evolutionary details of the theory—particularly regarding the interpretation of the vagus nerve and the evolutionary ordering of vagal circuits. Porges has responded to this criticism and refined parts of his formulation. That debate is not fully closed, and rightly so: this is how science works.

The core of polyvagal theory—that our autonomic nervous system operates within a hierarchy of survival circuits and that safety is the foundation for connection and recovery—stands firm as a clinical explanatory model and continues to be substantiated. Elsewhere on this website I discuss the scientific debate in greater depth; the website of the Polyvagal Institute (and here the Dutch foundation) is also worth following in this context.

The Three Pillars of Polyvagal Theory

Polyvagal theory rests on three interconnected insights. In most accounts, these pillars are listed in the same order: (1) Autonomic Hierarchy, (2) Neuroception, and (3) Co-regulation.

The first pillar receives the most attention in the literature, but that is not, in my view, a reason to describe it first in this overview. I now prefer a ‘chronological sequence’: what happens, step by step, in real life? That gives a different order:

1. Neuroception (the scanning process that sets everything in motion), and then, on the basis of that scanning, the regulation of the…

2. Autonomic hierarchy.

3. Co-regulation comes third, though it remains a somewhat tricky concept wherever you place it.

Ordinarily, a paywall would appear here — but because I consider this an important article for anyone with an interest in polyvagal theory, I have removed the paywall for this article.

Pillar 1: Neuroception — Our Unconscious Safety Radar

Our nervous system continuously scans the environment, our body, and the relational field for signals of safety or threat. This happens at lightning speed, automatically, and entirely outside our conscious awareness. Porges calls this process neuroception: the neural detection of safety, danger, or life threat.

Neuroception differs from perception. Perception is conscious awareness; neuroception is a deeper, older system that responds before the cerebral cortex has processed the information. This explains why we sometimes feel tense in a situation that ‘objectively’ seems safe or why we relax while others remain worried: our neuroception is responding to subtle signals we do not consciously notice.

The Three Information Channels of Neuroception

Neuroception draws on three streams of information to determine whether the current place and moment are safe or whether there is danger or life threat:

• External signals: environmental sounds, light intensity, spatial openness or enclosure, the familiarity of a place, and all other information coming in through the senses.

• Internal signals: muscle tension, heart rate, breathing, gut feelings, pain, fatigue, nausea, temperature sensation, hunger, thirst—in short, everything that arrives via interoception (the ‘inner senses’).

In people with a chronic condition, this channel is especially relevant and often especially problematic: the body continuously sends signals of unsafety or threat—pain, exhaustion, discomfort—causing neuroception to be structurally colored toward danger, even when no external threat is present. This explains why chronic pain and fatigue are so closely intertwined with autonomic dysregulation.

• Relational signals: these are signals that come directly from the nervous system of another person—tone and quality of voice, facial expression and eye contact, body posture and movement, and the quality of touch. It is not the environment or context as such, but what the other body radiates and what our nervous system picks up from it, before we do anything consciously with it.

Based on this scanning process—which takes place around the clock, using ancient brain structures in the brainstem and surrounding subcortical areas to analyze the incoming information from all three streams — the nervous system determines which autonomic state (Pillar 2) is appropriate, and automatically ‘switches’ to it. We do not choose this; our body does it for us.

Where our consciousness enters the picture is when we notice that our autonomic state has changed—for example, that our heart rate has gone up or that we feel more or less tense.

When Neuroception Makes ‘Mistakes’

We are all generally born with a reasonably well-calibrated neuroception. Our neuroception is ‘trained’ by the experiences we go through and can become dysregulated in the process. In people with a trauma history, neuroception may detect danger where none exists, or miss genuine threat signals. A relatively neutral remark from a colleague is experienced as an attack; a crowded room triggers panic; intimate contact feels unsafe. This is not a conscious choice or ‘overreacting’; it is a nervous system that has learned to be extra vigilant.

In people who experienced severe stress very early in life—for example, a premature birth, medical interventions as a newborn, or even significant stress in the womb — neuroception may be calibrated toward threat from very early on. In my articles on GHIA, I write more about this.

These insights have major consequences for how we relate to people who react strongly to situations that seem neutral to us. The question should not be ‘Why is he or she making such a fuss?’ but rather ‘What is this person’s nervous system detecting that mine is not?’ or perhaps even better, ‘What have you been through?’

Our neuroception does not make mistakes; it has been calibrated based on our experiences. Its intention has always been, and still is, to help us survive in a way that costs as little energy as possible.

Pillar 2: The Evolutionarily Shaped Autonomic Hierarchy

Now that we understand how the nervous system scans the environment (neuroception) — and how this forms the basis for regulating autonomic state—let us look at what the available options actually are.

Polyvagal theory describes that we humans share the same survival strategies as other mammals. When we feel safe, we are more inclined to seek connection with one another. This happens via the so-called ventral vagal circuits. One might also call this the ‘connection system’. In this state, we are able to feel compassion, comfort others, and behave in a friendly and understanding way. We feel more caringly connected to ourselves, and we are able to learn.

When neuroception detects a threat, a number of responses become available. These are often presented as a predictable, stepwise sequence of responses. Reality is somewhat less linear, but for now we will use the standard sequence.

First, we try to resolve a threatening situation by establishing a social connection. We ask for help or offer to help. The connection system is further activated. If this does not lead to a restoration of safety and connectedness, we then automatically engage our sympathetic nervous system (the action system) to flee from or fight against the source of threat. Fight and flight sometimes occur literally, but today more often figuratively—for example, raising one’s voice or blaming others (fight) or changing the subject or acting very busy (flight).

If activating the action system does not produce the desired effect, we ultimately fall back on the dorsal vagal circuits (let us call this the rest-and-withdrawal system), which immobilizes us in a freeze response. In this state, we feel helpless, powerless, and shut down.

Polyvagal theory thus describes three levels for dealing with stress and threat: three hierarchically organized subsystems of the autonomic nervous system.

The confusion often lies in the word hierarchical. The hierarchy is not so much about which state is activated after which; rather, it refers to evolutionary age and the fact that ‘newer’ systems inhibit the ‘older’ ones. In evolutionary terms, the rest-and-withdrawal system is the oldest, followed by the action system, with the connection system being the most recent.

We use our higher, newer brain structures to inhibit our older defense systems when there is no danger. An evolutionarily determined hierarchy—or, in more formal language, a phylogenetic ordering (i.e., the developmental history of a species).

Summary

For clarity, the following sequence is useful:

• In safety, or when safety is in question: seeking contact and social connection via the connection system. If that is not sufficient…

• When there is danger or apparent danger, switching to mobilization—the action system activates via the fight-and-flight response. If that also fails…

• Then there is apparently a life threat: a response of immobilization or freezing arises via the rest-and-withdrawal system.

This sequence suggests too rigid an order; for sensitive readers, a value judgment may also seem implicit—as if having the connection system activated is somehow better than having one of the other two active. The sequence fits with the concept of an autonomic ladder, an image widely used to explain polyvagal theory and one that has been very helpful but for which we now have better alternatives.

As we already concluded in the section on neuroception, the goal of the whole process is to ensure our survival. There are therefore no ‘wrong’ autonomic states; they are all adaptive—a response to the situation as neuroception has interpreted it.

Not Only in the Face of Threat

These systems do not only activate in response to stress and threat; they are also active in daily life. Our autonomic nervous system is always ‘on,’ 24 hours a day. Even when we experience no threat, the three systems are active in some combination. When exercising, the action system is active—but without threat being present; when meditating, the rest-and-withdrawal system comes to the foreground—again, without threat. This is an important addition that polyvagal theory has contributed.

Mixed States

Another aspect of autonomic regulation is that the three systems do not switch on and off like light switches but shift gradually. For this reason I have moved away from the ladder metaphor and developed an autonomic mixing panel.

This yields an even more nuanced picture of how the three systems work together and allows us to name states in which two systems are simultaneously in the foreground. When you are sitting with your partner on the sofa, for example, the chances are that both your connection system and your rest-and-withdrawal system are active. Often during exercise, not only the action system is running, but the connection system is also engaged. There are countless examples of how the autonomic mixing panel might be set at any given moment.

In recent years, considerable attention has also been paid to the concepts of fawning and please-and-appease—both of which are also examples of mixed states.

In this picture, neuroception is the hand that operates the mixing panel:

Free Choice?

No one consciously chooses to enter a fight-or-flight response or to freeze. Many survivors of violence or abuse carry feelings of guilt about not having resisted or having resisted less than they feel they should have. The response to life-threatening events, however, is not a voluntary choice; our body makes that choice based on neuroception.

In polyvagal theory, there is no such thing as a bad response—there are only adaptive survival responses.

No Fixed Sequence

Which autonomic state is activated in a given situation—whether safe or threatening—and how it is expressed differs from person to person. The evolutionary hierarchy is fixed; the three systems have developed in the sequence described. But the hierarchy does not mean that you always move from the connection system to the action system; this ‘phase’ can be skipped entirely, and someone may shift directly into the rest-and-withdrawal system.

Earlier experiences can cause the connection system to be less developed or to become depleted quickly, so that even a mild threat leads someone to slide into action or withdrawal. A very severe situation may also mean that the connection system is not further activated; after all, there is no point in seeking help when your house is on fire—you need to run (action system → flight).

Structures Involved

Central to all of this is the evolution of several cranial nerves, with the vagus nerve playing the most prominent role. You can read a great deal about this same vagus nerve these days on so-called social platforms. In addition to the vagus, four other cranial nerves play a role in the polyvagal story. And from there, the whole body, the entire hormonal system, and the entire metabolism are involved.

Pillar 3: Co-Regulation—Regulating Together

Our nervous system is not a solo performer. As mammals, we are naturally oriented toward connection with others, and that connection has a direct physiological effect. The presence of a calm, safe other person literally calms our nervous system—and when we are in a calm state ourselves, we can help others calm down too. This is what we call co-regulation: the mutual influence of nervous systems on one another.

How Does Co-Regulation Work?

The ventral vagal circuit (the connection system)—the evolutionarily newest and most developed part of our autonomic nervous system—is neurally connected to the muscles of the face, voice, and head. This connection enables social communication: a soft voice, an open facial expression, gentle eye contact. Through these channels, our nervous system constantly ‘reads’ the state of the other person’s nervous system.

A calm therapist, an attentive parent, a settled friend—their regulated nervous system functions as an external regulator for ours. This is not a metaphor or poetry. It is neurobiology.

Co-Regulation in Practice

The concept of co-regulation is helpful in explaining how and why young children develop their nervous system in the context of a caregiver and why early attachment is so important.

We also know that the therapeutic relationship can itself be healing, independent of the method the therapist uses; in this sense, the therapist ‘does’ something simply by being present. Most people have experienced, at some point, how someone in crisis can be calmed simply by being fully present—and conversely, how someone in panic is not helped by a loved one who also falls into panic. In groups, the dynamic can be powerful in both directions: co-regulating as well as destabilizing.

To make optimal use of co-regulation, it is important that professionals themselves have a well-regulated autonomic nervous system and can remain regulated even when their client is not.

Co-regulation is listed here as the third pillar, but you may well understand by now that its effect becomes visible through neuroception in an autonomic state. Co-regulation could therefore also be placed first in the sequence! Polyvagal theory is describing a genuinely dynamic system.

