Rainbow After Dark

Whisper into the void with me: https://rainbowafterdark.micro.blog

Podcast is on an indefinite hiatus

Note:

In this tender episode of Rainbow After Dark, I invite you into the heart of my inner process—where emotion, intuition, and discernment meet in real time. I’ll share from the raw edge of my own sensitivity, and speak on what it means to feel deeply in a world that often rewards disconnection. With a nervous system shaped by trauma and a healing path rooted in embodiment and self-trust, we’ll explore the slow, courageous work of emotional alchemy: metabolizing emotion into wisdom without bypassing or self-abandonment.

Together, let’s challenge the polished narratives of mainstream spirituality. I offer a compassionate critique of ideas like “high vs. low vibrational emotions,” affirming instead that all feelings are inherently worthy of presence. To quote myself: “There’s no such thing as a low or high vibrational emotion, okay? I will die on this hill.”

This was recorded in a moment of real-time vulnerability, and The Alchemist’s Laboratory is more than a conversation—it’s a lived example. In a nuanced return to my own intuition, I’ll model how to stay with what’s real, even when it’s messy or uncomfortable.

This is an offering to those who feel deeply, who question spiritual shortcuts, and who are learning—again and again—that their sensitivity is not a flaw but a compass.

Thanks for listening to Rainbow After Dark! If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss future ones. If something resonated with you, I’d love to hear your thoughts—feel free to leave a comment here, or on YouTube (I don’t use it much, but I exist!).

This podcast is a space for reflection and exploration—it is not a substitute for professional advice. Please take care of yourself and seek support as needed.

———

Transcript for Episode 8: “The Alchemist’s Laboratory”:

If you don’t know, I’m Rainbow, and this is Rainbow After Dark.

And this is the third time I’ve tried to record this episode. Not because I’m trying to make it perfect, but because the first time I screwed up the audio. I was working in a different way than I have done the other episodes—the other episodes in the past—and I, yeah… I ended up screwing up the original audio file and I couldn’t fix it and I wasn’t about to release it the way that I could release it so I recorded it again, and… it was… fine… but it didn’t feel right.

So, third time’s a charm.

We’re doing this again. If you’re listening in, welcome. It’s good to have you here.

Yeah. Let’s get into it.

So, today, what are we talking about?

I want to talk about alchemy.

So, what is alchemy?

Emotions are a big thing for me.

Now, the way we do this—energy—emotions are not problems to solve, okay? They’re not something to fix and they are not something to change. I feel like one of the things that we talk about a lot when it comes to emotions is: don’t be, you know, controlled by your emotions, and you can change, and you can control how you feel, blah blah blah blah, and like… okay, I get it.

But feelings are just feelings. That’s what they are. They are feelings and they are giving you information.

Everything is information.

Feelings are no exception.

I feel like, especially when it comes to the spiritual communities—spiritual field—there is a lot of demonization of emotions. There’s a lot of bypassing that is encouraged when it comes to emotions, suggesting that, well, if your, you know, natural state is, you know, bliss or whatever then you can choose to not feel suffering and blah blah blah.

There’s no such thing as a low or high vibrational emotion, okay?

Your anger comes up because it is showing you where your hurt is, what you’re protective of, where you need to set boundaries and make requests of people. It’s important and it loves you.

Your grief shows you what you have loved, what you care about, what is important to you in a different flavor. ‘Cause here’s the thing—you’re gonna hear me repeat a lot of this—emotions are just different flavors of the energy, okay?

They’re different flavors.

But ultimately, all of them carry a kernel of truth for you about your experience and what is important to you as the person you’re currently being right now—as the person who is inherent to you—who is natural to you.

Even our most rejected emotions, shame and fear—I feel like these are the two that people really, really don’t wanna feel—they are highly rejected. Fear especially.

No.

I highly disagree with this in like, a massive way.

Because through my process, this whole entire process of returning to myself, what has done the most good for me—what has helped me more than anything—has been befriending my fear.

The same with shame.

You know, ideally, it wouldn’t be this… quite this much of a task for us. We’d be—we’d be taught how to sit with our emotions. We’d be taught how to communicate how we feel and what we need in ways that don’t feel so threatening, that don’t feel so manipulative, that don’t feel misaligned with our integrity and with our fullness.

Being present and embodied is so important, and if you are bypassing and over intellectualizing what you feel, you’re going to stay stuck, and I don’t say this to shame you. I’m not telling you you’re doing it wrong—you’re in process, and that’s important. We can’t transform if we’re suppressing what we need to experience. So emotional sovereignty, emotional embodiment—full embodiment and acceptance of our experiences and the way we feel about those experiences—is key. And acceptance doesn’t mean that you’re okay with it necessarily; it means honoring and acknowledging what is. What is currently occurring in this present moment, or what you have felt about past experiences that might still need to be felt. ‘Cause just ‘cause it happened, you know, 30 years ago, doesn’t mean that it’s gone. It’s gonna live in your body until you feel it and process it. And this is a hard truth that I’ve had to learn. This is not something—this is still—this still can be challenging for me, right? I’m not talking from a place where I’m like oh I’m full—I’m fully—I don’t think that fully healed is a thing, right? As humans we are constantly in process, that is, that is the thing, you know? Even for me right now.

I’m sitting here and I’m talking to essentially myself. I’m talking to myself and if you’re listening to this, talking to you, who is, in some ways… you’re me, and I’m you, right?

We’re connected, we’re part of all of it, and I’m just being here, sitting in the discomfort that I feel about talking about this. Because it feels like I’m breaking the rules. Like, this is something that is really, deeply embedded in my system—that I can’t speak out against the status quo, that I have to do everything perfectly, that I can’t make mistakes.

And that’s okay.

When I stopped trying to fix how I felt—when I stopped trying to change it—that’s when things started to shift. Not just emotionally, but physically, spiritually. That’s when I realized that this wasn’t just healing—this was alchemy. It is an alchemical process.

And if you want to really alchemize your experience as a human, the way to do that is through feeling.

