Interoception: Get To Know Your Body's Internal Dashboard For Better Regulation

Welcome to the Satiated Podcast, where we explore physical and emotional hunger, satiation, and healing your relationship with your food and body. I'm your host, Stephanie Mara Fox, your somatic nutritional counselor.

About a year ago in one of my PhD classes, I voiced a huge gripe I had about somatic and nervous system practices. I shared that my friction with them was that they have been stripped down and depersonalized into these practices that anyone can do at any time and will support everyone in any moment to feel calmer or more grounded or safer or more regulated. My teacher replied with, "Well everyone still needs to start somewhere." This gave me a pause to reflect that even if you choose a somatic or nervous system practice that doesn't resonate with your body and is just some blanket suggestion, it can still teach you about what doesn't work for you based on your emotions, sensations, and nervous system states. And then, sometimes you're going to nail it. You're going to choose the exact bodily movement that you needed that brings your body into a place of safety and connection and brings greater ease and breath. So I've updated my perspective that all practices in all moments can be supportive and will be a discovery of yourself and for yourself to know what works for your body and nervous system.

I had an amazing experience in this episode being guided through a nervous system practice that quickly changed how I felt, so I'm excited to introduce you all to Alyssa Chang. Alyssa is a Neuroscience Health Coach based in Honolulu, Hawaiʻi, and the creator of The Regulation Method™ — a framework designed to help people break out of survival mode and understand the patterns driving chronic stress, pain, fatigue, and burnout. With over 14 years studying the brain-body connection, Alyssa works with a very specific person — someone who has already done a lot of the healing work. They understand their patterns. They've tried the approaches. And yet something still feels stuck. The insight is there. The body just hasn't caught up yet. That gap — between knowing and feeling — is exactly where she works. Her approach bridges the science of the brain, body, and nervous system in a way that feels approachable, validating, and actionable. No shame. No force. No quick fixes. Just a deep understanding of why your nervous system does what it does — and how to finally help it feel safe enough to change. Because Alyssa believes that when people truly understand their nervous system, healing doesn't just become possible. It becomes inevitable. We chat about the impact of neuroscience on healing, interoception, tailoring nervous system practices to your individual needs, practical exercises for enhancing awareness of the felt sense of your body, navigating sensory overload, the role of predictability in healing, and creating tiny moments of change.

Ways you can support the Satiated podcast include: please consider leaving a review anywhere that you listen to podcasts to help others find the show. You can also check out all of my affiliate links, join Satiated+, donate a few dollars to the show, and be able to Ask Me Anything each month, or check out working with me 1:1 or in any of my programs. I have self paced programs and my three month live Somatic Eating® Program which you can join the waitlist for now. The next class will be in October. All links are in the show notes. Now, welcome Alyssa! I am really excited for our conversation today, and to chat about the nervous system and everyone's unique bodies, but as always, first, how I like to get started is sharing a little bit about you and your history and how you got into this work that you're doing.

Alyssa Chang 04:34

Yes, well, thank you for having me. I started this work through you know these series of events, but looking back, I'll try to summarize it as concisely as possible. I studied kinesiology in college, and out of that, I became a personal trainer. It was actually a really funny story of being in like a conversation and then realizing I was actually in a job interview to become a trainer. So I really stumbled into this like health field. I spent a lot of my life being a competitive athlete, I played volleyball since I was age 10 through college, and then got into figure competitions. So I believed health was a lot about discipline, pushing through, like optimizing your body. And looking back, I can also see that I grew up with a lot of unpredictability at home, which taught me that I needed basically to find safety, and how I found safety was through control, and that eventually landed on my body, trying to control my body from how I performed to how I looked. But after spending so much time punishing my body through over exercising and under eating, my body just shut down. I fell into what is categorized as like metabolic damage, and I had just this laundry list of symptoms: chronic fatigue, anxiety, vertigo, binge eating, all these types of digestive issues, depression. And the harder I tried to fix my body with traditional approaches, the worse things became. And I was just left feeling super frustrated, super defeated, and everything ended up changing after I started studying neuroscience. I learned about the brain's main job is you know to keep us safe, to keep us alive, to protect us. And over time, through a very patient process, I realized that my symptoms weren't actually signs that I was broken, but they were these protective responses by my nervous system that was, you know, spent my entire life trying to keep me safe and alive. So since 2012, when I began studying neuroscience, I use these neuroscience-based approaches to help people really understand that their symptoms aren't random; they're not signs that you're broken. They're really protective, and so I believe that when we can all really understand how unique we are-the unique wiring of our nervous system-healing is possible because of the brain's ability to heal and heal and rewire itself.

Stephanie Mara 06:49

Oh, I love that! Thank you for you know just sharing that hope that things can change, and regardless of how far we've been on this path, because I know that I hear that a lot from those that I work with too. That it feels like from all the years of maybe the restrict binge cycle that it feels like, oh no, have I just ruined my body? Is it you know unsalvageable? I'm going to be struggling with my metabolism and my organ function and all of these things for the rest of my life. And what you're naming is like, oh, just the body doesn't feel safe, and it needs to feel safe so it can do the repair that it knows how to do.

