You’re Not Broken – You’re Wired for Survival

Have you ever felt like you were “overreacting,” anxious for apparently no reason, or shutting down without understanding why? In those moments, have you ever asked yourself: “Why does this keep happening?” or even, “What’s wrong with me?”

Our culture often frames these experiences as signs of brokenness, but what feels like being broken is actually your nervous system doing exactly what it was designed to do – keep you safe.

Polyvagal Theory, developed by Stephen Porges, is often called the science of safety. The theory explores and defines how our nervous system naturally responds to cues of safety and danger – often without our conscious awareness. There are three main states of our nervous system: ventral vagal (social engagement), mobilization (fight or flight), and immobilization (shutdown/collapse), and our nervous system moves fluidly throughout these states when noticing cues of danger as well as cues of safety.

The expression of these states during moments of perceived danger can look like people pleasing, lashing out, or shutting down. But these states are not signs of brokenness, they are survival strategies that your nervous system has developed over time. Furthermore, your nervous system doesn’t ask for permission, rather, it detects a cue of danger and reacts instantly without your awareness to keep you alive. So, what you or others in your life may label as “overreacting” or “numbing out” is actually your body trying to protect you from a perceived danger. For example, if you dissociate during conflict, your system has learned that shutting down is safer than fighting. If you find yourself being hypervigilant and overthinking, your system has learned that staying alert is the best way to avoid danger.

Our nervous system learns how to react to keep us safe based on our past experiences. A history of trauma or chronic stress shapes our nervous system to become overprotective, and this leads to misreading neutral, or even safe moments, as threatening. This causes symptoms like hypervigilance, dissociation, startle responses, lashing out, etc.  But these are not defects. They’re signals that your nervous system is trying to protect you – even if the danger isn’t actually there.

The good news: while these survival responses may become patterned habits, they are not permanent traits. Just like a muscle can be retrained, your nervous system can learn new patterns. Again, you’re not broken, you’re patterned for survival – and patterns can change.

Change and healing of these patterns occur through safe connection – both with others and within ourselves. Utilizing both co-regulation (e.g. therapy, snuggles with a pet, hugging a safe person) and self-regulation (e.g. breathwork, humming, gentle movement) support the return to a sense of felt safety in the nervous system. By learning to listen to your body’s signals with curiosity rather than judgment, you can reframe the question from “What’s wrong with me?” to “What’s happening, and what do I need right now to feel safe?”

Let’s notice our responses to danger with curiosity and compassion as we recognize that our nervous system has always been on our side. Let’s rewrite the story from “I’m broken” to “I’m brilliantly adapted.”