I do feel like the way that we do this though—the way that a lot of people talk about it—is really complicated and it’s not, like, sometimes they make it seem like it’s just a one off thing where you just, like, you just decide to feel it and/or you decide to let it go or you detach or whatever. I’ve heard—I’ve heard a lot of things over the years, and there was a period of time where I was like “obviously these people know more than I do, they’re in better situations in their life it looks like, so they must know something I don’t know, maybe I’m just doing it wrong”.

I get that.

There is certain emotions that are not as easy—that are much more challenging or uncomfortable or even painful to feel—than others.

Just personify your emotions.

This is weird for me to describe because I have what would be considered aphantasia.

One of the most interesting ones for me was the personification of control.

So, I don’t know if this is something that most people do naturally or can do.

If this is something that you do or have an experience with or do consciously and intentionally—I would love to hear about this, because I’ve never really talked to anybody about this before and sometimes it makes me feel a little nuts.

A lot of this relates to our intuition and intuition, I feel like, is something that’s very vaguely touched on, you know? We’re often told to listen to our intuition and to trust our intuition, but what does that actually mean?

And I know this from my own experience as someone who was very severely disconnected from their boy for the majority of their life.

And part of that is our intuition, right?

Intuition is a felt sense of knowing—it is a quiet clarity that’s rooted in inner safety. Being able to be safe with ourselves. And if we’re rejecting our emotions—if we’re rejecting the way we feel or if we’re rejecting our experiences because of some perception or believe that tells us that we’re not allowed to see them the way we actually do—or that we’re wrong or bad or low vibrational or whatever the heck the case may be—sinful—I don’t know. I didn’t grow up in that kind of paradigm, but I know it’s a thing. Then we are not able to actually access the safety that we need—the inner safety we need—to actually get in touch with our intuition. To actually be in alignment with ourselves, and in our integrity, and to be coherent with ourselves.

Like I said, trauma can masquerade as intuition—but it will show up as urgency, it’ll show up as fear, it’ll show up as reactivity—and the difference is that intuition tends to be very calm, really. At least for me. It’s like, it’s neutral—nearly robotic. It is devoid of emotional charge. It is quiet. Sometimes completely inconvenient. You don’t always want to hear what intuition has to say, and it’s not from some sense of reason, right?

Logic comes from our brain, form our mind, whereas intuition, it is a body-based knowing. And how it works for different people, I’m sure is different. I know in my experience, when I was working to really cultivate and reconnect to my intuition, it was a really challenging process to learn how much my trauma had been mimicking what I thought was intuition and that it was a mind-based process.

But there’s a big difference between feeling calm in knowing and panicked, and clarity versus chaos or confusion. Confusion is essentially, like, the embodiment of incoherence, which is why I often consider confusion to be its own form of clarity. It means I don’t have clarity about something—something is unclear—and that itself is a form of clarity because I may not know specifics, but I know something is incoherent.

So in the world that we have, that disconnects us from ourselves, form our bodies, from our intuition—how do we actually reconnect and how that process is gonna be different for everybody.

And it’s always really weird to talk about, like, parts of me as if they’re not me—as if they’re external of me or separate from me—‘cause they’re not. And I know they’re not. And it’s also a think where, like, to be in relationship with something, there is inherently some subtle separation. Not because there is inherent separation or real separation, but it’s like defining the edges so that you know where to work with the energies—the person, the place, the thing, the whatever.

I’ve even—as I’ve gotten more adept at working with this, one of the most interesting experiments that I did regarding, like, listening to my intuition, was what I sometimes refer to as the Stardew Valley mining experience—experiments. And if you’re not familiar with Stardew Valley, it is a farming simulator game. It’s a cute little, like, pixel art kind of… it’s a, you know, very calm kind of cozy little game. You get a farm and you can grow different plants and you can go fishing and you can mine and you get cute little cows and chickens and stuff. It’s like a really cute game.

And I don’t really know how this works and so if somebody out there has, like, explanation for how something like this works, especially because, like, this is, you know, this is a random program in a video game—that somehow my intuition was able to pick up on and give me some degree of instruction and direction for.

It’s still really challenging sometimes—it can still—I still question, you know, sometimes I get these hits and I’m just like, what? Why?

Even right now, you know, I’m sitting here—I’m questioning if I am off somehow… something about something I’m doing maybe doesn’t feel quite right, and I’m not sure why.

So maybe I need to put the phone down and stop.

So, I actually did stop recording after this.

Essentially, it’s the cultivation of free will.

And we’re gonna make mistakes.

You know, you get to be okay with making mistakes throughout the process of refining your discernment and reconnecting to yourself. And that can be really challenging, especially if you’re someone like me who has a history of perfectionism, and, you know, whatever your particular flavor—flavors of survival based adaptations are.

So it’s important to remember that discernment is about listening—really listening—to your body.

There’s a lot of moments where discernment didn’t show up in some big, dramatic way—it was a quiet “no” in my chest or that weird kind of “off” feeling that I couldn’t explain. Even if everything seemed fine on the surface.

Practicing discernment is not always easy.

This is an emotional, intuitive journey.

Every soft little moment of curiosity—that matters.

I know I personally am really bad at directions.

You’re your own alchemist, your own oracle, and your own home.

So welcome home.

I’d love to know how this landed for you, so if you have some thoughts, if you have some feelings—feel free to let me know.

And remember, that I love you.

Send us a text

Hey void whisperers!

Due to some tech gremlins and creative recalibrations, I will not have an episode available this week.

I always want what I share to feel aligned and intentional, and this week asked for a little more space.

We’ll be back next Thursday at 7PM PST, so please tune in then!

Thank you so much for being here, for listening, and for your patience.

Sending you love from the in-between. 💕 

Thanks for listening to Rainbow After Dark! If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss future ones. If something resonated with you, I’d love to hear your thoughts—feel free to leave a comment on YouTube or connect with me on IG @RainbowAfterDark (I don’t use it much, but I exist!).

This podcast is a space for reflection and exploration—it is not a substitute for professional advice. Please take care of yourself and seek support as needed.

More ways to connect coming soon—stay tuned, and thanks for being here.