Self-Regulation as a Complement

If you learned to co-regulate well as a child, the capacity for self-regulation develops. Techniques such as mindfulness, breathing exercises, Tai Chi, and Qigong help calm the nervous system from within.

Why Is Polyvagal Theory Important?

The theory does not only offer an explanation for what happens in the nervous system—it also has direct implications for how we relate to people, to complaints, and to recovery.

Education and Child-Rearing

A safe environment is not a luxury; it is the physiological prerequisite for learning and development. A nervous system operating in defense mode—with the connection system less active—cannot learn optimally. Children who grow up in unsafety develop a nervous system that is constantly on alert. The consequences are measurable well into adulthood, as extensively demonstrated by research into Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACE).

For the (Psycho)Therapeutic Practice

Polyvagal theory shifts the therapeutic gaze from ‘What is wrong with this person?’ to ‘What survival response has this nervous system learned?’ That is an important and less stigmatizing perspective. Body-oriented therapies such as Somatic Experiencing® work directly with autonomic state, far less through talking and cognitive processing.

For the Professional Themselves

Co-regulation makes clear that a professional does not only apply techniques, but is present with their own nervous system. A regulated professional offers a regulated space. This may well be the most active ingredient of any therapy or coaching session. As Stephen Porges said:

For Medication and Treatment Choices

Insight into autonomic dysregulation helps explain why certain treatment methods work and others do not. It also offers entry points for new interventions—from HRV biofeedback to voice use, from group therapy to body work.

For Society

At the societal level, polyvagal theory asks: which environments create safety, and which create chronic threat? This touches on architecture, policy, healthcare, and education — everywhere that people live and work together.

For each of these points, articles will be appearing on this website in the coming period—stay tuned!

Subscribe now

Implications of Polyvagal Theory

When Porges published polyvagal theory in 1994, he did not yet anticipate that pioneers such as Peter Levine (founder of the body-oriented trauma therapy Somatic Experiencing®) and Bessel van der Kolk (professor of psychiatry specializing in post-traumatic stress disorders) would take such a keen interest in his work.

Porges had not yet interpreted immobilization as a defense strategy in animals as a potentially traumatic response in human beings. But his theory finally explained what Levine, Van der Kolk, Ogden, and a number of other body-oriented pioneers had known for so long: the path to trauma healing runs through the body. This is how the sense of safety can be trained and restored.

We are, and will remain, both human beings and mammals—and for our survival, we need relationships and interaction with others. These are, for many people, the most challenging areas of life, and here lie clear links with themes such as attachment, intimacy, love, and friendship.

Video?

This wonderful short film with Dutch subtitles offers a clear and accessible explanation of the entire polyvagal theory.

If you have questions after reading this article, please post them in the comments below so that others may benefit from your question too.

Subscribe now

If you found this article worth reading and (not yet) feel like getting a paid subscription, you can always treat me to a cappuccino!

OK, I'll buy you a cappuccino!

I remember an afternoon when I came home from a bike ride in the rain. Not a dreary drizzle, but a real, solid downpour—the kind that soaks your clothes through and through and seems to rinse your thoughts clean at the same time. I stepped inside, changed, made coffee, and noticed something I found hard to name: I felt present. Not relieved to be indoors or sad that the ride was over, but simply present. Fully in the here and now.

It didn’t last long—a moment later I had picked up my phone, was typing a message, and was thinking about tomorrow. But for those few minutes, I had tasted something. I recognized what Matthieu Ricard describes as equanimity.

Before I read how Matthieu Ricard describes equanimity, it had always struck me as a slightly cold word. Equanimity sounds like “no emotions”—a certain greyness of experience, like a painting from which all the colors have been washed away. But that is precisely what it is not. The mountain does not stand motionless because it feels nothing or because it can switch off its feelings; it stands motionless because it is large enough to carry everything that passes without being blown over by it. The storm rages around it. The mountain is fully present within it—it feels the wind, and it is soaked by the rain. It does not lose itself in any of it and trusts completely that it will not be swept away.

“Happy for no reason”

Ricard writes that true equanimity is accompanied by inner joy. That gave me pause for a while. How can something that appears so still and motionless go hand in hand with joy? And yet it makes sense when you sit with it or when you have experienced it during meditation. The joy he means is not the exuberance of someone who has just received good news or the relief you sometimes feel after a tense moment. It is simply there. Always, really. Like light is simply there—without a reason to shine, but because it is the nature of light to shine.

Longing

I speak with many people about various forms of stress and its effects on their lives—and often about the physical symptoms that come with it. About the feeling of constantly having to balance on one foot, about how hard it is to relax without immediately feeling that you are completely falling apart or missing something important, or about the lack of understanding from those around them. Very often we arrive at a deeper longing—a wish for the stillness of doing nothing, for not having to be reactive, for a solid unperturbability, regardless of what is happening around you.

I think that longing is profoundly human. We have always searched for words for it: serenity, equanimity, inner peace—and so, too, composure. Ricard uses the metaphor of the mountain, and I find it very apt, because a mountain is nothing ethereal or elevated; it is earthy, heavy, and present. Perhaps there is something in that: equanimity has nothing of fleeing into abstraction or vagueness. It is, on the contrary, a radical being present—with both feet on the ground—while the world around you is in constant motion.

Simply be present for a moment

I sometimes think this is where meditative practice—in whatever form—ultimately moves toward. Not toward a state of lofty calm that separates you from the world. No, much more toward the freedom to stand right in the middle of it without being constantly swept along by the waves. There is something in you that does not sway with the tide. And from that place, you can be engaged with the world.

On that rainy afternoon, with my hands wrapped around a lovely cup of coffee, I was that, for a moment. Not enlightened, not freed from worries, and no different from my usual self. For a moment I was not pulled along by the current of the next thing and the thing after that, by the noise of the day. Just be present for a moment—like a mountain that lets the rain fall upon it without asking “why” or even “why me.”

And you?

Do you recognize moments in your life when you experience, perhaps just briefly, something of that mountain-like quality? Moments when you are not blown over, not swept away, but simply remain present? What makes those moments possible? And what pulls you out of them again?

If you found this article worth reading and (not yet) feel like getting a paid subscription, you can always treat me to a cappuccino!

OK, I'll buy you a cappuccino!

Introduction

For decades I have been fascinated by “how things work.” By “things” I mean above all our body, our brain, and our nervous system—but pursuing that curiosity quickly leads to the question of how all of this came to be1. From there it is only a small step to evolutionary theory, the emergence of the human sciences, and, from there, Buddhist philosophy and psychology.

Over the years I have collected and studied a fair amount of reading material on these themes2, but also on science in general. What struck me repeatedly while reading about scientific developments was how painfully slow the acceptance of new insights can be—especially when those insights connect different disciplines or domains.

In the current wave of negativity surrounding the polyvagal theory I see a parallel, and that is why I felt it was time to examine and write an essay about a number of past scientific discoveries and their journey toward acceptance. What can these stories teach us about how science deals with criticism3?

A scientist who poisoned himself

In 1984, the Australian physician Barry Marshall did something his colleagues considered completely insane. He took a petri dish in which he had cultured a bacterium, mixed the contents with a small amount of liquid, and drank it. Not just any bacterium, but a micro-organism he claimed caused stomach ulcers.

The medical establishment at the time was absolutely convinced of its wisdom: stomach ulcers were caused by stress, too much coffee, spicy food, and a hectic lifestyle. Everyone knew that. Treatment consisted of sedatives, antacids, and advice to slow down. That a bacterium might cause stomach ulcers? Impossible. The stomach was far too acidic for bacteria to survive in. That was basic biology, and Marshall apparently was not clever enough to grasp it.

A few days after his self-experiment, Marshall began to feel terrible. He suffered from bloating, his breath became foul, and he was vomiting in the mornings. When he underwent an endoscopy, his stomach lining was found to be severely inflamed. The bacterium he had swallowed—later named Helicobacter pylori—had struck. Marshall had proved what he set out to prove: this bacterium caused inflammation of the stomach lining, and from that inflammation a peptic ulcer could develop.

It would take nearly ten more years before the medical world took him seriously. In 1994, a major conference in the United States finally concluded that he was right: stomach ulcers were indeed caused by a bacterium, and they could be cured with antibiotics. In 2005, Marshall and his colleague Robin Warren received the Nobel Prize for their discovery.

Why did it take so long? Why did a scientist have to literally make himself ill to be heard? And why is this pattern—a scientist discovers something, is ridiculed, and years later is vindicated—so persistently recurring throughout history?

The man who moved continents

If you look at a world map, you notice something remarkable. The eastern coastline of South America fits suspiciously well into the western coastline of Africa—as if someone had pulled two puzzle pieces apart. German scientist Alfred Wegener made the same observation in 1912, but he went further than merely looking. He gathered evidence from several corners of science.

Wegener was, in fact, a meteorologist, someone whose work concerned weather and climate, but his interests were broad. Reading articles on fossils, he encountered something puzzling: the same ancient plant and animal species were found in both South America and Africa. How was that possible? Those creatures could not have swum across the ocean. Traces of ancient glaciers appeared in places that are now tropically warm. And rock formations on either side of the ocean resembled each other strikingly.

Wegener conceived an explanation that at the time seemed utterly nonsensical: the continents had once been joined. He called this supercontinent Pangaea, meaning “all lands.” Roughly 300 million years ago, this mega-continent had broken apart, and ever since, the various pieces had been drifting slowly away from each other. South America and Africa had literally drifted apart.

The geological community’s reaction was devastating. Wegener was not a real geologist—what could he possibly know about it? Moreover, he could not explain how continents might move across the hard ocean floor. The prominent British geophysicist Harold Jeffreys calculated that it was physically impossible. The forces Wegener proposed—a kind of pull from the Earth’s rotation—were far too weak to displace enormous landmasses.

At a 1926 conference in New York, Wegener was publicly ridiculed. Speakers were sarcastic and sometimes outright insulting. A geologist who later recalled that period said, “I once asked one of my professors why he never spoke about continental drift. He answered scornfully that he might consider it if I could prove that a force existed capable of moving continents. The idea was complete nonsense, I was told.”

Wegener died in 1930 during an expedition in Greenland, aged fifty. He never knew he was right. It would be until the 1960s before his ideas were taken seriously.

In the 1950s, an American cartographer, Marie Tharp, began working with data from the ocean floor. Tharp was not permitted to join the research ships herself—women were not welcome on board—so she worked in the office with the measurements sent back from sea. From those dry numbers she constructed detailed maps of what lay beneath the water.

There she discovered something remarkable: running straight through the Atlantic Ocean was an enormous mountain range, the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. More striking still was a deep cleft running along the center of that range, a rift valley. When she told her colleague Bruce Heezen, he was skeptical—it seemed as though she wanted to breathe new life into Wegener’s old fantasies. But Tharp was right.

That mountain range turned out to be the place where new ocean floor was being created. Molten rock welled up, solidified, and pushed the older ocean floor aside. Other scientists found magnetic patterns in the rocks that confirmed it. Gradually the realization grew: the ocean floor is continuously renewed. New crust appears along underwater mountain ridges; old crust disappears into deep trenches. And those moving plates carry the continents with them.

