Hello beautiful soul
The first time I realised I was living in a constant stress response was in my kitchen.
My new husband had just asked me where the key was — not kindly, but not cruelly either — and I froze. Completely.
I couldn’t move.
And that moment terrified me.
Why was I reacting as though I was in danger when, logically, I wasn’t? Right...!?
That moment sent me back into therapy (for the third time), and it began the journey that’s shaped the last four years of my life — a journey into the nervous system, trauma, and how we learn to feel safe in our own bodies.
Through that work, I came to understand that I’d been living with complex PTSD for most of my adult life.
Not the kind that comes from a single catastrophic event — the kind that comes from chronic emotional wounding.
Small ruptures that accumulate over time until your system forgets what calm even feels like.
When I first read about complex PTSD, I thought:
“That’s not me. I wasn’t in a war zone.”
But it turns out you don’t need a battlefield to live in survival mode.
Sometimes the battlefield is your own home.
Or your own head.
And the hard truth is, whilst my body was overreacting, she was right, my husband wasn't telling me the truth.
What I learned through therapy — and later through my somatic trauma training — is that by the time you’re an adult, 95% of how you show up in the world is automatic.
That means your nervous system, not your rational mind, is running the show.
It’s deciding how you react, how you lead, how you love, and when you shut down. And in this case, my body was absolute correct.
But in beginning the journey of discovery, I found the truth of not just my marriage, but what my body had been carrying this whole time.
That’s why awareness is everything.
You can’t change what you can’t see.
And here’s the part I’ve never stopped being grateful for:
It was my body that lit the path that led me out of that marriage.
Long before my mind could make sense of it.
And that path led me to discover the truth of my husband.
So honey, if your body is speaking to you right now in ways that you can't quite explain, please listen.
When I started my investigation into myself, I was honouring a deep knowing that something deep inside me was saying, “no more.” It just took me a moment to figure out that the "hell no" was to the man that I loved so dearly.
My body became my roadmap back to myself.
Each step a reclamation of safety, of power, of trust.
And that’s why I say:
Walking away can be the most courageous act of self-leadership.
It’s the moment you stop abandoning yourself to keep the peace.
The moment you choose truth over belonging.
The moment your nervous system finally exhales and says: home.
The science bit: your vagus nerve + nervous system map.
The vagus nerve is like your body’s internal data highway — running from your brainstem down through your face, heart, lungs, and gut.
It’s what constantly tells your body whether you’re safe or in danger.
When your vagus nerve senses safety, your body relaxes.
When it senses threat, it shifts you into fight, flight, or freeze to protect you.
That’s why it’s often called the “soul nerve” — because it’s behind everything from how you breathe and digest, to how you connect, communicate, and even lead.
Here’s the simple version I teach in my work with leaders and teams:
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Ventral vagal (safety + connection): You’re open, creative, grounded. This is where you feel most yourself.
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Sympathetic (fight/flight): You’re mobilised — overworking, overthinking, overdoing. You’re trying to control or fix.
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Dorsal vagal (freeze): You shut down — underfunctioning, withdrawing, avoiding. You feel stuck, numb, or detached.
Every human moves through these states — but most of us don’t realise when it’s happening. We also tend to have places that we go, essentially whether we lean towards some form of activation or shut down.
Once you can name where you are, you can start to regulate.
That’s where freedom begins.
Understanding your nervous system isn’t just personal growth — it’s leadership work.
Most workplace conflict isn’t about competence.
It’s about dysregulation.
One person is overfunctioning.
Another shuts down.
Both are trying to stay safe in a system that’s pushing them past capacity.
When we can recognise our own stress responses — and those of others — we stop taking behaviour at face value and start leading with empathy and accountability at the same time.
That’s what I call adaptogenic leadership — learning to recover, respond, and regulate so we can hold more complexity without burning out.
If you’ve ever found yourself frozen, overreacting, or walking away from situations not quite sure why — this is your work too.
To get curious.
To learn your system.
To bring more of yourself online.
Because awareness creates choice. And choice creates freedom. And perhaps, my darling, freedom is exactly what you need.
Rooting for you always
Ruth x
Ps. This week I am hosting a FREE yoga class in the Sisterhood community that goes deeper into how we start to work with the nervous system. Whether to regulate or to activate.
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