Whisper into the void with me: https://rainbowafterdark.micro.blog

Podcast is on an indefinite hiatus

In this episode, we enter the soft, messy, ever-changing place of becoming—this is me coming home to myself in real time. This is an unscripted, vulnerable stream of thought on authenticity, emotional fluidity, embodiment, and the process of learning how to feel. Let’s explore the ways we’re often taught to hide, repress, or perform ourselves into safety—and what it means to begin shedding those layers.

We’ll talk about the fear that comes up when we let ourselves be seen, the complexity of discerning between intuition and trauma responses, and the tenderness of learning how to meet all of our emotions—especially the ones that feel inconvenient or overwhelming. This is an invitation (for you and for me) to soften, to stay curious, and to practice the radical art of not abandoning ourselves.

If you’re navigating your own return to self, I hope this feels like a small recognition along the way.

Welcome home. 💕

Thanks for listening to Rainbow After Dark! If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss future ones. If something resonated with you, I’d love to hear your thoughts—feel free to leave a comment here, or on YouTube (I don’t use it much, but I exist!).

This podcast is a space for reflection and exploration—it is not a substitute for professional advice. Please take care of yourself and seek support as needed.

———

Transcript for Episode 7 — “Welcome Home”:

If you don’t know, I’m Rainbow, and you’re listening to Rainbow After Dark.

I would like to invite you to be here, to be present with me, and to remind you that right now you don’t need to fix or figure anything out. And this is a space of exploration, and I may very well be saying that more for myself than anyone else—and I also always just have the hope that perhaps there’s a chance that what I say could help somebody else out there.

So if you’re here, if you’re joining me—welcome.

I’d like to invite you into this space.

And what I want to talk about today is rediscovering authenticity and reclaiming self.

I feel like we often hear the advice “just be yourself”, “just be you”, “just be yourself”, which isn’t… I have complicated feelings about this.

Because most of us are kind of like bundles of survival strategies, right? I feel like humans are extremely sensitive. If you listened to my last episode I feel like I was extremely clear about this: we are soft, squishy, sensitive things.

Unraveling what it means to be our authentic self is a complicated process and it takes a lot of commitment and a lot of compassion and even courage to be able to do that, and I also understand that not everyone has the capacity or the resources or the support to be able to do that. Because it’s also really important to acknowledge that in order to be authentic—truly authentic—we have to have some degree of safety, right? Which is-it feels weird for me to say that, as someone who has never really experienced safety. I don’t know if I’ve ever felt safe in my life. I am learning very much how to feel safe with myself and that’s been a very long and ongoing process, and I’m doing my best to learn how to be safe in relationship with and to others, which is really scary for me. And I feel like, in some ways, it’s sad because so many of us are so shaped by what we—our survival strategies—who we’ve had to become and adapt to being in order to survive, in order to continue living in this world that we have, this world that we have designed. And I often feel like even though the world we exist in is designed by humans, it’s not designed for humans. It’s pure irony.

I know for me I developed a pattern of fawning, of people pleasing—I have a tendency toward perfectionism and ironically, I also kind of, like, inversely had a tendency to be kind of a little bit rebellious—a bit counter culture, alternative, that kind of thing. It was like I was stuck in the space between what other people expected of me and needed of me and rejection of that because it felt incorrect. And neither of them—neither of those expressions of me were fully honest. Which, you know… in some ways it was. It was honest to where I was at, right? It was honest to my present experience—to the experience I was having at the time and the things I was going through even if it was inauthentic. Which sounds contradictory and at the same time I don’t think it is.

And untangling that—exploring how these adaptations limit us—it’s a lot, right?

Especially because there is so much that is deemed “unacceptable” depending on the culture you’re in. There’s a lot of things that are deemed as being unacceptable and cognitively, I feel like in our present day climate, it’s easy to dismiss how important acceptance really is, right? Like, we all kind of know vaguely like, oh we all wanna be, like, loved and accepted, right? But I don’t feel like we always give full stock to what that really means and why it is so hard wired for us. Because historically as humans, if you were not accepted first off by your caregivers as a child, as an infant, you… I mean, you wouldn’t survive. You had to have that basic level of acceptance from your caregivers in order to survive into childhood and adolescence and adulthood.

How do I remove the masks?

And we accept that this is a process and that it is something that you choose over and over again, and each moment where you realize that you’re not—that you’re being inauthentic—is a moment that is inviting you to grow and practice compassion for yourself.

When we let go of those old identities, when we take those masks off, we are able to make space for what wants to emerge. For what feels less like survival and more like flourishing.

And also accepting that as we go through this process and become more ourselves, as we begin to accept and integrate our wholeness and our experiences, there’s a lot of feelings that are going to come up and we’re gonna have to meet grief and anger and fear. We might feel depressed, we might feel anxious. We might have already felt those things but they might come up in a way that has a different kind of texture or flavor that we’re not really accustomed to.

I feel like most people aren’t given the tools or the space or the resources or the support to actually feel their feelings, and when you don’t feel your feelings they just leak out sideways. They don’t stay contained. You know, you’re-you’re trying to bottle a tsunami. And this just doesn’t work. And you can try—but controlling your feelings is… I don’t feel like that’s really the goal, right?

I know for me, befriending fear, naming fear as my friend and not an enemy, not something to fight or beat or overcome, that has made a huge difference in the way I operate and the amount of compassion that I can have for myself and then extend to others.

Even right now, there’s a lot of fear coming up for me in expressing everything that I’m saying because even if nobody hears me, even if nobody ever listens to this, I feel vulnerable because this is a true expression of my thoughts, right?

A lot of this has to do with just, not only listening to our emotions, but listening to our bodies, and I think emotions are kind of born from the body. There’s a sort of feedback loop between the mind and the body when it comes to emotions, right? Because the way you think can absolutely influence the way you feel, but the way you feel also influences the way you think and it’s a whole thing.

And I also feel like most of us are very disconnected from our bodies. We are taught to ignore our body’s signals, our intuition, and not honor that our somatic experience is what really shapes our reality. And we have to understand it—we get a chance to understand it and what it wants to tell us and what it means for us as people and utilize it as a sort of gateway to what—to truth.