By the mid-1960s, plate tectonics—the refined version of Wegener’s continental drift—was generally accepted. But Wegener himself had died thirty years earlier, ignored and mocked by the scientific establishment. And Marie Tharp, whose maps had provided the crucial evidence, received recognition only decades later. Her name was often absent from the publications her work had underpinned.

Darwin and the earth that was too young

Charles Darwin wrote his famous book On the Origin of Species in the two decades before its publication in 1859. The idea was simple yet revolutionary: species change over time. Through natural selection, better-adapted variants survive and pass their traits on to their offspring. Over millions of years, this leads to enormous diversity and the emergence of new species.

Within twenty years, most scientists were convinced that evolution was a fact4. Species had not been created in immutable form but developed over time. Yet there was one colossal problem to which Darwin had no answer: the time required.

William Thomson (later Lord Kelvin), one of the most respected physicists of his era, had calculated the age of the Earth. Starting from a molten fireball that gradually cooled, he concluded the Earth was between 24 and 400 million years old. That sounds impressively ancient—certainly far older than biblical accounts suggest—yet it was far too short for Darwin’s gradual evolution. Darwin needed billions of years, not millions.

Darwin was keenly aware of the problem. In 1869 he wrote to his colleague Alfred Wallace, “Thomson’s views on the recent age of the world have been one of my sorest troubles.” He believed he was right but could not substantiate it with hard figures.

There were further difficulties. How were traits passed from parents to children? Darwin did not know. Genetics did not yet exist5. There were also great gaps in the fossil record. Where were all the transitional forms? Critics such as the engineer Fleeming Jenkin argued that variations had a natural ceiling: you could selectively breed larger cattle, but growth eventually stopped. How then could you move from one species to an entirely different one?

Interestingly, biologists did accept evolution, but often not Darwin’s mechanism of natural selection. In France, Lamarck’s theory remained more popular well into the twentieth century. Lamarck held that organisms passed on traits acquired during their lifetime to their offspring: a giraffe that repeatedly stretched its neck to reach the highest leaves would produce offspring with longer necks. This theory also sat more comfortably with the moral climate of the time—you could improve yourself, and that improvement would be inherited.

The breakthrough came only in the 1930s: the integration of Mendelian genetics with Darwinian natural selection. The discovery of mutations and heredity via genes solved the problem of inheritance. Radioactive dating showed that the Earth was billions, not millions, of years old. Lord Kelvin had simply not accounted for radioactivity, a phenomenon unknown in his day6. The “Modern Synthesis,” or Neo-Darwinism, integrated genetics with evolutionary theory. Only then—seventy years after Darwin’s publication—was natural selection fully accepted.

Germs in a world of miasmas

Well into the nineteenth century, physicians and scientists believed that diseases were caused by “miasmas.” Miasma comes from Greek and literally means “pollution” or “contamination.” A kind of toxic vapor, it was thought, rose from rotting material. If you came near sewers, swamps, or corpses, you inhaled that poisonous air and fell ill7. The Black Death, the plague that killed millions across Europe, was explained by such noxious emanations.

Against that backdrop, in the 1860s a French chemist named Louis Pasteur proposed a radical theory. Diseases were not caused by bad air but by microscopically small organisms: bacteria. These germs were so tiny they could only be seen through a microscope, yet they were everywhere8. And when they entered the body, they could cause illness.

The resistance was immense. Rudolf Virchow, a celebrated German pathologist, mocked Pasteur. He is said to have declared that he had never looked through a microscope and had no intention of doing so. His argument against germ theory sounded logical: “If microbes were responsible for diseases, and they are everywhere, we would all be ill.” What Virchow did not understand was that the immune system can fight off most germs and that disease results only under specific circumstances.

Across Europe and also in the United States, Pasteur’s theory was vigorously contested by medical professionals who did not want to accept the change. This was a fundamental shift in how medicine was practiced. If diseases came from germs, then instruments had to be sterilized, hands had to be washed, and patients had to be isolated—a completely unique proposition from simply ensuring fresh air.

Pasteur himself was not a physician but a chemist. He had begun by studying wine fermentation and discovered that micro-organisms were responsible for the process. He then applied that knowledge to diseases in silkworms and later to infectious diseases in humans and animals. He was, in short, an outsider to medicine who solved a medical problem from an entirely different discipline.

Other scientists added pieces to the puzzle. The Hungarian physician Ignaz Semmelweis showed that puerperal fever occurred far less often when doctors washed their hands. The English physician John Snow traced a cholera outbreak in London to a specific water pump contaminated with sewage. The English surgeon Joseph Lister began sterilizing instruments with carbolic acid, and suddenly far more patients survived operations.

By the end of the nineteenth century, most scientists were convinced. The German physician Robert Koch formulated criteria in 1884 for establishing whether a specific bacterium causes a specific disease. He identified the bacteria responsible for anthrax, tuberculosis, and cholera. Germ theory became a cornerstone of modern medicine. The journey from miasmas to microbes had taken roughly thirty years—thirty years during which physicians like Semmelweis suffered mental breakdowns because no one believed them, patients died of infections that could have been prevented, and a new truth fought against old certainties.

Proteins that cause infection

In 1982 neurologist Stanley Prusiner made a claim that overturned much of what biologists and physicians knew about infection. He had isolated the infectious agent responsible for scrapie, a disease in sheep. It turned out to be neither a virus nor a bacterium. It was a protein—an ordinary protein, without DNA or RNA.

That was impossible. The central dogma of molecular biology states that information flows from DNA to RNA to protein. That is how organisms reproduce, how life “works.” A protein without genetic material that can replicate itself? This contradicted everything that was known.

Prusiner named this infectious protein a “prion,” derived from “proteinaceous infectious particle.” His idea was that a normal protein found in everyone’s body sometimes assumes the wrong shape. That misfolded form is stable and can force other, normal proteins to adopt the same wrong shape—a kind of domino effect. These misfolded proteins accumulate in the brain and cause fatal diseases such as BSE (mad cow disease) and, in humans, variant Creutzfeldt–Jakob disease.

The scientific world reacted with enormous skepticism. Prusiner was contradicted and ridiculed. For two decades he endured the mockery of his colleagues. Even prominent scientists such as David Baltimore, himself a Nobel laureate, were among the doubters. Some scientists persisted in claiming that an undiscovered virus must be involved. A protein alone simply could not transmit disease.

But Prusiner held on. He identified the specific protein and demonstrated that it occurred in two forms: a normal variant present in everyone and a disease-causing form folded differently. He conducted experiments showing that prions were resistant to treatments that normally kill viruses and bacteria—such as radiation that damages DNA—indicating that this was not a virus but a protein, albeit one extraordinarily stably folded and resistant to most methods that ordinarily break proteins down.

In the 1990s the BSE epidemic broke out in Great Britain. Thousands of cattle fell ill and had to be destroyed. Worse still, people who had eaten infected meat developed a variant of Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease. Suddenly this was no longer a theoretical discussion but a real public health emergency.

The tide turned. More and more scientists concluded that Prusiner might well be right. In 1997, fifteen years after his first publication, he received the Nobel Prize.

What these stories share

When you place all these examples side by side, several patterns emerge.

First, not one of these scientists could tell the complete story at the time of their first publication. Marshall had not conducted randomized trials. Wegener did not know how continents moved. Darwin did not understand how traits were inherited. Pasteur could not yet determine which specific bacterium caused which disease. Prusiner could not explain every detail of prion replication.

Yet the absence of a complete mechanism proved to be no reason to reject the entire theory. Later research and the growth of knowledge filled the gaps. For Wegener, it was oceanography that provided the key. For Darwin it was genetics. For Pasteur it was microbiology. For Marshall it was clinical trials with antibiotics. For Prusiner it was the structural biology of proteins.

Second, all of these theories ran directly counter to established convictions. Continents did not move—everyone knew that. Species had been created immutably. Diseases came from bad air. Stomach ulcers came from stress. Infectious diseases came from viruses or bacteria, always with DNA or RNA. These ideas formed the paradigms of their time—the worldview on which scientists based their work, the firmly anchored scientific consensus.

Third, these scientists were often not taken seriously because they were “outsiders.” Wegener was a meteorologist, not a geologist. Darwin was a naturalist without a formal academic position—essentially an amateur—not an established scholar at a university. Pasteur was a chemist, not a physician. Marshall was a gastroenterologist, not a microbiologist. Prusiner was a neurologist, not a molecular biologist or biochemist. That they came from another field was used against them. They could not possibly grasp the finer points of the discipline.

But it was precisely that outsider status that gave them an advantage: they saw connections that specialists overlooked. Wegener combined geography, paleontology, and climatology. Darwin brought biology and geology together. Pasteur applied chemical knowledge to medical problems. Marshall linked clinical observations with microbiology. Prusiner united neurology and biochemistry. They looked over the fence of their discipline and saw a larger picture.

It is inevitable that you become an outsider when you publish a theory spanning multiple fields. That also explains a significant part of the fierce resistance: cross-domain theories are judged by each discipline at their weakest points.

The problem of crossing domains

That last point—the cross-disciplinary character—deserves closer examination because it explains much of the resistance.

Scientific disciplines are like countries with their language, culture, and laws, written or unwritten. Geologists employ different methods than biologists. Anatomists look at the world differently than psychologists. Every discipline has its standards for what counts as evidence, its journals, and its experts who determine what is publishable.

If you develop a theory that fits within a single field, your work is assessed by experts in that domain. They examine your methods, your data, and your reasoning. If it is sound, they accept it. If it is weak, they reject it. That system works reasonably well.

The paradox is that precisely the apparent “weakness”—not “being fully at home in a given field”—is what creates space for out-of-the-box thinking. A specialist would never ask certain questions because they do not fit within the paradigm of that field. An outsider asks exactly those uncomfortable questions.

Geologists looked at Wegener and saw the mechanism does not work; the forces are too weak. That was true. But they did not see the strength of the paleontological and climatological evidence because that was not their area of expertise.

Biologists looked at Darwin and saw the mechanism of inheritance was missing; the timescale was wrong. Also true. But they missed the geographical and anatomical patterns that Darwin found so compelling.

With Pasteur it was clinical medicine. He was not a physician; he had not treated patients. That was accurate. Medical practitioners looked down on this chemist who thought he could tell them how diseases worked. But they did not see the strength of his experimental evidence.

With Marshall it was the absence of large clinical studies. One self-experiment does not make science, critics said. Where were the randomized trials? Yet his microbiological observations were correct, and when the trials came, they confirmed his hypothesis.

With Prusiner, it was the apparent impossibility of proteins without nucleic acid. That contradicted molecular biology. Critics kept searching for hidden viruses. Yet his biochemical work was meticulous and careful.

And today? Anatomists look at the polyvagal theory and see the anatomical details do not match exactly as described. Porges suggests that different vagal systems operate independently, but anatomists observe that the nerve fibers that slow the heart originate from different nuclei in the brainstem and work together rather than as separate entities. That too may be true. But anatomists do not necessarily see the clinical value, the therapeutic applications, or the explanatory power for trauma responses—because that is not their area of expertise.

