Your eyes are wide open, even though you got into bed almost an hour ago. You can’t stop replaying something you said earlier today. You were told it landed fine, and you want to believe it, but that hamster wheel in your brain won’t stop spinning.
That’s how a persistent pattern plays out on the inside. Something triggers it, and then the anxiety, overwhelm, rumination, or fear takes over. Your nervous system switches on to fight, flight, or freeze, and when that happens, you physiologically can’t go to sleep. Under threat, falling asleep could mean being eaten by your perceived predator, so the body makes sure that you don’t. The mere thought of what you said has switched on an alarm, even though nothing’s really on fire. The pattern is so familiar that you believe it’s just who you are.
Ever lose your words in the middle of an argument, then think of the perfect comeback hours later? Here’s why.
When you go into fight, flight or freeze, your survival brain (the amygdala) sounds the alarm. A surge of stress chemicals like adrenaline and cortisol pulls resources away from your forebrain, the part that handles language, reasoning and logic, and sends them to the big muscles in your arms and legs so you can fight or flee. Your thinking brain goes into a brownout.
Once the perceived threat has passed, the lights come back on, and suddenly you know exactly what you wish you’d said.
The frustrating part is that you know it’s happening. You’re aware that your mind is creating it. You see it coming, but you can’t stop it.
If you’ve ever asked yourself, “Why does this keep happening?”, I’ve created a short quiz to help you see your core pattern so that you can finally start doing something about it.
You do not have to keep living this way.