Alyssa Chang 07:35

Yes, exactly. And it's such a patient process as well because there's this point where we're like doing the right things, but we feel worse. You know, we're resting, but we get more tired, and so there's this ironic stage that we arrive at where it's like I'm developing more self awareness. I feel like I'm doing the right things. I'm trusting my body. I'm resting when I need to, and it's like, why do I all of a sudden feel everything more? You talk a lot about the insula cortex and interoception and that ability to really understand what's happening on the inside of your body is such a skill, and that's part of the healing process is like we kind of need to feel a little bit more, so we have a better gauge of like what is safe and what's not safe.

Stephanie Mara 08:10

Yeah, could you say more about that of like, because I do touch a bit about that, but just with your neuroscience background, I'm wondering if you can explain more fully of that phenomenon that I see a lot for those that I work with. That it's like, wait a second. I thought that as I maybe started doing some body image or food recovery, I would start feeling like quote unquote better. But initially, it's like everything feels more raw and intense.

Alyssa Chang 08:42

Yes, totally. So let's talk about the part of your brain called the insula cortex. So we can think of it as like your brain's internal dashboard. So just like the dashboard tells you like how much gas you have left, like if the engine is overheating or if your tire pressure is lower and you need more air, the insula is getting all of that information, and it's trying to help you understand what's happening on the inside of your body. So, how are you breathing? How fast is your heart rate? Are you hungry? Are you thirsty? Do you have to go to the bathroom? And it's constantly piecing all this information together and creating a better, more clear internal picture. So that's what we call interoception. It's that ability to know what's happening on the inside of our body. Some people have really clear interoception, so they notice when they're getting stressed before they get overwhelmed. They notice their hunger before they get hangry. But other people are more disconnected from interoception, so suddenly they're anxious and without realizing it, like their shoulders are up their ears. They have a migraine. They're skipping meals before they notice a hunger cue, and then we have the other category where maybe they have heightened interoception. So they notice every single like flutter of their chest, their stomach, right, the smallest little cue, and it can feel so overwhelming, like they're quote unquote too aware. And I think that's where someone who's moving from a place of like punishing their body and pushing past body signals-it's not that they're maybe in a over-aware hyper interoception space, but they're just developing that internal awareness that can feel overwhelming. So the goal isn't to notice everything, and it's not to notice nothing. It's just to have that enough awareness where we can understand what our body and brain are trying to communicate to us, while also having a brain that can accurately interpret those signals without assuming that everything is a threat, everything is an emergency.

Stephanie Mara 10:35

Oh, I'm so excited that you are getting into both because I find that one piece that I focus on more here is on maybe the lack of interoceptive awareness and needing to build that up, but I think it's just as important as what you're pointing to is that there is a huge part of the population that has heightened interoception, where you're feeling every ping, every pang, every thing that is happening in your body, and I'm curious if you could say more that what you found because what I've been looking into more is how sometimes, especially on social media, there are these blanket suggestions. Do this, especially in like the nervous system and somatic world, but really it has to be unique to your body, based off of what kind of interoceptive ability do you need? Do you actually need to increase it, or is it actually heightened in your unique body where you need to zoom out and maybe take in more of your exteroception of like, can I land my body in the space and the safety of the here and now, and sometimes actually take distance from your body a little bit.

Alyssa Chang 11:46

Yes, so well summarized because this is where you know the common advice is like, well, manage your stress. Why don't you do a meditation? And so I'll have clients like, okay, let me do a guided meditation, even right, and that's even like hopefully more supportive container for them, and they're sitting there, and they're like, I feel every sensation in my body. And I work with a lot of clients who have chronic pain as well. So when they're finally still, that's where like the volume of their pain could like drastically crank up, which then leads them to closer being in a place of panic because they're feeling so much. And so, so much of my work is assessing their nervous system and understanding okay which parts of your brain might be overactive that don't need more like tools and resources and which parts are underactive that we can actually yeah give a little nudge to. But it is this like balancing act versus like we just want more vagus nerve you know activation tools right. It's like actually, let's understand the complexity of like you as a person, your lived experiences, what your lifestyle also looks like. For my mom clients who are constantly overstimulated because of their kids, they probably need a lot of sensory reduction tools because they're so like attuned to like the kid in that corner playing with toys while the other kids throwing stuff on the floor, and like they're still also hungry and they haven't eaten, right? So it's so much input that they're getting, and there's a common term now called HSP, right? Highly sensitive personalities, which is just this connection to the our interceptive cues, like that being very, very, like constantly on all the time for them.

Stephanie Mara 13:23

Yeah. So I'm wondering if you have examples of what actual activities, and again, to anyone listening, this is going to be unique to you. You have to try it on, feel it in in your own body. Does this actually resonate with my body? Where does it take me in my body? But I'm wondering where you would guide someone that has to turn up or down the interoceptive volume?