The problem is that no one surveys the complete picture. Each discipline judges the work on the aspects that concern it and that it understands. And when you work across domains, there is almost always a discipline where your work is vulnerable—perhaps because you do indeed make errors in that field, perhaps because you are not familiar with the latest insights there, or perhaps simply because you, as a generalist, do not have the depth of knowledge of a specialist.

This is why cross-disciplinary theories attract so much criticism. Every discipline sees the weak spots within its domain. And that criticism can be entirely valid. Darwin genuinely did not know genetics. Wegener genuinely lacked a mechanism. Those points of criticism were legitimate.

But what critics often miss is the synthetic power of a theory—its capacity to bring together different puzzle pieces from different fields into a new picture. That is precisely where the strength of a cross-domain theory lies, and it is precisely what specialists do not always see.

The role of time and technology

In virtually all of these examples, time played an important role. It took decades before the theories were accepted—sometimes because new generations of scientists grew up unencumbered by the old prejudices, but often because new technologies produced evidence that had previously been impossible to gather.

Wegener’s theory only gathered momentum when sonar techniques could map the ocean floor, when scientists used magnetometers to measure magnetic patterns in the seabed, and when seismographs could trace earthquakes across the globe. None of those techniques existed in Wegener’s time.

Darwin’s theory was confirmed when genetics developed, when microscopes became powerful enough to observe chromosomes, and when radioactive dating revealed the true age of the Earth. Darwin did not have those tools.

Germ theory benefited from better microscopes, from techniques for culturing bacteria, and from the discovery of viruses as microscopes grew still more powerful.

Marshall’s work was confirmed when antibiotics became available and it could be shown that stomach ulcers disappeared when the bacterium was killed.

Prusiner’s work gained support when proteins could be purified and their structure determined at a molecular level.

Occasionally an idea is simply ahead of its time. The tools to prove it do not yet exist. The framework to understand it is not yet in place. That is why a theory may have to wait decades before the rest of science catches up.

Not every criticized theory is rehabilitated

There is another important aspect that belongs in this essay. For every theory that survived criticism and was eventually accepted, many others were criticized and rightly rejected. Those stories deserve attention too, because they show that criticism can have good reason.

Consider the phlogiston theory of the eighteenth century. Scientists believed that combustible materials contained a substance released during burning—phlogiston. This theory had adherents for decades, was defended by prominent chemists, and seemed to offer an elegant explanation for a range of phenomena: why things burn, why fire goes out in an enclosed space, and why metals rust. But there was a problem: metals became heavier when they burned, not lighter. The theory required increasingly elaborate adjustments to explain this, such as “negative phlogiston.” In the end, Lavoisier’s oxygen theory made the entire construction superfluous.

Or consider cold fusion in 1989. Two scientists claimed to have achieved nuclear fusion at room temperature—which, if true, would have solved the energy crisis. The press was euphoric. Laboratories across the world attempted to reproduce the results. A few claimed success. But gradually it became clear that it did not work. The original experiments had rested on measurement errors and overconfidence.

Or polywater in the 1960s and ‘70s. A Russian scientist believed he had discovered a new form of water with bizarre properties. International labs studied the phenomenon; publications, conferences, and discussions followed. It turned out to be nothing more than contaminated water.

Or vitalism—the idea that living organisms contain a special “life force” that makes them fundamentally different from dead matter. Popular in the nineteenth century and enjoying considerable scientific support, vitalism was gradually undermined as biochemistry and molecular biology demonstrated that life processes are simply complex chemical reactions. No special force required.

These theories shared something with the examples that eventually proved successful: they were defended by eminent scientists, they had supporters and opponents, they attracted fierce criticism while their proponents held firm, and they promised revolutionary insights. Yet they were mistaken.

What makes the difference?

This is a meaningful question—particularly when we later look more closely at the polyvagal theory. If you are in the middle of such a scientific struggle, how do you know whether you are a Darwin or a defender of phlogiston? In hindsight it is easy to see, but during the process?

Patterns can be distinguished, though they offer no guarantees. Phlogiston required ever more complicated assumptions to explain observations. Cold fusion could not be consistently reproduced. Polywater vanished the moment more careful work was done. Vitalism became increasingly redundant as science advanced. These theories were not merely rejected because of new insights; above all, they eroded because they failed to deliver on their promises.

The theories that did survive—evolution, plate tectonics, germ theory, prions—had a different dynamic. They began rough and incomplete but became more robust as more research accumulated. They predicted things that were later confirmed. They opened fruitful lines of inquiry. They converged with evidence from an ever-growing number of disciplines, rather than diverging.

Darwin predicted transitional forms that were found decades later. Wegener’s continental drift received support from oceanography, seismology, and paleomagnetism—entirely different fields that independently arrived at the same conclusion. Pasteur’s germ theory led to antisepsis, vaccination, and antibiotics—practical applications that worked. Prusiner’s prions explained an ever-growing number of diseases as molecular biology advanced.

The difference lies not in the quantity of criticism nor in how long a theory withstands resistance. The difference lies in what happens as the investigation continues. Do the problems grow, or do they resolve? Do explanations become more complicated or simpler? Do different lines of research converge on the same conclusion or point in different directions?

For cross-domain theories, there is something more. The theories that survived—evolution, plate tectonics, and germ theory—ultimately became stronger through interdisciplinary research. Biologists collaborated with geologists, chemists with physicians, and neurologists with biochemists; the disciplines reinforced each other and filled each other’s gaps. With the theories that disappeared, such as vitalism or the ether theory, the opposite happened: as disciplines developed, they rendered the theory increasingly redundant.

This may be the most important distinction. A viable cross-domain theory builds bridges between disciplines that remain standing even as details are adjusted. It opens new fields of inquiry, poses new questions, and leads to productive collaborations. Flawed cross-domain theories merely fill temporary gaps in knowledge and disappear once those gaps are filled by other means.

But these too are criteria that can mainly be applied in retrospect. During the process itself, the distinction is often not sharp. That is precisely why scientific skepticism is so valuable: it ensures that only theories capable of withstanding continuous scrutiny survive.

The polyvagal theory in perspective

Against this background, it is interesting to look at the polyvagal theory. This theory, developed by Stephen Porges—who worked on it from the 1970s and formally introduced it in 1994—seeks to explain how our autonomic nervous system responds to safety and danger and how this influences social behavior and emotion.

The theory combines neurobiology, evolutionary biology, psychology, psychiatry, and trauma therapy. It is a cross-domain theory par excellence. And, like the historical examples, it attracts criticism from multiple directions.

Anatomists and neuroscientists point to anatomical details that do not hold up. The “ventral vagal complex,” as Porges describes it, is said not to exist as a separate anatomical entity. Claims about unique mammalian innovations in the function of the vagus nerve are disputed. The details about which fibers travel where do not always appear to match what anatomy reveals.

That criticism is important and must be taken seriously. If the anatomical foundation of a theory does not hold, that is a real problem.

Yet at the same time, therapists, psychologists, and other professionals find great value in the theory. The concepts of neuroception (the unconscious detection of safety or danger), of a hierarchy in stress responses, and of the connection between autonomic regulation and social behavior prove to be clinically very useful. Trauma treatment has been influenced by them. The understanding of autism, anxiety disorders, and PTSD has benefited from them.

A tension thus arises between science and practice. Different disciplines see different things. Anatomists see anatomical errors. Therapists see therapeutic value. Both observations can be true simultaneously.

We genuinely do not know how this story will end. The polyvagal theory is not yet complete—Porges himself does not dispute this. He is willing to adapt his theory, responds to criticism, and refines his claims. The scientific discussion is ongoing. And that is the difference from our historical examples: we look at those with the wisdom of hindsight. We know how their stories ended. With the polyvagal theory, we are still in the midst of the process.

Perhaps this theory will follow the same path as evolutionary theory and plate tectonics: a large core of truth that is initially rough and imprecise but is gradually refined and accepted. Perhaps it will emerge, fifty years hence, that Porges was essentially right, even if details had to be adjusted. The theory is already opening fruitful lines of inquiry, gaining support from multiple therapeutic traditions, and demonstrating practical value—all characteristics that the successful theories displayed as well. Perhaps a refined, more complete theory of the autonomic nervous system will be developed that integrates certain insights from Porges.

We simply do not know. The history of science does not teach us that every cross-domain theory that attracts criticism will ultimately be vindicated. It teaches us that such theories must be assessed in a particular way and that the process of acceptance or rejection can be complex and lengthy.

What we do know is that Stephen W. Porges has published more than 400 articles on the PVT9. These are not “unfounded” scientific claims. His work is a beautiful transdisciplinary synthesis, one that remains incomplete—and Porges himself is aware of that.

As Porges recently wrote10:

Polyvagal theory emerged from my efforts to bridge psychological processes and autonomic function, drawing on insights from neurophysiology, neuroanatomy, clinical medicine, and the study of brain–body connections across disciplines. Developing this theory illuminated a fundamental challenge in science today: disciplinary silos often restrict collaboration and the integration of knowledge, as specialized methods and language can inhibit the exchange of ideas. When research remains isolated, advancing collective understanding becomes more difficult. This study examines the development of PVT and articulates its core principles in light of interdisciplinary engagement—particularly with colleagues unfamiliar with the theory's foundational literature. Bridging such gaps requires not only sharing knowledge but also cultivating openness to new perspectives, intellectual flexibility, and a spirit of curiosity about ideas that challenge established assumptions.

What can we learn from this?

An important lesson seems to be that science always contains a tension between specialization and synthesis—and we need both. We need experts who know every detail of their field, who can spot errors, and who maintain standards. Without them, science would descend into speculation and fantasy.

But we also need generalists who draw connections between disciplines, who ask new questions, and who dare to think outside the box. Without them, science would become mired in ever-narrower specializations that no longer communicate with each other—leading ultimately, in the extreme case, to a specialist who knows everything about nothing.

What we see is that these two types of scientists often clash. The specialist sees the errors, the imprecisions, and the lack of depth. The generalist sees the new connections, the synthetic power, the larger picture. And both are partly right.

A second lesson is that time and patience matter. Wegener’s theory needed fifty years. Darwin’s vision needed seventy. Genuine insight and profound knowledge apparently take time. New generations must graduate without the old prejudices. New techniques must be developed. Puzzle pieces from different fields must come together.

A third lesson is that criticism is valuable, even when it ultimately proves unfounded. The criticism of Darwin forced evolutionary biologists to become better—to develop genetics to study fossil evidence more carefully. The criticism of Wegener forced geologists to investigate the ocean floor to discover mechanisms. Criticism sharpens theories, and by doing so may help them survive.

And despite all these lessons, we must be cautious with historical analogies. That Wegener was right does not mean that every scientist who attracts criticism will be vindicated. That Marshall won a Nobel Prize after years of ridicule does not mean that every rejected theory will be rehabilitated. Phlogiston, cold fusion, polywater, and vitalism remind us that criticized theories may be criticized with good reason.

A messy process

Some ideas come too early and die before their time arrives. Some scientists devote their lives to a theory that turns out to be wrong. Semmelweis ended his life in a psychiatric institution, broken because no one would take his handwashing hypothesis seriously.

Science beyond domain boundaries is not easy—neither for the theory nor for the scientist. It regularly invites criticism; it requires a particular way of evaluating, one that looks beyond the weak spots in individual fields and pays attention to the synthetic power of the whole.

