✨ What does your anxiety need to feel safe?

Yesterday, my older posts “Conversation with the Nervous System” (Chapter I and II) popped up on my social media. It made me reflect on my cPTSD (chronic anxiety) and how far I’ve come on this journey.

I grew up in a household where it wasn’t safe to speak or act freely without consequences. I always had to walk on eggshells, holding back my expression and emotions (especially anger and pain—they were taboo). That created a constant sense of unsafety in me, also known as… anxiety.

And if I’m honest—it always sucked to live with anxiety.

It felt like no one understood how hard it was for me to work, study, or live—doing all the usual daily things people do, but with constant symptoms of cPTSD:

Brain fog, body contractions, panic attacks behind my smile, dizziness, constant exhaustion, insomnia, nausea.

Literally, I had to talk to people while secretly having an anxiety attack, acting “normal”—then excuse myself to the bathroom just to try to survive a little more.

I also felt angry. Angry at people for not understanding. Angry at myself for not being able to express what I was going through or what I needed from them. And by that, not giving them a chance…

From the outside, I looked stable—I was just good at acting normal while collapsing on the inside.

Anxiety isn’t a dysfunction. It has its own intelligence—and emotions within it.

So it needs to be met with the same intelligence. On a human level, that means openness, curiosity, love, compassion, and deep understanding through listening.

Only we can give that to ourselves (though sometimes others can support or inspire us).

Do you ever feel touched by a scene in a movie where someone is going through something intense—desperate, panicked, frozen, shocked—and then someone steps in with unconditional presence? They hold them tightly, look into their eyes, and that overwhelmed person finally starts to melt… cry… scream… and finally release, softening into calm?

That’s what happens when the body finally senses safety through another.

And that’s likely what your nervous system didn’t receive in those difficult or traumatic moments or relationships—probably when you were very young. So your nervous system keeps responding to those emotions whenever something reminds you of those situations now.

Most likely, you don’t even notice the emotions in your body anymore, because they’ve gone unconscious—buried since those original painful experiences, so everything just feels shallow emotionally.

What I discovered about anxiety in the past 5 years since I do somatic work is this:

It’s always about not feeling safe in the body and with the feelings in it for some reason. Feeling unsafe means that something within us remains UNFELT, unmet, unheard, or unseen. And because it remains unfelt, there’s a push-pull relationship with fear:

→ “I have to hold onto this fear to feel safe.”

 (because, ironically, we developed a relationship with it because that was the only thing we could feel in that overwhelming situation/relationship)

→ “I want to let it go, but I can’t.”

→ “I don't want to feel this fear.”

→ “I’m afraid to feel this fear.”

→ “I want to feel safe, but I can’t.”

→ “It’s not safe to feel safe.”…

This is unconscious resistance.

And when that resistance is allowed and gently relaxed (with somatic tools, with journaling, with presence)—I finally feel connected with my anxiety and fear.

Then it softens. Then it speaks. Relaxes.

And what I find is always something similar:

A 'little girl' inside—alone, afraid to feel, to be seen, unable to explain why she couldn’t just finish a task, afraid of her own power and anger, afraid of getting hurt again, afraid to express her needs for love, safety, support and attention.

I know it’s not easy to go to the unconscious root of anxiety and allow that vulnerability. But guess what… that’s exactly what makes me feel safe now—in the present moment and in my body. My anxiety went from a 10 to between 0 and 4 over the past few years. So there is hope, if we trust that there’s life beyond it.

So, what is your resistance to fear and anxiety? And what does anxiety say to you once you meet it with

present, loving awareness? What unmet and unfelt parts is it showing you? Is there anything it’s afraid to experience on the outside—or afraid to feel inside?

Let me know what you find. And if you’re curious about how to explore this with compassionate somatic inquiry, I’m here.

Feel free to book a free meet-and-greet call.

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You can access my free Natural Rest meditation series, designed to help with resistance and anxiety, by clicking this link.