Alyssa Chang 13:46

Yes. Why don't we go up first? Because I feel like that's definitely a common experience for many, where they're more in like a disconnected, numb place. Maybe they don't know when they're hungry. They don't know what's going on in their body. So the vagus nerve is a huge hub for connection. It's one of the biggest information highways. Most people hear about the vagus nerve as something that helps calm us down, but it also does a really big job of actually carrying information from your brain to your body and vice versa. So it's constantly sending those updates from your heart, lung, digestive system, throat, and your tongue is such a big region that takes in all the information. So something that's super fascinating is the back portion of your tongue has a lot of sensory fibers that are connected to the vagus nerve and the vagus system, I should say. So that means when we do tongue mobility exercises, which sounds super funny, but they are so rich in information that is so closely connected to the brain-body communication "quote unquote" network. So I do a lot of tongue mobility drills with clients who need more interoception. So let's say they are someone that they don't have a very clear communication signal to their hunger. What we'll end up doing is throw in a bunch of tongue mobility at more consistent dosages. So in the morning, they have a little tongue mobility tool kit that they run through, and we identify right for them: is it needed every hour? Is it every few hours? And the more consistent repeated inputs through the tongue to contact the vagus nerve to send that up to the brain. What they start noticing is they're like, oh, at least I'm starting to think about food, and then the thinking about food turns into like, oh, I now maybe feel something in my body. I'm feeling a little slickish. Oh, maybe I'm a little irritable, and so it expands their library of being able to communicate. I should say more so understand what their body is communicating to them. So a quick tongue mobility exercise that I love is called Around the World. So, if you're listening, you can definitely try this. I always like to have someone take a quick assessment of how they're currently feeling. So, you can either do a very subjective, like how am I feeling right now? It could be calm, anxious, whatever language comes up. I also like to pair it with like an objective assessment, so Stephanie, you can feel free to follow along. But just rotate your head and neck to your left, and then rotate it to your right. And all you're paying attention to is how far you can rotate. And if you do have any body talk, like tension in the shoulders, tension in the neck, do you feel anything?

Stephanie Mara 16:15

Yeah, as I move my head from side to side, I can feel that like right at the side of my neck, there's some tension on both sides.

Alyssa Chang 16:25

Okay, great. So tension is always going to be the secondary thing to a brain already in an unsafe place. So you know, if you've been on your computer right, you're four hours ahead of me. So there's probably been a lot of like lot of sitting, a lot of being on my computer already today.

Stephanie Mara 16:40

Yep.

Alyssa Chang 16:41

Yeah. So we can definitely talk about like vision therapy as well. That's one of my go-to strategies for a lot of people that are trying to shift out of this like very sympathetic state. Utilize nervous system tools to help them literally embody safety. So I like again we did that quick assessment. That's our quick little inventory of like how is Stephanie's body feeling? We have a little tension on both sides. Around the world is sealing your lips, and you're basically tracing your tongue in a circle around the front of your teeth. So what I'll have you do, Stephanie, is do three in each direction. Eyes stay straight ahead, perfect. And as you do this, if you're following along, you might notice that, like, wow, my jaw is getting tired. My tongue is getting tired. Remember, the tongue is a muscle that also has a lot of again movement and sensory-rich information and receptors. So, after the three perfect stephanie, just go ahead and rotate your head and neck to the side, and then do you notice the difference?

Stephanie Mara 17:39

Yeah.

Alyssa Chang 17:39

Okay so what I try to do is this is like the practicality of like what is nervous system work? Wow, great. We understand the insula houses interoception. We understand the tongue is a big hub for the vagus nerve. Cool. I'm gonna look at the vagus nerve tools for this specific client to help improve interoception. So, doing the tongue mobility. If you're watching the video, obviously you can see, but Stephanie had more range of motion, and she smiled. So the tension, I assume, was probably gone.

Stephanie Mara 18:02

Yes, the tension was like almost entirely gone on both sides of my neck. So people can hear that. Yeah, and it was very, very clear, very transparent of just like, yeah, I could turn my head even more so over to both sides.

Alyssa Chang 18:03

Beautiful, beautiful. And again, what we want to land on is that tension, limited range of motion. It all is a sign that we're in a little bit more of a stress state. But you know, if you had a very busy morning, your brain's going to prioritize what's more essential, which might be like, oh, I have to hammer out this email. I have to, you know, report to this client, and the body talk is there, but we get used to ignoring it, and so a lot of the work is like, how do we have interoception, the awareness of how we're actually feeling, but also the tools to help reduce that accumulation of stress and threat. So this is how quickly the nervous system does work as well. It's like let's find that specific strategy for your specific brain to reduce the output of tension and pain, the less tension and pain we feel, the less that will actually be in that dysregulated place.

Stephanie Mara 19:08

I love that we practiced right here and right now because people could probably rewind and track how long that took.

Alyssa Chang 19:17

Yes.

Stephanie Mara 19:18

Because I find that especially when someone's in, let's say, food recovery, sometimes food becomes so alluring because it's so quick. It's like when you don't feel like you have the capacity to be with what is here, or the you know sympathetic nervous system that is turned on high that food is just so readily available to be like well, I can just so quickly go reach for food. But us doing that probably right now. I mean, what that maybe took 10, 15, seconds, something like that. So just to start to update, sometimes I think of it as like somatic memory of like they're other resources that I can choose that are just as fast if my capacity to be with what is here is low, because I never want anyone to feel like they just have to sit with the huge amount of discomfort and not help themselves through it.