But we must understand that we cannot use the past to justify the present. That Wegener was ultimately proved right says nothing about whether a current theory will be vindicated. Every theory must be judged on its merits—with nuanced criticism and attention to both weaknesses and strengths.

The stories of these scientists teach us above all: be open to new ideas, but also be critical. Do not dismiss too quickly, but do not accept too readily either. Pay attention to the criteria that distinguish successful theories from failures: convergence of evidence, predictive power, fruitful research programs, and practical applications that work. And recognize that science is a process unfolding over decades, with much uncertainty and few guarantees.

In conclusion

Can we say something meaningful about the polyvagal theory? I think so.

If we look at the criteria that distinguish successful theories from failures, we may recognize certain patterns in the polyvagal theory. It opens fruitful lines of inquiry: from the microbiome-gut-brain axis to parasympathetic biofeedback, from research into social signals to studies of body-based interventions. It is gaining support from different disciplines: not only psychotherapy, but also education, perinatal care, addiction care, and autism support are applying its insights.

There are practical applications that demonstrably work: trauma-sensitive care in hospitals and mental health settings, regulation interventions in education, and support for developmental trauma. Porges’s model serves as a physiological explanation for the success of various body-based trauma therapies, including Somatic Experiencing®.

And the theory is becoming more robust as research accumulates: Porges continues to respond to criticism and continues to publish—which is how science is supposed to work. It is precisely the pattern we saw with Darwin, Wegener, and many of the other scientists mentioned here: a rough beginning that is gradually refined, not a rigid construction that collapses at the first headwind.

The criticism that exists certainly contains elements that still need to be examined, and I will be writing about those in the period ahead. But that is, in my view, no reason to throw the baby out with the bathwater.

Something for a future essay: the manner in which the polyvagal theory is being criticized does not deserve a prize for elegance—it is more reminiscent of the heated debates of Darwin’s era than of a nuanced scientific exchange.

The question is not whether every anatomical detail is correct—Darwin did not know genetics; Wegener had no explanatory mechanism. The question is whether the theory is fruitful enough to advance our understanding and whether it brings different disciplines together in a way that proves durable. Of that I am convinced. The polyvagal theory has given me more insight into the connection between body, emotion, and behavior than any theory I have encountered in the past several decades.

Whether in fifty years Porges’s theory will look exactly as it does today? Probably not. But the same was true of Darwin’s theory of evolution.

If you found this article worth reading and (not yet) feel like getting a paid subscription, you can always treat me to a cappuccino!

OK, I'll buy you a cappuccino!

Around session four or five of the compassion training, I would often show the video below. It still moves me every single time. It is about sound and expectation—but for me it is above all about connectedness and our shared humanity, a central theme in compassion training.

In the video, Bobby McFerrin gives a whole new dimension to the phrase ‘playing the audience’… 😄 Watch and join in:

You can look at it, as usual, from multiple angles. The neurological perspective is fascinating: which neurons fire, and which brain regions are active? Interesting as that is, it is not what matters most to me. I do not feel neurons firing. I notice nothing of the activity apparently taking place in my brain.

What I do notice is this: hearing the melody brings with it a kind of recognition. It stays with you. When I show the video to people I know, they too often recognize the little tune as something like a primal melody. And what also strikes me: there is not a single wrong note. It works perfectly the first time, and it sounds relaxed.

The pentatonic scale: music everyone already knows

What McFerrin uses is the pentatonic scale: a scale with just five notes (penta = 5). That sounds simple, and in a way it is. But that simplicity is precisely its strength.

The pentatonic scale contains no so-called ‘tension’ intervals—the semitone steps that in Western music create tension and rest. As a result, pentatonic music sounds open, harmonious, and calming. There is essentially no wrong note: any combination of the five tones sounds good. Musicians sometimes call it a ‘safe’ scale.

And what is remarkable is that this scale appears in virtually every culture on earth, independently of one another. From the Scottish Highlands to Chinese classical music, from West African sounds to the blues, from Andean music to Japanese folk songs—the pentatonic scale is everywhere.

A universal musical language

How can a scale be so universal? Music scientists and cognitive researchers suggest that one possible explanation is that the pentatonic scale closely aligns with the natural overtone series—the acoustic structure that arises whenever a tone sounds. Our ears and brains are naturally sensitive to these proportions. The pentatonic scale ‘fits’, as it were, the way we humans perceive sound1.

This may also explain why children around the world spontaneously sing pentatonic melodies when they play. It is not a learned structure, but something that arises naturally. Neuropsychologist Stefan Koelsch describes it as a ‘biological priming’ for certain musical patterns—a kind of factory setting.

McFerrin demonstrates this brilliantly in his experiment. He gives the audience one note, then two, then moves to a third spot on the stage. The audience sings the next note—one they have never heard—immediately and perfectly. Not just this audience: he has done this experiment all over the world, and it always works: “Every audience gets this.”

Indigenous peoples and the power of shared sound

Anyone who listens to the music of indigenous peoples will notice something: music there is rarely an individual affair. Among the San people of the Kalahari, healing rituals are sometimes collective singing and dancing sessions lasting many hours. For Aboriginal Australians, the ‘songline’ connects generations and landscapes. In the Andes, making music and singing together is an everyday social activity.

In all these traditions, music serves a function that goes beyond entertainment: it regulates the group. It brings people into a state of shared presence. Music as social glue, as a medium for co-regulation.

It is striking that many of these traditions make use of—you guessed it—pentatonic or similarly simple tonal structures. I do not believe this is because they could not make more complex music, but rather because these sounds touch something deeper, something that does not need to be learned.

A polyvagal perspective: safety is something you can hear

Stephen Porges’ polyvagal theory offers an interesting lens through which to understand this. Our nervous system is—so the theory holds—constantly scanning for signals of safety or danger. It does this not only through sight or smell, but also through sound. Porges calls this neuroception: an unconscious scanning of the environment. Indeed, sound (‘acoustic stimuli’) appears to be of great importance for safe neuroception.

As social mammals, we are specifically sensitive to vocal signals within a particular frequency range—the range of the human voice, of what is called prosodic, melodic communication. When our nervous system picks up such sounds, it interprets them as a signal of safety. The ventral vagal system—the system that enables social connection and relaxation—comes online.

Pentatonic music fits remarkably well into this picture. The gentle, harmonious intervals, the absence of sharp dissonances, and the rhythmic and melodic character—these are precisely the features that our nervous system recognizes as ‘safe’.

And there is more. When people make music together—and especially when they sing together—not only do their voices synchronize, but also their physiology. Heart rate, breathing, and even autonomic activation move towards alignment. Co-regulation through sound. Exactly what you hear happening in that hall with McFerrin: an entire audience, without any rehearsal, creating something beautiful together and audibly enjoying it.

More than 99.99% the same

We are genetically 99.99% identical to one another. We all have a brain that works in more or less the same way. And we have, as McFerrin’s experiment suggests, perhaps also a shared musical intuition that transcends culture, language, and time.

That is a beautiful thought, and it touches on something fundamental: music is not a luxury, not a side matter. It is one of the oldest and most powerful means people have to relate to one another, to regulate together, and to signal and receive safety.

Perhaps we underestimate the importance of music for our well-being—in education, in healthcare, and in our daily lives. While the answer turns out to be simpler than we might think: five notes, a hall full of strangers, and the recognition that, deep down, we are all the same.

If you found this article worth reading and (not yet) feel like getting a paid subscription, you can always treat me to a cappuccino!

OK, I'll buy you a cappuccino!

Foreword

The article below was recently published in the Tijdschrift voor Begeleidingskunde (Journal of Guidance Studies), issued by the Dutch National Association for Supervision and Coaching (LVSC). I wrote it together with Cees van Elst.

In the course of writing the article, Cees and I decided to develop a Master Class: Polyvagal-Informed Guidance in Coaching Practice. You can read more about this on this page.

Our thanks go to the LVSC for the opportunity, and our compliments to them for their excellent and substantively rich journal—well worth reading for professional supervisors and coaches!—and to Cees for the enjoyable collaboration.

For the purposes of this English translation, we have revised and improved the original article in a number of places.

Polyvagal theory offers tools for working in a trauma-informed and process-oriented way, without taking the therapist’s seat. Coaches use knowledge of the nervous system to create a neurobiologically safe environment by centering self- and co-regulation rather than the coachee’s narrative. In this way, they naturally deal professionally with themes that involve insecurity.

The society in which we work is a performance-oriented, malleable society. The message is often, If things are not going well, something needs to be fixed (Schinkel, 2020). Pain, loss, disruption, and doubt are quickly medicalized (Trappenburg, 2021). Therapy and diagnoses are lurking, while many people do not actually need therapy but space and recognition. They are seeking a place where their experience can settle and slowly begin to move. In our practice as professional counselors, we increasingly see people who, from a medical perspective, appear to be ‘fine’ but who still do not feel free. They feel tired, tense, listless, or overwhelmed. They are not sure what is wrong, only that something appears to be wrong. And what about us as coaches or counselors? We sometimes have doubts too. Is this trauma? Is it burnout? Is it overwhelm? Should I refer them or stay? And if I stay, what can I ‘do’ with a person who is clearly not feeling well and where trauma may be playing a role?

We assume that many coaches know what to do: let them tell their story and offer ‘holding space’ in which the coachee feels safe, heard, and not judged (Plett, 2015). We assume that many coaches then also want to help coachees make sense of and fix their story. After all, that is often the request for help and the appeal: ‘Help me, I want to get rid of something; how do I do that? And where does it come from?’ In short, we start with the coachee’s story and too quickly descend into the psychological recesses of the soul, even though that is not our professional role. What if we were to involve physiology and unconscious bodily processes more consciously in our sessions?

In this article, we explore what coaches can achieve with physiological knowledge of polyvagal theory (Porges, 2011). In practice, this model has proven to be a workable framework that grounds our interventions. It has its origins in neuroscience and was initially applied mainly within trauma and psychotherapy practices (Porges, 2011; Dana, 2018). The theory provides language, insight, and scope for action in relation to what we sometimes already intuitively sense. We do not present ourselves as scientists but as practitioners. We explore how polyvagal theory can help professional counselors be present with their clients with greater confidence, gentleness, and somatic awareness. Because when viewed through a polyvagal lens, the question is not what happened, but what is happening here and now—in the body, in the space, in the relationship (Dana, 2020). The key question we are exploring is: how can a polyvagal-informed coach contribute to recovery, self-regulation, and meaningful movement—without it becoming therapy?

Polyvagal theory at a glance—a physical lens on human experience

Those who guide people always work with the body, even when the conversation remains entirely verbal. Polyvagal Theory (PVT), developed by psychologist and neuroscientist Stephen Porges (2011), offers an innovative and body-oriented perspective on how the autonomic nervous system constantly scans the world for safety and danger. More importantly, it shows how these unconscious processes determine what a person feels and thinks and how they behave. The theory does not provide counsellors with diagnoses, but rather a lens through which to understand behaviour and experience via the state of the nervous system.