And this is especially hard if we have been gaslit and abandoned and invalidated and dismissed, especially repeatedly, especially throughout our entire lives throughout multiple, you know, relationships and experiences where this is something that’s really reinforced. That our body and our feelings and our experiences can’t be trusted.

And then trying to differentiate the sensations you feel—is what you’re feeling, you know, are you just, are you, are you triggered?

And I feel like humans tend to be quite intuitive creatures, right?

Everything is energy, and different energies kind of have different flavors, different textures—what is palatable and enjoyable for different people is going to be different. And our own personal perceptions are going to also contribute to how we actually interpret certain energies, and especially if we’ve experienced copious amounts of trauma, ongoing stress, you know, chronic stress—various experiences that I feel are fairly common throughout the scope of humanity, right?

Extending compassion to ourselves and just doing our best—doing what we can to be aware and conscious and compassionate, first and foremost, to be compassionate towards ourselves—to make room for the fluidity, you know, that—the multiplicity, the evolution—because we’re not static.

We’re not static beings.

I’ve had people in the past accuse me of being inauthentic because I’m not the same with everyone and I can understand that kind of perception, right?

Ideally we don’t abandon ourselves.

It’s a balance.

Each moment, through each little moment that we are able to really connect to ourselves is transformative. It’s radical. It’s a radical thing to choose self compassion—to choose not to abandon yourself, to choose to hold yourself accountable in a loving way. Because we’re not trying to be perfect, here. Nobody’s perfect and what even is perfect? Even if that was attainable, I feel like everyone’s idea of perfection would be different. So that’s not the goal—it’s never the goal. You know what they say, they say “progress over perfection,” right?

Because this is all just about coming home to ourselves and the journey that we go on in order to get there, and the journey is the thing.

And sometimes that’s frustrating and that is fair.

But that’s the entire point.

I don’t feel like we would incarnate as humans and have this experience of being humans if we were meant to stay static—if we were meant to just be one thing and experience one thing.

We’re here for the full spectrum, right?

‘Cause the other thing, too, is that sometimes, I think, we think we want to be a certain version, a certain character, or even caricature of ourselves. Or we are attracted to something in someone else that we want for ourselves. And it’s important to ask “why”? You know, what does that mean for me?

But are you at peace with that?

These are just thoughts—my thoughts.

Take it or leave it.

I do hope that if you’re listening, if you’re still here listening to me, that there’s something I’ve said that has felt like it is recognition.

I think I’m gonna wrap this up, so, if you’re still here—thank you.

I would like to invite you to reflect a bit and maybe ask:

You are not alone in this.

I am here and I exist and I am—this is my journey, too, right?

I don’t have it all figured out.

I’m figuring it out as much as I can figure it out—I’m walking the path, I am taking each step—even though it’s dark—trusting that it’s… it might make sense at some point, right?

So, I encourage you—if you’re able to do your best to meet yourself with softness, with grace, with care, and compassion—wherever you are, whatever part of the journey you’re at, whatever your journey looks like.

You’re here.

So thank you for being here.

And remember, that I love you.

We’d love to connect! Feel free to send us a text!

A gentle practice for arriving in the present moment.

This practice is an invitation to pause and come home to yourself, just as you are. There’s nothing to fix, no state to achieve—only space to soften, to feel, and to be. Through a simple guided journey, you’ll be gently reminded that you are not alone in what you’re holding.

Using breath, body awareness, and compassionate presence, Soft Landing creates room for tenderness, regulation, and connection with your own inner wisdom. Whether you’re feeling overwhelmed, untethered, or simply needing a moment of grace, this practice offers a place to rest—a reminder that you are here, and that is enough.

Music Credit: “Sincerely” by Kevin MacLeod

Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License

https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Source: https://incompetech.com/music/royalty-free/index.html?isrc=USUAN1100771

Artist: https://incompetech.com/

Thanks for listening to Rainbow After Dark! If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss future ones. If something resonated with you, I’d love to hear your thoughts—feel free to leave a comment on YouTube or connect with me on IG @RainbowAfterDark (I don’t use it much, but I exist!).

This podcast is a space for reflection and exploration—it is not a substitute for professional advice. Please take care of yourself and seek support as needed.

More ways to connect coming soon—stay tuned, and thanks for being here.

Whisper into the void with me: https://rainbowafterdark.micro.blog

Podcast is on an indefinite hiatus

A gentle practice for arriving in the present moment.

This practice is an invitation to pause and come home to yourself, just as you are. There’s nothing to fix, no state to achieve—only space to soften, to feel, and to be. Through a simple guided journey, you’ll be gently reminded that you are not alone in what you’re holding.

Using breath, body awareness, and compassionate presence, Soft Landing creates room for tenderness, regulation, and connection with your own inner wisdom. Whether you’re feeling overwhelmed, untethered, or simply needing a moment of grace, this practice offers a place to rest—a reminder that you are here, and that is enough.

———

Transcript for “Soft Landing Practice”:

Wherever you are…

Softly… arrive.

Let your eyes soften… or close, if that feels safe.

You’re here.

Begin to notice your breath…

Inhale…

You might even let your exhale be a little longer than your inhale.

Let your body know: it’s okay to soften.

You can’t think your way into safety.

Bring your attention now to one point of contact—

Let that be an anchor.

If your mind wanders, that’s okay.

Notice any areas that feel tense, tight, or guarded.

Maybe offer a few words like:

No judgment. No rush.

See if you can invite in a sense of support.

You are a soft, squishy, sensitive thing—

Your nervous system is not broken.

Maybe now, in this small moment,

Take one more slow inhale…

And when you’re ready…

You’re here.

[Music fades]

———

Music Credit: “Sincerely” by Kevin MacLeod

Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License

creativecommons.org/licenses/…

Source: incompetech.com/music/roy…

Artist: incompetech.com

Thanks for listening to Rainbow After Dark! If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss future ones. If something resonated with you, I’d love to hear your thoughts—feel free to leave a comment here, or on YouTube (I don’t use it much, but I exist!).

This podcast is a space for reflection and exploration—it is not a substitute for professional advice. Please take care of yourself and seek support as needed.