Alyssa Chang 20:14

Totally, and I think that's such a like simplified. I was told that when I was going to a therapist for my binge eating, she's like, Sit with the experience, and I was like, But this experience is so overwhelming that I literally will get into a panic attack, and so I never could like place my fork and utensils down and wait between each bite. Like it was just too overwhelming, and that is not anyone's fault. That is just the piece of where your nervous system is at. We have to understand where we need to better meet you.

Stephanie Mara 20:41

Yeah, exactly. So that was an exercise I'm guessing to we started with turn up so that I could really feel. So if someone's like, Oh my gosh, I'm feeling everything, I certainly have those moments too, where I'm just like in a very hypersensitive place. I'm like, I feel every ping, every pang, every.

Alyssa Chang 21:00

I'm like, the wind is giving me anxiety, you know.

Stephanie Mara 21:03

Yeah, don't get me started on wind. But yeah, if someone's like, Oh my gosh, it's too much. I'm taking in too much right now, what's maybe something different you would offer to turn things down?

Alyssa Chang 21:15

Perfect. And to go back to the original assessment, we had everyone check in with the range of motion, but also subjectively. So after you did your tongue mobility, that you you gave a good laugh, which is always such a beautiful sign of like, oh, I'm regulated. You know, I can access that lightness. So as we go through this one, do the same assessments. Right, we're checking in with like, okay, how am I feeling? I am feeling overstimulated. Maybe I am feeling tired or some sort of like data point. And then Stephanie, let's also have you check back in with your neck rotation. So, just seeing if that stuck. Like, did the tension come back, or are you still pretty good?

Stephanie Mara 21:48

No, I'm still pretty good there.

Alyssa Chang 21:49

Awesome. Okay, that would also tell us something. So, if your tension came back, that would tell me like, oh, there's something continuing to put your nervous system in more of that alerted state. So, what I like to do is a drill called palming. So our eyes, as I mentioned earlier, I'm big fan of vision therapy. Our eyes are our brain's first chosen sensory system to better understand our level of safety. So we rely heavily on our eyes to understand: Am I safe? Am I not safe? So the hard part is that how our world has evolved is that we're not using our eyes in the same dynamic way, we're using them to be on screens, and we're getting a lot of blue light, which already puts us in that sympathetic state. So palming is a great relaxing, down-regulating tool for those of us that maybe are in that heightened state. So all I'll have each of you do is rub your hands together till they get a little warm. Then you're going to close your eyes and then stack your hands over your eyes. Perfect. So your goal, Stephanie, is to remove as much light as possible. And once you're in that place, you're just going to take some intentional breath. So breathing in through the nose, and then exhaling. And I like to have clients do at least three breaths. We'll just do three today. You can do three to five, but what we're doing is we're removing sensory input. Again, remember that it's your brain's like most important sensory system, but sometimes it can be so overwhelmed that it puts us into more of that stress state. So by reducing light, we might notice that, like, oh, I'm feeling actually just in general better. Good after those three breaths. Keep your eyes closed. Bring your hands back down. Good. Let allow the light to like adjust through closed eyes, and then when you're ready, Stephanie, you can open your eyes, and then you can check your neck again to see how it feels.

Stephanie Mara 23:41

Yeah, I mean, it's it stayed pretty loose. It might be like a smidgen looser.

Alyssa Chang 23:45

Yeah.

Stephanie Mara 23:46

It's interesting. I always feel like for those that are still in the process of kind of doing nervous system work, like I've been working on this for many, many, many years now. It feels like there's this switch. Like it just feels like after the second breath, I could feel this click in my body that was like I suddenly felt my feet, and it was like, oh, okay, that was the parasympathetic nervous system turning on. Like it was just so clear of like, oh, I just switched into something else, and and it's so subtle. I really want to just like normalize for people listening. Like it's so subtle when you get to that point of being like, Oh, I just dropped in, or I just came back, or something just shifted. I heard another practitioner at one point describing the nervous system instead of an on-off switch, more like a stick shift car.

Alyssa Chang 24:38

Perfect. Yeah, yeah.

Stephanie Mara 24:40

It's like it's not like we just turn it on and turn it off. It took two breaths to get to the point where it was like downshift, downshift, downshift. Ooh, sweet spot.

Alyssa Chang 24:51

Yeah.

Stephanie Mara 24:52

Where it's like ooh, I just shifted into a different gear.

Alyssa Chang 24:55

Totally, and I think the hard part is with nervous system work. It's not that glamorous like transformation that we see on social media. It's those subtle things of like, oh, I felt my feet, you know. And it's like, how long were you moving through your day that your brain wasn't connected to your full body, right? And when we're not connected to our full body, the brain just can't register memories as well. When we're disembodied, that's where we're moving through autopilot. That's where we can actually move closer towards burnout because we don't recognize and realize just how much we're actually holding and how quickly we're moving through our day.

Stephanie Mara 25:27

Yeah, completely agree. I'm curious as you started to learn more about this from your own experience, because you said that there was a lot that you were navigating in a body that really needed a lot of support. What did you notice start to shift and change in your own experience as you started to practice this work on yourself?