Three Functional Systems

The autonomic nervous system (ANS) independently regulates those things that we do not need to use our minds for, such as body temperature, heart rate, breathing, digestion, pupil size, and other automatic processes that are vital to life. The ANS consists of the sympathetic part (activating, like a ‘gas pedal’) and the parasympathetic part (calming, like a ‘brake’). Examples include an accelerated heart rate during stress (sympathetic) and a slowed heart rate during relaxation (parasympathetic) (Bear, 2020).

Porges adds an extra layer to this in his polyvagal theory: he describes the ANS not as two, but as three functional systems that are organized hierarchically, based on evolutionary age. In response to unconscious assessments of (un)safety, the ANS shifts between three primary states (Porges, 2011; Dana, 2020):

1. Ventral vagal system: the evolutionarily youngest system, which focuses on social engagement and connection. This system becomes active when safety is experienced. People feel calm, connected, curious, and capable of social contact. In this state, they can reflect, play, learn, attune, and recover. When there is a mild threat—for example, someone looks angry after a comment—the ventral system can help prevent escalation by sending additional signals of connection and safety.

2. Sympathetic system: is older than the ventral part and comes to the fore in the event of threat or stress. The body prepares itself to fight or flee. People become alert, tense, angry, or anxious. Their focus narrows, and their connection with others diminishes. Even when safe, the sympathetic system can be activated. This creates sympathetic activation combined with connection, as we see in sports, play, and engaged work.

3. Dorsal vagal system: the oldest system. It becomes active when fighting or fleeing is no longer possible. This system switches to immobilization or freezing. People feel numb, withdrawn, powerless, or dissociative. In extreme forms, this leads to depressive or dissociative states (Dana, 2020). In safety, this system regulates our basic homeostatic processes, such as digestion and metabolism, and plays a vital role in our health.

This classification is often represented as an ‘autonomic ladder’ (Dana, 2020). We automatically move up and down this ladder continually throughout the day, depending on what the body registers as safety or threat. Although the ladder is widely used, it has shortcomings, just like any model. We have chosen to use an autonomic mixing panel as a metaphor for the three autonomic states (de Caluwé 2025).

Neuroception

The detection of safety or threat occurs outside of conscious awareness. Porges introduced the term ‘neuroception’ for this: an automatic and non-cognitive process in which the nervous system continuously scans signals from the body (interoception), the environment (exteroception) and interactions with others (co-regulation) (Porges, 2004). This process occurs in the oldest brain structures, though the exact mechanisms remain unclear. Neuroception determines whether a situation is perceived as safe or unsafe, even before thoughts or interpretations arise.

Voice use (prosody), facial expression, body posture and movement, the layout of a room (including its scent), and signals from the body can influence this assessment (Dana, 2018). You can think of neuroception as the hand that operates the autonomic mixing panel.

Our knowledge of neuroception provides coaches with a crucial tool for influencing autonomic states in their professional practice. This allows us to shift from psychological understanding to physiological comprehension.

Our bodies exist in an era for which they were not designed. Our nervous system and stress system are still the same as they were some 300,000 years ago. However, the amount of stress and stimuli has increased exponentially. Our ‘ancient’ stress system is unable to distinguish between physical danger (a sabre-toothed tiger chasing us) and psychological threat (a client sending a critical email).

A neuroception of unsafety increases the likelihood that our ventral vagus will be less active than ‘normal’—or more accurately, than what is natural and healthy. People with reduced ventral vagal tone experience diminished connection with others and have limited access to positive feelings, including (self-)compassion. Their learning ability also decreases.

Co-Regulation

Co-regulation is the effect of interpersonal interaction on the capacity to regulate one’s physiological state (bodily sensations and emotions). All relationships involving connection revolve around co-regulation. We learn to co-regulate in our early years, with the help of well-regulated parents or carers. Co-regulation is not a luxury; it is a biological requirement for our survival.

The need for human contact varies from person to person, but no one can do without it. People who claim they don’t need others likely live with a chronically activated nervous system.

As a coach or counselor, co-regulation means that you yourself serve as a regulatory instrument. Your tone, posture, speech, pace, and presence influence the state of your coachee’s nervous system and vice versa. Whether you invite connection or unintentionally evoke threat is largely registered somatically—not through rational reasoning.

If polyvagal theory can explain much of our behavior based on the functioning of the autonomic nervous system, then the theory is also relevant for coaches. For coaches, PVT-informed work means being consciously present with what emerges in the body and in the relationship, without analyzing or attempting to solve it. Because the nervous system does not want to be understood, it wants to be felt and encountered (Van der Kolk, 2014).

Example 1: Checking in

Marjan enters the practice hurriedly, her face red. “Phew, almost late,” she gasps, and sits down. “But I’m here!” She immediately begins her story about recent events. The coach notices that the coachee has clearly not yet landed (sympathetically activated) and indicates that it is important to check in first. “Breathe calmly and focus on your breathing.” Meanwhile, he counts her respiratory rate and notices it decreasing from 20 to 12 breaths per minute. He asks, “Are you more grounded now?” “Yes,” she says immediately. “Okay, Marjan, what do you want to talk about today?” Marjan immediately launches into her story.

In the above example, a lot seems to be going well. The coach notices the sympathetic activation (which was almost impossible to miss) and intervenes to help the coachee regulate so that the session time can be used effectively. However, signs suggest that Marjan remains sympathetically activated. The tone of her “Yes” is hurried, and she gets straight to the point. Activation to this degree means that the ventral part of the coachee’s autonomic nervous system may still be insufficiently active, preventing optimal connection and openness. That does not mean that the session cannot be valuable, but from a polyvagal perspective, a different start to the session would have been possible (please be patient; you are almost at example 2).

Applying polyvagal theory in a coaching session

Rather than responding immediately to the narrative content (’what happened?’), PVT invites us to first attune to the coachee’s physiological state (’what is the current setting of this person’s autonomic mixing panel?’). From this perspective, it becomes clear why one coachee talks actively and urgently (sympathetic activation), while another barely makes contact and appears absent (dorsal activation). Or why someone calms down when you, as coach, simply remain fully present without ‘doing’ anything (ventral regulation through co-regulation). What matters is that the coach offers connection without forcing the other person to connect as well. Any pressure on a trust-building process—which coaching fundamentally is—proves counterproductive. After all: if genuine trust exists, why would such pressure be needed? The coachee’s nervous system is often sensitive to this, especially in cases of trauma. The coachee might say something like, ‘I’m not very talkative today.’ However, this may be a rationalized explanation for an unsafe neuroception that arose because the coach unconsciously pressured the coachee. This can occur when the coach over-directs or absorbs the coachee’s arousal.

Slowing Down and Bearing With

The necessity of embodiment in the coach is therefore a key practical implication of PVT. In other words, as a coach, you are present not only cognitively but primarily through your body, breath, facial expressions, voice, and nervous system. You remain aware of your own state—even if slightly activated—provided you can ground yourself in it and slow down. Only a regulated nervous system can provide safety to another (Siegel, 2010).

Slowing down and bearing with are key concepts here: slowing down to notice what is happening somatically and bearing with to remain present with the other’s tension or discomfort without attempting to resolve it. This requires an attitude of ‘mutual inquiry’ (Epstein, 1999): exploring together, with curiosity, what the body is communicating, without judgment. ‘Mutual’ also implies ‘equal’—the coach need not have answers and must be able to abide in ‘not-knowing.’ Now we enter the ‘magical’ field where space can open, insights emerge, and discoveries unfold.

“Shut Up and Be Present!”

Co-regulation does not work through words, but through the relationship. The autonomic nervous system registers various safety signals that coaches can consciously employ. These include calm breathing, a warm vocal tone, and non-intrusive eye contact. This means that a simple coaching stance of silence and presence often proves more effective than any tool or technique (Dana, 2020).

The challenge for coaches is therefore not determining what to say or do, but rather how to be present. Am I regulated? Can I relate to the tension without taking it over, without pushing, without avoiding it?

Self-Regulation

Coaching from a polyvagal perspective means helping coachees recognize, normalize, and ultimately regulate their own autonomic responses. This requires coaches to develop somatic awareness, articulate physical sensations, and build experiential knowledge of ‘the mixing panel.’ Not through explanation alone, but through embodied experience, slowing down, and self-regulation. Self-regulation begins with learning to recognize signals: ‘When do I notice myself drifting, withdrawing, or accelerating?’ Co-regulation supports this process: through your attunement, presence, and calm, the other can re-experience safety. Only from that basis is reflection possible.

Example 2: Co-regulation

Marjan enters the practice hurriedly, her face red. “Phew, almost late,” she pants, and sits down. “But I’m here!” She immediately starts telling her story about recent events. The coach notices that the coachee has clearly not yet settled down (sympathetic activation) and also notices that this is affecting him; he experiences a restlessness that was not there a moment ago. He allows Marjan time to check in and breathe more calmly, then checks in with himself (slowing down). He consciously sits differently and breathes in and out calmly (slowing down, self-regulation). He notices himself calming down and can now look at Marjan with a gentle smile and ‘soft eyes’. Marjan says, “I’ve settled down now.” Nevertheless, he notices that Marjan still sits tensely, her eyes remain slightly widened, and her facial muscles appear somewhat ‘tight’. Moreover, her voice remains somewhat ‘elevated’, and her abdomen appears uninvolved in her breath. The activation has not really calmed down yet. “Okay,” says the coach, “I’m glad you feel you’ve settled, Marjan. How do you sense that in your body right now? Shall we explore that together?”

In this encounter, the coach invites the coachee to become curious and inhabit the here-and-now without hurrying (slowing down). The here-and-now is essential for connection and increased ventral vagal activation. A sense of calm emerges, creating space to explore the coaching question. Neither coach nor coachee knows where this will lead. But if the coach trusts that the coachee will discover insights and perhaps even answers, movement will emerge, allowing them to explore the question together from within the connection.

Traces of Trauma

Most coaches are not therapists. Yet it is virtually impossible for coaches not to encounter trauma. This is not because everyone is severely traumatized, but because trauma, broadly defined, is inherent to being human. In this example we don’t know whether a trauma part of Marjan was triggered, but her sympathetic activation could be related to this. Coaches speak of wounds, losses, shame, blockages, or unexplained reactions. These often contain traces of trauma, even if they are not identified as such.

The polyvagal theory also provides insight here and makes it possible to approach these themes without pathologizing or treating them. The nervous system’s response translates into behavior and aims to manage the situation as adaptively as possible. If someone could have avoided the freeze response through different means, they certainly would have. We won’t elaborate on what trauma is precisely, but we want to share Gabor Maté’s insight: ‘Trauma is not what happens to you, but what happens to you as a result of what happens to you.’

In example 2, we see that the coach creates an atmosphere of safety and connection, even though he does not know exactly what the underlying triggering problem is. From this position of not knowing, the coach can still slow down together with the coachee and create space so that the sympathetic activation can decrease. And then the coachee enters an entirely different session than in example 1.

Trauma-Sensitive Work

In our experience, many coaches recoil from signs of possible trauma dynamics: inexplicable reactions, intense emotions, avoidance behavior, ‘checking out,’ or freezing. Ien van der Pol wrote a clear guide for coaches on this topic: ‘I want the fear to disappear and for working with the effects of traumatic events to become more widely known among professional counsellors’ (Van der Pol, 2020). Practice reveals that the danger lies not in trauma’s content, but in how we engage with it. Attempts to fix, probe deeply, or accelerate can prove dysregulating (Van der Kolk, 2014; Van Elst et al., 2022). Repair implies something needs fixing—that something is ‘wrong’ with the coachee. In the ventral vagal state (calm, connection, and self-awareness, where nothing is ‘not-right’), both coach and coachee can welcome new perspectives and release old patterns (Dana, 2020).