More ways to connect coming soon—stay tuned, and thanks for being here.

Whisper into the void with me: https://rainbowafterdark.micro.blog

Podcast is on an indefinite hiatus

Note: This episode touches on themes of fire, loss, and trauma.

In this episode of Rainbow After Dark, we explore the beautiful, complicated truth of what it means to be human: we’re soft, squishy, sensitive things.

We’re made of water and nerve endings, after all—fluid-filled bodies with spongey brains and tender hearts trying to make sense of a world that often demands we toughen up and disconnect. But what if our sensitivity isn’t a flaw?

Let’s go on a journey through the nervous system—our body’s operating system—and the ways it silently shapes every part of our experience, from our emotions and relationships to our sense of safety and belonging.

I’ll do my best to name something many of us feel: that beneath our overwhelm, anxiety, and disconnection is a nervous system doing its best in a world that rarely feels safe.

This episode is a love letter to the sensitive ones, the tender-hearted, the emotionally attuned, and anyone who’s ever been told they were “too much.” It’s also an invitation—to soften, to listen, and to reconnect not just with yourself, but with the systems we live in and the culture we create together.

This episode closes with a short grounding practice to help you come home to your body.

Because regulation isn’t about fixing yourself.

It’s about remembering your softness, reclaiming your sensitivity, and building a world where it’s safe to belong.

(The longer practice mentioned in the episode is available as the “Soft Landing” Practice!)

Thanks for listening to Rainbow After Dark! If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss future ones. If something resonated with you, I’d love to hear your thoughts—feel free to leave a comment here, or on YouTube (I don’t use it much, but I exist!).

This podcast is a space for reflection and exploration—it is not a substitute for professional advice. Please take care of yourself and seek support as needed.

———

Transcript for Episode 6 — “Soft, Squishy, Sensitive Thing”::

The average adult human is about 55 to 60% water. We’re more liquid than solid. We’re basically some animated, sentient jello—you’ve got some solid bits to help you move around but let’s be real here… you’re soft. Squishy, even. And that’s okay.

And it’s not just our bodies that are soft and squishy—we’re emotionally sensitive. Our hearts and minds are tender, whether we like it or not.

We are soft, squishy, sensitive things.

Despite what society would have us think about being soft, squishy, and sensitive; I’m here to affirm that even the most rough, rigid, and resilient of us (even if secretly) are soft, squishy, and sensitive at our core. It doesn’t mean we can’t be those other things (you can be more than one thing!), however, I wholeheartedly believe that you will not find a single person on this planet that is completely distanced from being soft, squishy, and sensitive, both literally and figuratively.

This squishy softness is exactly what makes our nervous system such an integral part of our experience. It’s super sensitive, and it’s in charge of more than our egos often want to admit. It picks up on energy, it controls how we feel, how we react, and how we connect with our reality.

Before we get into this; I’m not a doctor or a therapist or a certified anything—I’m a Fellow Human™ who has spent a long time navigating the human experience and realizing my life is some sort of chaotic science experiment. I have lived through enough plot twists to qualify as a case study. Although I can’t offer medical advice, I can offer my story—and maybe some language and frameworks that might help someone else make sense of things. I hope you appreciate my metaphors.

If you’re a human (if you’re listening to this, I am assuming you’re a human) who has ever been told “you’re too sensitive!” that “you need to toughen up!” or to “grow some thicker skin!”, this is for you.

So, humans… we’re these jiggly, fluid-filled meat suits walking around with our tender little feelings and spongey brains, and we needed a system to keep all of it coordinated. Enter (insert boss music): the nervous system. AKA: the body’s communication superhighway. It’s not just about reflexes or those weird twitches when you’re falling asleep—hypnagogic jerks or whatever they’re called—it’s literally your operating system. It’s the reason you can move your hands, feel your feelings, freak out about that email you forgot to send or that other thing you forgot to do (you know the one). The reason you cry when a dog or cat looks at you with their cute little face, or get totally overwhelmed in the grocery store. It is all the nervous system.

It’s like a squishy sponge of sorts—it absorbs all the signals in our environment and filters them through our internal lens of safety—or lack thereof.

Even though this thing is running the show, most of us never really learned how it works—or how to take care of it. I mean, it’s called the ‘nervous’ system, and yet no one thought to mention that it might be connected to, I don’t know, feeling nervous? Anxious? Burned out? Wild.

As I mentioned, the nervous system is basically like your operating system or your body’s internal Wi-Fi network. Except it’s much faster than any Wi-Fi, much older than any software we’ve ever built (or anything we’ve ever built, period), and it never turns off—even when you sleep. It lets you feel things, move, breathe, digest food, doom-scroll, cry during an ASPCA commercial, or every time you watch a Pixar movie. It’s electric, it’s chemical, and it is deeply relational.

It’s also incredibly sensitive—kind of like that one friend who picks up on every subtle shift in a room’s energy (me, I’m that friend). Except that friend is also in charge of regulating your breathing, your blood pressure, your ability to focus, your muscle tension, your sense of time, and your reaction to someone asking you, ‘Hey, can we talk?’

And here’s The Thing: if that system gets overwhelmed or disrupted—and for a lot of us, it has, over and over and over and over and over again—sometimes on a daily basis—it doesn’t only impact your body. It changes your thoughts. Your emotions. Your sense of self. Your capacity for connection. It even shapes what kind of world you believe is possible.

And when we’re all navigating our own dysregulation, it’s no surprise we live in a world that reflects this kind of disconnection. Our culture encourages disconnection; it pushes us to preform, to shut down, to keep moving even when our bodies—and nervous systems—are screaming for rest.

When your body is constantly in survival mode—when it doesn’t feel safe to rest, to feel, to connect—it doesn’t just change you. It changes what kind of culture we create. A society full of dysregulated people will build systems that reflect that dysregulation.

So, let’s talk about this beautifully complex, often overlooked, and deeply sensitive system that shapes our entire human experience: the nervous system.

If you’ve ever found yourself crying at a stoplight for no apparent reason, forgetting how to breathe because someone used that tone, or staring at the ceiling at 3AM contemplating the collapse of civilization and why that one person hasn’t texted you back—it’s not just you “being dramatic.” It’s your nervous system doing its best to interpret a confusing world with limited information and ancient wiring.