Alyssa Chang 25:47

Yes, I love answering this question because I feel like it really normalizes the healing process. I started this work because a mentor was like, this will change like your clients' lives. Like, it's the missing link that will help like those clients that were coming to me for pain, and I was doing the typical like let's foam roll it, let's stretch it, and they would get a relief, but it never stuck around. So I went into the trainings, and I was so like flared and symptomatic that like none of the tools worked for me. Like initially, the all the vision therapy tools like it made me feel really overwhelmed. Like I would get like my eyes would like blackout. I would get like sparkles in my vision, which was just informative in general too to be like, oh, that's an inappropriate response by my brain to just move my eyes in a circle, you know. So it was helpful to take that lens in. But I didn't respond well. But when I used it with my clients, it was like you could not deny it. Like it was a similar response to you. I would have them check something. I would move their eyes or their tongue, and they would like come back to me and smile and being like, where'd my pain go? And I'm like, it's not in your body. Like it's in your brain. Like we're doing these drills. And so I was really bought into like how quickly my clients were transforming. But it was also the way the training was built, where we did a lot of focus on areas that I was super compromised in. So once I got to like a higher level of the trainings, where we started to approach it from a different angle, then I started to notice that like, oh, I'm not waking up with that chronic pain I felt in my shoulder, and my pain became more intermittent. My anxiety felt just way more manageable versus like every day I was like deep breathing in my car before I was stepping into work. I think for me, when it came to food, I noticed that my binge eating episodes were far less frequent, and it was just because there was this inherent safety I was building in my body through. I talk a lot about with my that my work prediction, like the brains need to predict what's around the corner, what is coming up next, and the more that I had a body that could better predict what was coming because I was moving my eyes in small muscles, I felt safer, and so mine was very gradual, very subtle.

Stephanie Mara 27:58

Yeah, thanks for normalizing that again because I feel like, and I agree with you, what we're getting on social media are these huge transformations. Like I started doing nervous system work, and my binge eating was gone within seven days. I started doing nervous system work, and my entire body pain was gone in you know five days, and sure that may have been able to happen, but usually we don't know the background of how much else they were doing and putting into place that was building up their capacity over time to have things change. But I appreciate you naming how small and subtle and and little these changes are, and I know for those that are listening, kind of in food and body image recovery, is like you're feeling so uncomfortable that you want that big transformation, and you want it now. You wanted it like yesterday. So I'm wondering what, if anything, helped you or those that you've worked with to slow things down, to look out for the subtle, to make the subtle feel safe enough that something was changing, rather than looking out for like the big transformation.

Alyssa Chang 29:12

Oh, to make the subtle feel safe. I feel like that's such a wonderful quote. Yeah, I mean, when I think back of my own personal experience and the demographic I work with. There's this inherent urgency, right? I just desperately want to feel normal, like I don't want to be overrun by these symptoms. And I think for me, my approach has always been like, let's learn the science because education and learning is inherently going to be regulating. So once I could really help my clients like understand like what in their health history was contributing to like the expression of a symptom like panic or anxiety or restrictive eating behaviors or binging. Like once they understood that it wasn't their fault and it was like a normal, expected, and quote unquote healthy outcome. For them, their brain to keep them alive. I think that helped reduce the urgency, and I think within the stage of like making progress, it really comes down to like I always say, become your detective. And we took a lot of notes in the beginning, and I was always trying to bring and highlight like in our sessions, like what's something different that happened this week? And it always is super subtle. Like, oh, I didn't have to like do an extensive decompressing routine before I fell asleep. Like, I kind of got into bed, I read a little, and I fell asleep. And I'm like, cool. Let's walk through the science. When we can actually get into bed and like actually fall asleep when we're supposed to fall asleep, these are all the things that you were probably doing during the day that was helping release a little bit of that cumulative stress that you were building. So, what did you do? So, it's a lot of me bringing conversation and helping them see that the small little efforts they're making over time result into bigger things, like better sleep quality and what better sleep quality can mean for better regulation, and then what that means for like their goals, so it's like kind of this storyline that I like to bring them through.

Stephanie Mara 31:05

Yeah, so I hear two things in there that I completely, absolutely resonate with and agree with is first that validation piece I find is so important, especially if you're someone who has a history of past trauma and maybe grew up in an environment that was invalidating, where you didn't feel seen, heard, and met in whatever circumstance, that that just validating and acknowledging my body is doing exactly what it's meant to do is so unbelievably powerful to start to normalize why your body is doing the things that it's doing, why it's giving you the urges and impulses it has.

Alyssa Chang 31:43

Yes, 100% And I named the word predictability. And for me, I grew up in an environment that was emotionally very unpredictable. My mother has schizophrenia, so I woke up to like I don't know what mood she's going to be in. Was there going to be a lot of like chaos or instability? And so you know, knowing the brain needs predictability, it will naturally start looking for the things that it can predict, and that's why food is something that we end up coping with, is because it is predictable, right? I know exactly what you know I'm going to eat. I know exactly how many clinical calories might be in it. I know what I might need to avoid, and so it creates like a sense of order in our brain. And from the outside, it can look like, oh, all this is super disciplined, but like underneath that, my nervous system was trying to create safety through predictability. That's you know very different than someone who's making like intentional choices to feel good in their body.

Stephanie Mara 32:34

Yeah, thanks for naming that too. That again, if you're someone who has found yourself in like what would be called chronic dieting. There's a predictability to dieting, where you know what you're gonna do. It gives you a plan. There's structure. There's order. There's control in it. And what you're naming is it gives your brain that predictability that it needs when maybe you're going through times of your life that feel very unpredictable.