A trauma-sensitive coach notices when the coachee becomes sympathetically or dorsally activated. The coach thus recognizes that the coachee’s autonomic nervous system detects something from the there-and-then in the here-and-now, triggering an unsafe neuroception and activating their survival mechanisms.

From a PVT-informed perspective, coaching focuses not on ‘repairing’ or resolving trauma, but on strengthening capacity for self- and co-regulation (containment). It is a fundamental way of supporting people in rediscovering their own movement, with the body as compass and the relationship as bedrock.

The coach as holding environment, not as solution machine

As we’ve seen, presence itself is physiological information. Rather than fixating on story or analysis, lived experience itself becomes the anchor of the coaching journey. This aligns with the polyvagal approach, in which the coachee’s state—not their story—guides the work. Hence the principle: ‘Story follows state’ (Porges, 2011).

This way of coaching requires not only knowledge of the nervous system but also ongoing self-reflection. The examples reveal how coaches can sometimes get swept up in their own survival responses: fixing, avoiding, over-regulating, and filling in gaps. Coaches can only provide a safe bedrock if they know themselves and can access their own ventral state. Professional coaches therefore work in trauma-informed and process-oriented ways but do not process trauma unless specifically trained to do so. Concretely, this means that training programs for professional coaches must invest not only in methodology but also in:

• (Neuro)physiological knowledge;

• Somatic awareness and interoception;

• Self-regulation skills;

• Knowledge of trauma responses;

• Creating space for trauma-sensitive reflection;

• Embodied learning, not just theoretical knowledge.

Fortunately, several such training programs in the Netherlands are recognized by the LVSC (Dutch National Association for Supervision and Coaching).

In a world where stress, burnout, and disconnection seem more the rule than the exception, coaching has become an in-between practice. Not therapy, not nothing, but something that moves in the space between. It is precisely in this space that polyvagal theory offers a workable lens: a way of seeing people that requires not diagnosis, but presence. This enables us to work with people who might otherwise benefit from therapy.

Key Element

When coaching people, you always work with the autonomic nervous system—whether aware of it or not. That is the central conclusion of this article. PVT-informed coaching means not treating trauma but learning to recognize someone’s autonomic state and how to offer safety at the nervous system level. This demands a fundamental shift in coaching practice:

• From analyzing to attuning: story follows state, not the reverse.

• From solving to regulating: you need not fix anything but must be able to hold and bear with it.

• From method to humanity: your presence is often your most powerful instrument.

Especially in our current era, when existential discomfort is often medicalized, coaches need language for life’s inherent pain, whether large or small. Language that normalizes rather than pathologizes. Polyvagal theory offers such language: practical, somatic, and relational. In this article, we have shown what that can look like. Coaches who work in a PVT-informed way:

1. Recognize signs of autonomic activation;

2. Can slow down rather than speed up;

3. Can remain present without ‘doing’;

4. Create space where regulation and healing can emerge, without directing.

These four capacities can be trained but demand an integrated, embodied foundational stance. The key lies in the coach’s fundamental trust that open exploration of an issue or question offers the greatest possibility for a fruitful session. In our view, coaches need more training in stress and autonomic nervous system physiology, self-awareness to recognize their own signs of autonomic activation, and supervision grounded in PVT-informed practice.

The authors will offer several masterclasses on ‘Polyvagal-informed and embodied coaching’ in 2026.

More information is available at www.relaxmore.net and www.heartfulatwork.nl.

You can download a PDF of the article:

The Bridge Between Nothingness And Therapy - De Caluwe and Van Elst

1.91MB ∙ PDF file

Download

Download

Authors:

Ronald de Caluwé (1963) engages in compassionate bodywork through mindfulness, tai chi, and qigong. He is fascinated by polyvagal theory, writes about it regularly, and is a board member of the Dutch Polyvagal Institute. Website: www.relaxmore.net. Email: ronald@relaxmore.net.

Cees van Elst (1962) is an LVSC-registered coach working for the Academy for Medical Specialists. He is the owner of ‘HeartfulAtWork Coaching & Consultancy’ and a board member of the Dutch Polyvagal Institute. Website: www.heartfulatwork.nl. Email: cees.van.elst@heartfulatwork.nl.

References:

Bear, M. F., Connors, B. W., & Paradiso, M. A. (2020). Neuro-science: Exploring the Brain (4e editie). Wolters Kluwer.

Dana, D. (2018). The polyvagal theory in therapy: Engaging the rhythm of regulation. W. W. Norton & Company.

Dana, D. (2020). De polyvagaaltheorie in therapie: Het ritme van regulatie. [The polyvagal theory in therapy: Engaging the rythm of regulation]. Mens!

De Caluwé, R. (2025). Een nieuwe samenvatting van de polyvagaaltheorie. [A New Overview of Polyvagal Theory]. Online: https://www.relaxmore.net/p/een-nieuwe-samenvatting-van-de-polyvagaaltheorie.

Epstein, R. M. (1999). Mindful practice. JAMA, 282(9), 833–839.

Grossman, P., & Taylor, E. W. (2007). Toward understanding respiratory sinus arrhythmia: Relations to cardiac vagal tone, evolution and biobehavioral functions. Biological Psychology, 74(2), 263–285.

Plett, H., Smit, M. & Elstak, P. (2021) De kunst van Holding Space: Lessen in liefde, loslaten en leiderschap. [The art of Holding Space: lessons in love, letting go and leadership]. Het Noorderlicht.

Porges, S. W. (2004). Neuroception: A subconscious system for detecting threats and safety. Zero to Three, 24(5), 19–24.

Porges, S. W. (2011). The polyvagal theory: Neurophysiological foundations of emotions, attachment, communication, and selfregulation. W. W. Norton & Company.

Schinkel, W. (2020). De nieuwe democratie: Naar andere vormen van politiek. [The new democracy:towards alternative forms of politics]. Boom.

Siegel, D. J. (2010). The mindful therapist: A clinician’s guide to mind-sight and neural integration. W. W. Norton & Company.

Trappenburg, M. (2021). De zorgval. [The healtcare trap]. Boom.

Van der Kolk, B. A. (2014). The body keeps the score: Brain, mind and body in the healing of trauma. Viking.

Van der Pol, I. G. M. (2020). Coachen waar het pijn doet: Werken met trauma in coaching en begeleiding. [Coaching where it hurts: working with trauma in coaching and guidance]. SWP.

Van Elst, C., Van Rijssel, M., & Smit, L. (2022). Van vermijding naar bevrijding: Drie coachingswegen naar Zijn. [From avoidance to liberation: three coaching pathways toward embodied Presence]. Samsara.

Jon Kabat-Zinn developed the Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) program in the US. In this interview, he reflects on its origins, its growth, and the vision behind it1. 

You founded the Stress Reduction Clinic in 1979. Since the clinic’s inception, impressive changes have taken place in the field of healthcare. Mindfulness has gone mainstream and is increasingly being applied in medicine. What motivated you to want to spread this method?

That is one of those questions with an impossibly long answer, but in a single word I can summarize it as “karma.”

From an early age I have had an interest in and curiosity about the “big questions.” My father was a highly respected scientist, and my mother was a painter. I could see and sense that my parents had entirely different ways of seeing and experiencing the world. My father approached things through scientific inquiry and exploration, while my mother’s experiences arose from emotion and the senses.

I loved science, and when I discovered Buddhist meditation and martial arts, I was able to bring these two ways of seeing the world together in my own unique way. From there grew the Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) program, which became my “karmic assignment.”

Was helping people learn to experience in a new way one of your intentions when you developed the MBSR program?

The educational system focuses primarily on making students better thinkers but gives little attention to our own capacity for awareness and to the cultivation of consciousness. Mindfulness is a way of restoring our balance. Rather than becoming lost in our thoughts or consumed by our emotions, we can experience greater equanimity, clarity, wisdom, and self-compassion when we learn how to inhabit that other dimension of existence.

Not only education, but modern science as well tends to look only at numbers and data, while these represent only a small part of the whole.

Yes, that is often the case, but every truly good scientist is both artist and scientist. Everything that is interesting is found at the boundary between knowing and not-knowing. I realize I now sound like a meditation teacher, but when you are in a laboratory or thinking about psychology, you need to know what you know. If you cannot move beyond that, you will not be able to make that insightful, unique connection that no one has ever made before.

Long ago, Hans Selye spoke at Omega. He was the first scientist to relate the word “stress” to human conditions, rather than using it as a technical term. The MBSR program seems to be the next phase in the study of stress.

I think it shows great genius that Selye used the word “stress” in that way, because it is true that if you do not know how to have a good relationship with life, this will certainly have consequences for your health. If you stand at a production line for twelve hours a day or constantly tell yourself that life is not worth living, the body will respond to that in a more or less predictable way.

The MBSR program essentially says that you can look inward and that self-regulation can take place. You can use the various systems of your body to bring body and mind into alignment. In this way you can influence the ups and downs that are part of life—in a manner that minimizes stress and maximizes a sense of well-being and contentment.

How did you know you wanted to continue studying Mindfulness as a way of reducing stress?

It actually all happened in the course of ten seconds during a retreat in 1978. In a flash, I saw in detail what I was meant to do. I know this sounds strange, but it felt almost like a dream fulfilling itself. I myself had little to do except to be an instrument to make it possible. On the other hand, there was, of course, a strong intention and an enormous amount of work for me to do. Something like this does not simply arise on its own.

Were you certain that Mindfulness would help reduce stress when you started your research in 1979?

No, there was no certainty that it would work or that people would be willing to participate in something that most resembled nothing whatsoever. Paying attention to obvious things like the breath and sensations in the body would probably appear to be a waste of time.

Today, people are realizing that a sense of well-being does not come from outside, or from a pill—it is found when you look inward. All suffering, stress, and addiction stem from not realizing that you are already where you are looking to be.

The MBSR training you offer together with Saki Santorelli is one of the most popular programs. How do you keep the work feeling fresh after the many decades the program has been offered?

We experience the freshness of it as we teach the program, because it arises from the present moment. We do not use our notes from thirty years ago or even from thirty minutes ago. We feel from moment to moment what is needed when we sit with a group. In that way, we embody what we want to teach the participants. We use no paper, so we cannot do it any other way than we do.

You spent several weeks in China speaking about the MBSR program. What was it like to reintroduce a tradition that originated there but was not carried forward after the Cultural Revolution in 1970?

It felt like the closing of a karmic circle. The level of interest in secular mindfulness was extraordinary. I kept asking myself what it would be like if China were to return to the deep roots of wisdom—the Taoist and Chan Buddhist traditions—given that it will play an increasingly prominent role in the world over the coming hundred years.

It is sad how much of their tradition has been lost but wonderful to see their interest in it. I encouraged them not only to explore the MBSR program but also to look deeply back at their own origins and to consider how this might influence healthcare, industry, the environment, and society.