Your nervous system is not just this biological thing that controls your heartbeat and digestion and makes your eyelid twitch when you’re stressed. It’s also the system that helps you decide if it’s safe to love, to rest, to speak up, to be seen.

And for a lot of us—the answer has been “no” for a really long time.

When we talk about disconnection, we’re not just talking about the kind where you forget to respond to a text or ghost someone (although, yes, that too). We’re talking about a physiological disconnection: from the body, from self, from safety, from other people, and from the moment we’re in. It’s not a personality flaw—it’s an adaptation. A brilliant one, actually. If your body had to shut down certain signals, numb out feelings, or go on high alert to survive something that didn’t feel survivable… that wasn’t a failure. That was intelligence. That was your body protecting you.

But those same protective strategies—when they stay switched on for years or even decades—sometimes generations—they start to become the thing that keeps us stuck. Personally, relationally, and collectively.

On a personal level, disconnection can feel like being trapped in your own mind. Like no matter how much you journal, talk it through, try to “figure it out,” something still doesn’t shift. Like there’s a delay between what you know and what you feel. It can look like burnout, anxiety, hyper-independence, chronic illness, self-sabotage, numbing, or just feeling like you’re not fully here. (Raise your hand if you’ve ever disassociated during a conversation and came back to earth just in time to nod like you knew what the heck was going on.)

In relationships, dysregulation can sound like:

But this isn’t just about us as individuals—our collective nervous system shapes our world.

We live in a world that rewards disconnection. It normalizes burnout. It treats rest like laziness and overwork like virtue. It tells us to “suck it up”, “push through”, “keep going”, to “hustle harder, just do more”, swoosh included…—even when every fiber of our being is screaming “NO”.

But here’s the hope: if disconnection is something we’ve been conditioned into, reconnection is something we can choose—over and over, in small, tender ways. We can relearn how to listen to the body. How to move toward safety instead of away from it. How to be with ourselves, and with each other, in a way that doesn’t require us to armor up all the time.

Regulation isn’t about “fixing” yourself. It’s about remembering your softness. Reclaiming your sensitivity. Giving your nervous system a chance to feel safe enough to show up fully. And when we do that—not just as individuals, but as communities—we start to build a world that isn’t just about surviving… but about actually belonging.

Our nervous systems shape our entire experience as humans. They control how we think, how we feel, how we interact, how we function… it isn’t just a biological concept; it is mental, it is emotional, it is everything.

Now, I live in the US so I know my view is US-centric, but based on my observations, most people are walking around with some degree of dysregulation. That’s not a personal failing—it’s a symptom of our culture. In our current cultural climate, a mature, fully regulated nervous system is extremely rare, if it exists at all. It could just be a myth.

Dysregulation isn’t just a personal issue—it’s at the root of systemic problems like violence, oppression, and destruction.

And here’s something we don’t talk about nearly enough: you cannot regulate a nervous system that is still under threat. You can try. You can have moments of relief. You can build tools. But no amount of deep breathing or somatic practice will fully ‘rewire’ a system that doesn’t have food, safety, housing, or support.

Those of us who are more resourced have more capacity to regulate, and thus more responsibility to help shape safer systems—not from a place of saviorism, but from a place of relational integrity.

Sometimes these regulation practices are even weaponized or used to spiritually bypass the very real, material conditions people are living in. True nervous system healing can’t be divorced from justice, safety, and care.

I feel like it’s really important to talk about all of this because I believe disconnection and nervous system dysfunction is at the root of all systemic issues. It’s what allows us to harm others, to exploit others or treat them as subhuman, to harm our home—our planet.

Regulation isn’t about fixing yourself; it’s about remembering our softness and reclaiming our sensitivity.

Years ago, throughout most of my 20s, I was mostly housebound, relying on a caregiver, and I was visiting doctors, physical therapists, and therapists like it was a full time job. I was in severe chronic pain, completely exhausted, and I felt hopeless. Even after many years of therapy and medical treatment, something was missing. It wasn’t until I began exploring body-based approaches that I realized the key was connection and nervous system regulation.

Now: I live independently, my pain levels are the lowest they’ve been since I was a teenager, and while I do still deal with constant pain and various symptoms, I’ve made more progress in the last few years—mostly through somatic practices and nervous system regulation—than I did in the entire decade before that. And I had no idea this was possible—when I started doing this kind of work, it was solely to help me process trauma, I had no idea it would affect every aspect of my life.

I had a few therapists over the years recommend the book “The Body Keeps The Score” by Bessel van der Kolk and while I am aware of some controversy around the book and the author since reading it, when I read the book and he specified top-down versus bottom-up processing, I had a lightbulb moment.

They say trauma is stored in the body, and that’s true—but more specifically, it’s stored in the nervous system. It’s not just a memory—it’s a physiological imprint. A loop of signals that tell us we’re ‘not safe’—even if we are. And if the trauma is ongoing, that loop doesn’t stop. It doesn’t get archived. It stays open. Raw, and alert.

I started looking into somatic practices and nervous system dysfunction and how to heal my nervous system.

I had almost completely disconnected from my body due to my history of pain and trauma—I often didn’t want to have to have a body, I felt frustrated and hopeless—I learned to reconnect to my body, to begin loving and caring for it, and I learned to speak to myself with kindness, to reconnect to my feelings and my genuine experience of existence.

Not to be dramatic, but it completely changed my life.

I feel like the essential role of the nervous system in healing and nervous system regulation is being talked about more than it ever has been, and I still feel like this is not something widely discussed or implemented and there is a massive, humongous, gigantic gap in what we know and what we teach people.

Because you also have to remember—the healing I’ve done over the past 5 years or so has been facilitated almost entirely on my own. Despite my best attempts at finding a somatic therapist or similar practitioner, I wasn’t able to access anyone who took my insurance. I wonder what kind of progress I could have made with someone who was trained for this kind of work. And that’s something I find extremely frustrating, too—there are people trained in this kind of treatment but accessing them if you aren’t properly resourced is nearly impossible and the people who would benefit the most from this kind of intervention are the people who often don’t have the resources to actually access it.