Alyssa Chang 33:02

And a body that might feel very unpredictable too. Like I don't know if I'm going to get anxious. I don't know if my pain's going to take over today. If I'm going to get a migraine, it's like, okay, well let me hone in and focus on the one thing that I feel I have some semblance of control over.

Stephanie Mara 33:15

Yeah, you know I've seen the same thing with binge eating too, and I feel like even in my experience of when I was binge eating, that it got to a point where I realized I didn't want to be doing it anymore, but the predictability of it and knowing how I would feel, how I would feel through it, how I would feel the next morning was so safety producing to know what I was about to experience rather than the unknown of I've been binge eating in the evenings for so long, I don't even know how to navigate an evening without it anymore.

Alyssa Chang 33:49

Yes, 100%

Stephanie Mara 33:52

Yeah, and I want to come back around to the other thing that you mentioned, which I love and I do also so much is know what's different. Like so often, I feel like we're pointing out what's the same, what's not changing, where we feel stuck, and I don't know from maybe you can name like what parts of our brain actually are looking out for that, like looking out for the known rather than the like. But there are things that you're doing that are different that are leading potentially to different results, but I know, I think it might be the reticular activating system that like filters out anything that's not within our blueprint of like what we know or what we are go what we expect to happen.

Alyssa Chang 34:36

Yeah, yeah, I think that you know when we look at the nervous system, it is so hardwired to look out for red flags and danger, and I think that that's the system we're working with. And so, it takes a lot more effort to start to train the brain in a way to look for things that feel non-threatening, normal, neutral, and then also, yes, positive, joyous, good, all the things, and so when we're asking the question of like what is different, I think it gives us a bigger language of how to describe it versus even like was that good, was that bad, was that healthy, not healthy, which creates that very like oh gosh, I need to fit in these two boxes, and so when we create the language around what is different, I think it gives us a better opportunity to actually describe our internal experience, to also hear our intuition. And yes, as you had mentioned, your brain has like this threat filter, and so it's always moving information first through that threat filter based off of our own lived experiences and the hardwiring of our brain. And so, if something has the flavorings of our past that feel a little too familiar, where we weren't safe, your brain's going to sound the alarm bells, and we're going to create the symptoms we don't want to have out of protection. So, I might get anxiety because I smelt a scent of something that reminded me of something that was not pleasant for me, and so it's really about updating that outdated map to help my nervous system have a much more neutral response to it, and to teach myself that, like, oh, there is no threat in the room; the threat has passed. I'm okay.

Stephanie Mara 36:13

Yeah, and again, it sounds so small. Where what you're pointing to is that tiny little moment where you took three deep breaths before you started to eat, and you're like, whatever, I'm just breathing. And then that tiny little moment where, after a meeting, you checked in with yourself, and you like placed your hand on your heart, maybe did some tongue exercises, and then you're like, whatever, like that was so small, like that didn't do anything. But then, like your naming, suddenly you're getting into bed at night and you're falling right to sleep, and you're like, I don't know what was different, and it's all those tiny little moments that sometimes I feel like we bypass, where it's like, what is this even doing for me? But until we kind of like your naming pause and actually do maybe sometimes a self-assessment of the day, and actually look out for what were the cues of safety. What did I do for myself that actually led to me feeling more embodied, safer, more connected right now? And it is those tiny, tiny, tiny little moments where we do something different.

Alyssa Chang 37:16

Yes, 100% And what's challenging is again, like we want those big transformational steps because it can kind of convince us that a something is working. Where so much of nervous system work is we can only move at this pace that your nervous system understands to be safe. So where we're really naming is like, how do we really trust what our body is trying to tell us? How do we trust that our brain is trying to keep us safe and alive when every symptom we're getting is things that like don't make sense that make us feel worse. So I always like to help clients think about how they maybe swap questions. So instead of like, what's wrong with my body, right? What's wrong with my symptoms? Why is it just me? Why am I defective? Is really getting curious of like, oh, what is my body actually trying to tell me? And so much of us maybe fall into the category of how do I stop doing this, right? Like hunger becomes something we ignore, fatigue is something we push through, pain just becomes something that like our brains hardwired to either compartmentalize or push down. So over time, it makes sense that we stop listening to the body because we decided at some point that it wasn't something we could be trusted, and I think the irony of all of this is that most people are really trying to work really, really hard to control their body because they don't trust it. But the body has often been trying to protect them the entire time, so we just haven't learned how to speak the language and how to interpret it, and so this healing journey is really about how do I develop the language of understanding these cues? What is my anxiety actually trying to protect me from and teach me? Oh wow, okay, I get really overwhelmed by this crowded grocery store, so maybe I need to, you know, for now adjust my schedule. Like maybe I park a little further. I take a longer walk. I do some breathing. But there's so many lessons within the symptom. And again, if we can understand that, like they are there to protect us, we will be so much more informed with what we actually need to do from that education of understanding those symptoms.

Stephanie Mara 39:18

You're speaking my language. I feel like you just encapsulated everything that, like, is what I also try to teach. So I always get really excited when other people talk about this too, because I wish that, and maybe this will happen. You know, now that we're learning more about the nervous system. But I wish I had learned this when I was a teenager.