So Mindfulness can help us to act from a sense of morality and ethics?

Mindfulness is about love and living lovingly. When you cultivate this love, it gives you clarity about life and compassion for life, and your actions will be in accordance with that. All ethics and morality, the sense of connectedness, all of it arises from paying attention.

How is your own personal growth? What astonishes you most in your work?

Since becoming a grandfather, I have been discovering how to divide my time and find balance across the different areas of my life that call for attention and time. There is an overwhelming need to bring mindfulness closer to people, but at the same time I must say no to ninety-nine percent of requests to speak publicly, and that is difficult.

At the same time, I try to stay true and to embody my work, to articulate its mysteries, and not to fall into the trap of thinking I have arrived. Given the state of the world today, I find it a challenge to act according to what a Zen teacher called the “thousand-year view.” The crises of today will reverberate through the next three, four, or five generations. All I can do is strive to be as integral as possible in what I do in this brief moment.

It is interesting how Mindfulness is about being in the present moment and yet simultaneously encompasses the long term.

Yes, this is what helps people realize that this is a way of being that looks not only forward but also back through time. Chinese, Japanese, Vietnamese, Tibetan, and other historical traditions are all different currents in the same river, different directions in the same ocean. Looking ahead, we can trust that the seeds we plant will ultimately change the world.

But why do you do it? The real reason is transformation. Societal transformation will not happen in a month, a year, or a lifetime. But we see it happening, right before us, from person to person. We need not worry about the future if we attend to the present moment with care and awareness. In a sense, that is the best insurance policy we can have.

At Relax More you can follow this powerful program online or regularly join the live meditation days.

If you found this article worth reading and (not yet) feel like getting a paid subscription, you can always treat me to a cappuccino!

OK, I'll buy you a cappuccino!

Learning to Sit Still

The English author Tim Parks wrote ‘Teach Us to Sit Still’. I received the book last year on my birthday. Parks had unexplained pains in his lower abdomen. No doctor could help him. Raised in evangelical-Protestant circles and long since a non-believer, the writer reveals himself to be a great skeptic when he takes up meditation. But he has no choice. Only silence and concentration — particularly the so-called vipassana meditation, from which mindfulness training is derived — prove to help him.

It is a book I read with great pleasure. Frank and honest. Parks is entirely himself when he describes how he wrestles with his complaints, and his skepticism toward meditation is beautifully rendered. Recognizable, at least to me — partly from my own history, and partly from the reactions I still occasionally receive from people who believe that meditation is an escape from reality, rather than a genuine encounter with it.

Ultimately, Parks writes something remarkable about what he discovers in that stillness:

Language builds domes, and builds other domes on top of them when the first ones fade. Because words are never still. The beginning of a sentence directs attention forward; the end requires you to hold the beginning in mind. One paragraph leads to the next, and this page to the following one. The eyes are ahead of the lips. Reading, we turn the page while the last line of the previous one still needs to settle in our heads. As I type, my thoughts run ahead of my fingers. Driven forward. Never in the now. Never possessed by this moment.

That last sentence touches something in me. “Driven forward. Never in the now. Never possessed by this moment.” Parks describes here how our thinking constantly pulls us away from what is truly present. We are always on the way to the next sentence, the next thought, the next solution. And it is precisely in that perpetual rushing forward, in that relentless search for a way out, that we miss what is here now.

The Wisdom of Having Enough

There is a beautiful story about a fisherman who finds a copper bottle with a lead stopper in his net. He opens the bottle, and before him appears a powerful spirit capable of granting any wish. The liberated spirit says to the fisherman: “You may make three wishes and I will fulfill them. What is your first wish?”

The fisherman thinks for a moment and then says: “I wish you to grant me the wisdom to make the right choice for my remaining two wishes.” “It is done,” says the spirit. “And what are your other wishes?”

The fisherman is briefly silent. Then he says: “Thank you. I have no further wishes.”

This story, from ‘Keys to the Heart’ (Asoka Publishers), touches on the same thing toward which Parks is writing. True wisdom is not the fulfillment of all our wishes, but the recognition that we actually need nothing beyond what is already here. It is the capacity to be still with what is, rather than constantly striving for what ought to be.

The Paradox of Acceptance

What both Parks and the fisherman discover is something paradoxical: it is precisely in relinquishing the struggle, in accepting what is, that space for change arises. Parks found no solution to his pain by fighting harder or by consulting more doctors. He found relief by becoming still, by being present with his experience without constantly trying to change it.

That may well be the hardest lesson in dealing with the difficult things in life. We are so accustomed to solving problems, to striving for improvement, to fighting against what we do not want. And sometimes that is necessary. But there is also another way: the path of acceptance, of being present with what is difficult without immediately needing to do something about it.

The Fisherman Who Sits Still

As I was writing, I found myself thinking of a video I saw some time ago. A motionless kingfisher, moving in harmony with whatever the moment brings — in this case, moving without complaint or resistance with the way the wind blows. The result: a clear view of the fish and, with a little luck, a successful hunt. That would likely have been different had there been resistance to the wind.

A beautiful example of moving with the flow, having no further wishes, being fully in the moment.

On Acceptance

Acceptance is neither passivity nor resignation. It does not mean approving of what happens, nor that you have to like it. It is an active form of wisdom. The fisherman does not choose to make no choice out of apathy. He chooses it because he recognizes that what is present in this moment is enough. Parks does not meditate because he has given up. He meditates because he discovers that stillness and presence contain a different kind of strength than fighting and striving.

Never Possessed by This Moment

“Driven forward. Never in the now. Never possessed by this moment.” These words of Parks describe, in essence, the core of much human suffering. We live in stories about how things were and how they ought to be. We build, as Parks so beautifully puts it, domes of words and thoughts, and build other domes on top of those. We are perpetually in motion, always on the way to what comes next.

But what if we were to stop all that doing? To simply be here for once, and to find peace in that? What if wisdom lies not in the fulfillment of all our wishes, but in recognizing that we are already complete, here and now?

That may well be the best advertisement for mindfulness I could wish for: not as a technique for solving problems, not as a path to get somewhere or as an escape from reality — but as a way to finally allow ourselves to already be here. Right in the middle of reality.

If you found this article worth reading and (not yet) feel like getting a paid subscription, you can always treat me to a cappuccino!

OK, I'll buy you a cappuccino!

Introduction

My colleague Saskia, with whom I run terugnaarhetmidden.nl, drew my attention to a podcast about GHIA: Global High Intensity Activation. Two months ago, I wrote an extensive article about GHIA, a topic that has an important connection with early life stress, Somatic Experiencing® (SE™), and polyvagal theory.

In the podcast conversation, host Lisa Danylchuk interviews therapist and SE teacher Mahshid Hager about GHIA. The conversation is titled “Global High-Intensity Activation, Rhythmicity & Healing with Mahshid Hager.” Danylchuk’s podcast series is called “How We Can Heal.”

Very fascinating, in my opinion, because there isn’t much good information available about GHIA. The term comes from SE, so it’s particularly interesting when a teacher speaks about it. Once I started listening, I was captivated by Mahshid Hager’s pleasant tone and substantive knowledge, and before I knew it, I was already halfway through. So I quickly grabbed my notes and…

Read more

Introduction

It happens countless times a day. You’re sitting at your desk, having just dealt with the last email of the day. Or you come home with groceries and have put everything away in its proper place. Or you’ve done your morning exercises and sit down with your first cup of coffee. Something small or significant has been completed.

It happens automatically: an inhalation that’s too big for an ordinary breath, followed by an exhalation that sits somewhere between letting go and landing, accompanied by an audible or inaudible “phew.” As if you’re placing a comma in the sentence of your day.

If you pay attention, you can notice even more changes in precisely that small moment. Your shoulders drop a fraction. Your face relaxes, and your jaw becomes less tense. The eyes soften again and perhaps even your belly. You know where you are again.

Why We Sigh

Sighing…

Read more

Not for Dutchies?

Prepaying feels uncomfortable for many people. You know it’s possible, but you’d rather not. Will you actually get what you paid for? Will it be delivered as promised? Won’t there be some fine-print trap around the corner? We Dutch seem to have been raised with a preference for simultaneous exchange1. Seeing is believing. Cash on delivery. A deal is a deal.

That pragmatism protects against naivety. It keeps the world somewhat manageable. But there’s also a shadow side: when that “you first, then me” mentality unconsciously seeps into places where it doesn’t belong. In friendship, in neighborly contact. In care or in compassion.

That’s what this is about—something that has become so commonplace in our time that it often flies under the radar: conditionality. The tendency to give only when we know there’s something in return. We’ve unconsciously taught ourselves that giving carries a risk. That you’ll be taken advantage of (meaning you’re foolis…

Read more

Introduction

The number of COVID cases is rising again (this article was published in early January 2026) and appears to be approaching (almost) epidemic levels.

The good news is that there is increasing evidence for the importance and effectiveness of qigong in the treatment and prevention of COVID and long COVID. Below I describe two studies. One dates from early in the pandemic (2020): Qigong for the Prevention, Treatment, and Rehabilitation of COVID-19 in Older Adults. American Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry, May 2020.

“Potential mechanisms of action include stress reduction, emotion regulation, strengthening of respiratory muscles, reduction of inflammation, and improved immune function.”

The second study was published in November 2025 in BMC Complementary Medicine and Therapies: Experiences with Qi and changes in post-acute sequelae of COVID-19.

“Approximately three-quarters of participants reported improvement in one or more …

Read more

More and more people have mixed feelings about their presence on so-called social media. All that business on X, Facebook, Instagram and TikTok; on the one hand it’s fun, on the other hand it takes mountains of time and you don’t get much out of it. A funny quote I came across:

Back in the day, without Facebook, man, those were the times!
You had to call all your 400 friends every evening to tell them what you’d eaten!

In any case, I’m glad that I’m only still somewhat active on LinkedIn. After canceling Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and I think another one or two, I had time left over for other things—like learning something about polyvagal theory—and it cost me exactly nothing in terms of clients or subscribers.

Recently I found a video on the Dutch Cowboys website that shows exactly what—besides all those stimuli to keep scrolling and watch just one more video—is so strange about all those so-called social media. The video is called “Can I Be Your Friend?” and…

Read more

Researchers at the University of Calgary discovered that stress is more than just contagious: it changes the brain at the cellular level. And from a polyvagal perspective, we now understand why this happens and what it means for our social connections.

Research in Mice

In an important study published in 2018 in Nature Neuroscience, Jaideep Bains, PhD, and his team at the Cumming School of Medicine’s Hotchkiss Brain Institute (HBI), a division of the University of Calgary, discovered that stress we pick up from others can change our brain in exactly the same way as real stress does. The study convincingly demonstrated this in mice, and by now (2025) much follow-up research has been conducted that has further expanded these findings.

“Brain changes resulting from stress reinforce many mental disorders such as PTSD, anxiety disorders, and depression,” says Bains, professor in the Department of Physiology and Pharmacology and member of the HBI. “Recent studies sho…

Read more

Introduction

Polyvagal theory is quite “HOT” at the moment. Charts and ladders with traffic light colors are flying at you left and right. On one hand, this is quite understandable, but it brings with it a risk of excessive oversimplification, and that’s not good for anyone.

Read more