I also want to acknowledge that when we talk about nervous system regulation, we’re not just talking about healing trauma from the past. We’re talking about surviving trauma that’s still happening. Because for a lot of people, trauma isn’t a singular event—it’s a condition. A context. A lack of safety that continues. And if someone doesn’t have access to food, shelter, or support, asking them to regulate their nervous system is kinda like asking someone to meditate their way out of a house fire.

I encourage you to think about how this disconnection shows up for you and people you know in your life—how are you numbing yourself or avoiding what you feel or feel you need to do? Do you feel anxious? Depressed? Exhausted? Are you prone to overthinking? Prone to illness or have chronic illness or chronic pain? Do you struggle to just be present with what’s in front of you?

When we reconnect with ourselves, with our bodies, with our feelings… we can access more awareness, we increase our capacity to tolerate discomfort, our capacity to focus, our capacity for connection, our capacity for life.

The world often teaches us to disconnect from ourselves. From each other. From our lived experiences. From reality. And I don’t blame people for being dissconnected or even for choosing disconnection because choosing connection is not an easy path—not with the way things currently are.

But connection is essential to life and softness isn’t weakness—it allows for more fluid experiences of intelligence, increased adaptability, and genuine empowerment.

If you have started cultivating regulation and awareness—if you have also identified the need for softness and connection—thank you.

And if you want to start and don’t know where to begin—begin by noticing. Noticing your breath, how your body feels, what emotions you’re carrying. Not to try to fix or change anything, but to be present with it. And slow down. Take a deep breath, and slow down. Your nervous system will thank you—the world will thank you, even if it’s in the whispers of the energy rippling through the cosmos.

And if you can’t begin, that’s okay. You’re where you need to be.

Okay, we’ve just covered a lot—softness, science, society, sentient jello—and if your brain is doing that thing where it’s spiraling with excitement or maybe it’s floating somewhere near the ceiling like a balloon, that’s okay. Let’s give your nervous system a chance to catch up.

So, wherever you are, unless you’re driving or doing something that requires your full attention—please do not meditate while operating heavy machinery—see if you can just pause for a minute or two.

Begin by noticing the places where your body is being held right now. That might be the feeling of your feet on the floor, your back against a chair, your hands resting in your lap.

Just breathe naturally, softly. No need to deepen it unless your body wants you to.

See if there’s a small part of you—your shoulders, your jaw, your hands—that could let go just a little.

Then, if it feels okay, place a hand on your chest, or over your heart, maybe on your belly—somewhere that feels grounding or soothing.

Finally, take a moment to thank your body—not because it’s perfect or pain-free or doing everything you want it to, but because it’s still here. Still trying. Still communicating.

And when you’re ready, slowly bring yourself back to the space around you.

I’ll also have a longer practice as a separate offering, so please check that out if you feel called to it.

Until next time; remember, you are a soft, squishy, sensitive thing. And I love you.

Whisper into the void with me: https://rainbowafterdark.micro.blog

Podcast is on an indefinite hiatus

In this episode of Rainbow After Dark, we explore the paradox of being both cherished and cast aside, inspired by the myth of Chrysomallos—the golden ram from Greek mythology. As someone who has lived the experience of being both the “golden child” and the “black sheep”, I found deep resonance in this story and how it reflects the roles we inherit in dysfunctional family systems.

How do these roles shape our sense of worth? What happens when we realize that our value isn’t in what we sacrifice, but in who we truly are? Through mythology, personal reflection, and a deep dive into family dynamics, I invite you to question the roles you’ve been assigned—and imagine what it might feel like to step beyond them.

You are more than what you give. You always have been. Thank you for being here.

Thanks for listening to Rainbow After Dark! If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss future ones. If something resonated with you, I’d love to hear your thoughts—feel free to leave a comment here, or on YouTube (I don’t use it much, but I exist!).

This podcast is a space for reflection and exploration—it is not a substitute for professional advice. Please take care of yourself and seek support as needed.

———

Transcript for Episode 5 — “Golden Sheep Have Gilded Fleece”:

Today, we’re going to talk a bit about how family dynamics influence our personal identity.

There’s something powerful about finding the right information or the right story at the right time.

What struck me in particular was that Chrysomallos, this golden ram, is not only the origin of the Aries constellation, but is also a being that was both valued and discarded. When I learned this it really hit me, and it led me to further reflect on my own life and how, like Chrysomallos, I have also been revered and cast aside, seen as precious and also disposable.

This myth felt like it was about me, like, personally; specifically about my complicated relationship with identity and the roles I’ve been assigned in my family and in relationships.

Before I talk more about how the myth connects to my story, here’s a quick summary in case you’re not familiar with the myth: Chrysomallos was sent by the nymph Nephele to save her children Phrixus and Helle, but only Phrixus survived. After being sacrificed to Zeus, his golden fleece became a symbol of incredible value—this is the golden fleece that is also from the myth of Jason and the Argonauts—but Chrysomallos was discarded once his task was completed. This paradox felt like it mirrored my own life.

I understand that the ancient Greeks saw sacrifice a bit differently than we might see this now—it was considered an honor and Chrysomallos was exalted through this sacrifice—but he didn’t really seem to have a choice in the matter and I cried when I was reflecting on this.

Just like Chrysomallos—both a hero and a sacrifice—many of us find ourselves cast into specific roles within our families. These roles often feel both precious and burdensome. Just like Chrysomallos’ worth was undeniable even though he was ultimately discarded, I’ve experienced the same paradox in my own life, so let’s talk about roles in dysfunctional family systems.

In dysfunctional family systems, we might hear about roles such as the “golden child” or the “hero”, the “black sheep” or the “scapegoat”, the “lost child”, or the “mascot”. These roles are typically assigned to family members based on the family’s needs and dysfunctions. This isn’t something done consciously or intentionally, it isn’t like we get name tags or anything like that, but these roles occur frequently enough that they’ve been observed repeatedly and given names like these. They are ways for the family to cope with chaos and instability by casting members of the family into certain positions depending on the circumstances. You might usually be one of the roles, or exclusively one of these roles, but you can also be more than one or even all of them.