Alyssa Chang 39:38

Oh my god! For sure.

Stephanie Mara 39:39

Like how different it would have been when I was feeling so insecure and uncomfortable, and feeling all sorts of sensations I couldn't make sense with. And if I had had the language to be able to understand what my body was trying to tell me, and to be able to understand nervous system from maybe like a teenager lens, maybe. Maybe not my adult lens that I have now, but how different individuals might feel towards their body, and I completely agree with you that we need to change the questions that we're asking rather than what's wrong. Because I find that sometimes asking that question kind of perpetuates the threat response. Then we're looking actively for what's wrong, and...

Alyssa Chang 40:22

I need to fix it. Yeah, yeah, and so it's solution oriented to something that isn't actually what we need. We don't need to fix the body, right? Like the body is doing its job trying to protect us. And I think all the coping mechanisms we have with being hyper vigilant with food, exercising are just ways we're trying to control, and again, it is that loop we get caught in. And how do we find like that exit out of the loop? And it's like, oh yes, the education around this, the strategies that can help you feel and embody regulation versus intellectually knowing and understanding what you quote unquote should do. Like that, those are different languages we're speaking.

Stephanie Mara 40:59

Yeah, something that I actually just heard you pointing out as well is that it can be both, where yes, learn maybe the psychoeducation of what you're teaching about of like here's what's happening in your body, but then it needs to be paired with the nervous system somatic exercises and practices of we can't talk ourselves out of the response. We can understand it, which I think brings sometimes some relief for a lot of people of like, okay, I get what's happening in my body. This makes so much sense. But then, because we can't be like, hey, sympathetic nervous system, like you could turn off now. I'm totally safe. Like it doesn't really respond to that. It responds to more its language, which is us getting into the body and moving in the body in different ways, whether that be subtle or big. But that's what the nervous system is going to start to respond to.

Alyssa Chang 41:53

Yeah, it's a felt experience repeated over consistent times that we can then actually do the rewiring process. And I speak from personal experience where I read every single book. I was trying to analyze everything intellectually, and I was like, Why am I not better? You know, I know everything, and it was like, Oh, you are missing this very crucial bridge to have the felt experience to experience in real time. I'm feeling super anxious, and this happened recently. I was under recovered. I had a lot of sleep that wasn't what my norm is. I was actually in a session, and I was like, Oh, I am feeling panicky. And I was like, Oh, I have not felt this in a while. And my client is talking to me, and I'm like, Okay, we need to practice real time regulation. So I took my breath. I could feel the anxiety literally start to calm down, and I think we not that I wish upon everyone to have these anxious moments, but to wish upon you the tools that empower you to understand that, like, I actually have quote unquote more control in a situation, and I don't want control to be something that you know we deem as negative or anything. A lot of us seek it, right? We want to know what's coming up next. We want to know what's around the corner, and so these nervous system tools are little control levers to help us understand. Like, oh, I always be like anxious. I wonder why. Cool. Okay, let me now go to a tool to help teach my body. You're okay if you're just sitting in a session, like nothing's wrong. And having that experience was my own reminder of being like, ah, this stuff works. This stuff does work.

Stephanie Mara 43:23

Yeah, thank you for also just reminding everyone about how it is okay to want to find something that helps yourself. You know, I think you named it. I've named it as well of a lot of the times, even when I first started, like recovery work was also just like okay, you just need to sit with it. You just need to feel it. You just need to get into your body. And the only thing that helped me at the time was like I had to keep moving. That was the only thing that could help me be with the intensity in my body was if I just kept moving with the intensity. So it wasn't like I just sat there on the couch being like okay, I'm being with the intensity and and like just feeling more and more and more ultimately dysregulated because sometimes we don't have the capacity yet to be with that much discomfort. So I appreciate you naming that it's okay to want to find things that help yourself. And what I find is it's just building onto your sense of resources that it's not just maybe food or fill in the blank the one resource that you always go to scrolling on your phone, binge watching Netflix shows you know that it's like okay those can all be supportive and I have other options that meet me in when you I do that check in where am I at and what would actually help me in this moment?

Alyssa Chang 44:42

Yes, specificity so empowering. I often think about like what does it actually look like in a successful way when you do sit with discomfort. Like if it was a cartoon, you know, like I'm trying to play to my brain, like okay, you're feeling grief or you're feeling something really intense. And like you're told by someone to be like, yeah, you need to sit and feel it, but then what happens next? You know, I'm thinking like you just feel feel more and more, and then you're like, okay, I gotta go to work or something, and you're just like full of all these emotions and experiences. Like there's not a container that's clear and supportive of what does it truly mean to sit with discomfort, you know, and have the trust in yourself that you're like, I can do this, you know.

Stephanie Mara 45:27

Yeah, I completely agree. I think that that's where the direction of this field needs to go to in general is that nuance and being like, okay, can we, yes, acknowledge and name what is happening for me right now, but then being able to understand what is needed next for yourself to move through that experience-that maybe we need to update some of the language rather than like sit with it, because so like that doesn't give the imagery of what it actually is like to like interact and move with what is showing up.

Alyssa Chang 46:05

Yeah, because if we sit with it, it's just gonna sit there. It's gonna be there.

Stephanie Mara 46:09

It's gonna get bigger. Yeah, absolutely. Well, I'm curious. You know, we've explored so much today, and you've already offered a lot of really fantastic practices people can play with. You know, I always like to wrap up with a little baby step that people can play with. I'm curious if there is anything that you would add on that we haven't touched on that might be helpful for people to continue to practice in their own life.

Alyssa Chang 46:33

Yeah, I feel like maybe it's more of like how do we create a much more concise summary of like what we went through, and I feel like number one, like you are not broken. There is nothing wrong with you. Your brain and body are working so hard, and probably harder than you realize, to keep you safe and alive. And if we anchor in that foundation of like, there is nothing wrong with me. It's just my brain. You know, it gives us a more compassionate next step. And that compassionate next step is then to get curious, change the framing of the question. Instead of What's wrong with me? Why am I defective? Hmm, what might about this environment or situation might feel unsafe? What am I seeing as like a threat and a dangerous input to my brain? Then it could be like, okay, I'm feeling off. You don't even need to name a specific experience, but just things are feeling a little weird, and being able to name that already puts you in a more, let's say, empowered state because it downshifts the amygdala, which is our fear response part of the brain, and it brings back online our prefrontal cortex where we can make more decisions. And then we can actually have you insert the palming drill or around the world, bring that somatic felt experience of safety into your body, and after that whole experience you took yourself through, just distract away. Just be like, pat yourself on the back. Good job. I gave myself a little win. I did something different, and over time, when I repeat this, this is what's going to amount to bigger changes for myself. So maybe it's more of that like concise, like step by step process that you can you can lead today with. I love that, and thank you for naming. How do I move out of this? It's kind of like people know how to go on a diet, but don't know how to get out of a diet. Yeah, and what does maintenance look like? Right, like I was in this period of restriction, and now I'm like at my goal, and like, cool. Do I still eat restrictions? Like, how do I bring back normalcy? Yeah.

Stephanie Mara 48:22

Yeah. So I really love that you're naming like, okay, at the end of this, when maybe you feel a subtle shift of I feel a little bit calmer or more relaxed or more connected, you just go on with your day. If you then are like, okay, but I have nothing next in my day, it might be like, what do I want to do? Do I want to scroll on my phone? Do I want to take a walk outside? Do I want to go read a book? You know that you have choice in what you want to move on to, or sometimes it's your days are so packed. You do this amazing exercise in the middle of your day. It does help you kind of decrease that stress load that you were talking about, and then you have to go into a meeting, but it was effective enough to even have you navigate your day differently.

Alyssa Chang 49:08

Yeah, and I think the reality is, is like that also is part of the process. Is like, how can we do it just enough so that then you can actually step back into the meeting? Like, how do these practices become so practical that they can fit in between a day where you have packed back-to-back meetings, and I'm such a big fan of distraction because we really need to titrate this embodied experience of safety. Because many people don't know what that feels like, and what they do feel safe, it can feel so new and overwhelming. So, how do we actually plan for distraction being a part of this process? How do we plan for stepping back into life in a way that's like, yeah, this is just what I do. I regulate, and then I go into my meeting, and then it just becomes part of your routine. And again, over time, you'll start to see again those subtle shifts of like, wow, I can move through this process. I can show up in my meeting and be fully present.

Stephanie Mara 49:57

Yes, I think of them as micro moments of safety, rather than you have to like luxuriate and savor the safety for like an hour or all day. It's like, no, can I have a micro moment of safety so my body can get used to this felt sense, and then I'm going to go into a meeting that's probably going to activate me again.

Alyssa Chang 50:17

Yeah, yeah. But now we have the difference. Now we know, like, oh, interoception, right? Oh, this is safe. This is definitely not safe. I now have a clear understanding.

Stephanie Mara 50:26

Yeah, and like you pointed out, when you go into the meeting, knowing you have resources of like, I can breathe, I can feel my feet on the floor, I can do things for myself to navigate this activation differently. Oh my gosh, I loved this conversation and everything that you talked about today. I'm curious how individuals can keep in touch with you.

Alyssa Chang 50:46

Yes, so I have a website, coachalyssachang.com. If you do go to my website, there is a free masterclass. It's 45 minutes long. We go much deeper into the pain neuroscience. I do walk you through two additional brain-based tools live or in that coaching call, just so you can get have that experience of like, wow, my brain works really fast. This is what can shift in a matter of seconds. I also am on social media @coachalyssachang, and yeah, those are probably my two main platforms.

Stephanie Mara 51:15

Awesome! I will put those links in the show notes, and just thank you so much again for your time today and sharing all of your wisdom.

Alyssa Chang 51:21

Oh, thank you, Stephanie.

Stephanie Mara 51:23

Yeah. Well, to everyone listening, if you have any insights or aha moments from today's episode, email me at support@stephaniemara.com anytime. And I hope you all have a safety producing and satiating rest of the day. Bye!

Keep in touch with Alyssa:

Website: https://www.coachalyssachang.com/
Email: hello@coachalyssachang.com
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/coachalyssachang/
Free 45- minute masterclass: https://www.coachalyssachang.com/masterclassoptin