When I was a kid, I often found that I moved between these roles. I could be any of them but there were two that I took on most often: I was the golden child—aka the ”good” one, the one who did everything right, who took on responsibility and carried the emotional load for others. Conversely, I was also a black sheep—I was often cast aside or neglected when things got difficult. My parents didn’t really see me and often dismissed my needs, and my siblings ridiculed and ostracized me.

This fluctuation between being valued and discarded created internal chaos. One moment, I felt like I was special, the one who could do no wrong, someone whose presence mattered. And the next, I felt like I was an outcast, I was overlooked or I was even sometimes blamed for things that I had no control over.

This paradox—the tension between being adored and cast aside—is exactly what I felt growing up. I found myself both celebrated for what I could offer and, at times, discarded when I was no longer useful. This created a sense of confusion and instability in my own identity.

The contradiction of being both cherished and discarded has a profound impact on how we understand ourselves. It creates a sense of internal instability, a deep confusion about where we truly belong. Am I the golden child or the am I the black sheep? Am I the hero or the scapegoat? Am I someone who is worthy of love and acceptance, or am I someone to be used when necessary and then cast aside?

This internal conflict felt extremely complicated because I never fully embodied just one role. I wasn’t just the good child or the problem child; I was both, switching back and forth depending on the family dynamic. This duality made it difficult for me to know who I truly was outside of these roles. I got so caught up in navigating the space between being seen and unseen, valued and discarded—I lost touch with who I was—with my own authentic self. I felt like I needed to be perfect to be loved and accepted; if I could just be perfect, maybe everyone would just stop fighting. But I also rebelled against the dynamic and I didn’t recognize these behaviors were also a result of my conditioning until more recently.

This experience is not unique to me; it’s a reflection of the collective trauma many of us carry, especially those who grew up in dysfunctional family systems. The pressure to fit into one of these roles can make it incredibly difficult to form a stable sense of identity. When we are constantly switching between roles, it becomes hard to trust ourselves or know who we truly are underneath those labels that other people gave us.

What really stuck with me about the story of Chrysomallos was that he was revered for his mission, but his worth ultimately reduced him to the golden fleece—coveted but disposable. They may have felt like they were honoring him, I suppose… but did anybody ask Chrysomallos what he wanted?

This felt familiar based on my own experiences in my own relationships. I’ve often felt like I was praised and valuable for what I could offer, and then I was abandoned once I was no longer needed. And this has led me to really question my worth.

Reflecting on these contradictions—being both revered and discarded—I’ve wondered if a lot of us experience this same paradox. Maybe we’ve been given roles that don’t truly define us, like, as we really are—or we’ve internalized what others have told us we should be.

The golden fleece of Chrysomallos symbolizes immense worth, and it also speaks to the weight of expectation. Being seen as “special” or “chosen” often comes with the burden of meeting others’ needs, being everything for everyone, losing sight of your own needs in all of it.

The golden fleece wasn’t just a gift—it was a burden. Chrysomallos’ value was not about who he truly was, it was about what he could offer others. I have often felt the same—like I was honored for my gifts, appreciated for my talents, but I was trapped by the expectations that other people had of me.

The perception of worth, especially when tied to external validation, can easily become a tool of control. When others place us on a pedestal, it’s easy to feel like we’re being both honored and restricted. Which I suppose makes sense if you think about literally if someone were to put you on a pedestal—like, you’d, you know, you’d be elevated above other things that aren’t on the pedestal, but you also just have the little platform on the pedestal to move around on, right? And you’ll do everything you can to stay on the pedestal because you know what it feels like when you fall off of it. You don’t even realize nobody is seeing you clearly because you feel the need to cling to their positive perceptions. I’m talking about myself, of course.

This idea runs really deep, not just in families, but throughout our entire culture. We’re often taught that love is proven through sacrifice. Worth is tied to what we can give up. To be truly “good”, truly valuable, we have to diminish ourselves for the sake of others. To shrink ourselves so others can grow.

The sacrificial lamb. The golden child. The black sheep. The scapegoat. These are all different manifestations of the same wound: The belief that someone must be sacrificed for the survival of the system.

I’ve believed that for most of my life—even if this was almost entirely subconscious. I believed that my value was in what I could do, what I could give, how much of myself I was willing to lose for others.

But what if that was never true?

I’ve been rethinking what worth really means for a while now.

Just as Chrysomallos’ golden fleece became a symbol of incredible worth and also a tool for control, I’ve found my own worth often defined by what I could provide for others, rather than who I truly am. And now, I’m learning to redefine that.

Chrysomallos’ story reminds us that even the most revered can be discarded when they no longer serve others’ needs. I’m learning that my worth is not based on what I sacrifice for others. I get to choose my worth from within—not being defined by roles, but by who I am at my core.

What if we were meant to live beyond what others wanted from us?

I feel like we’re not really taught that service is not the same as sacrifice.

What happens when we realize we were never meant to sacrifice ourselves?

Most of my life I didn’t know who I was outside of these roles. I thought I did—but I didn’t know how to exist without either proving my worth through achievement or feeling the shame of being cast out. And now, I’m learning. I’m learning that I don’t have to be golden to be worthy. I don’t have to be an offering to be loved.

I think about Chrysomallos. What would his story have been like if he had lived, not as a sacrifice, but as a legend in his own right?

And I wonder… what if we could do that, too?

How can we honor ourselves without being consumed by expectation? What if we could step outside the roles we were given and choose something different?

If you’ve ever felt like the golden sheep—favored and then forgotten, lifted up only to be offered up—then I hope you know that you were never meant to be sacrificed.

You were meant to live.

You are more than what you give. You are worthy, not because of what you sacrifice, but because of who you are.

I’ll leave you with this question:

I encourage you to consider some small action you could take towards this—towards stepping outside those roles—or even just sitting with the idea and seeing how it feels.

I know that stepping out of these roles we’ve been assigned isn’t always easy. Sometimes it’s one of the hardest things we will ever do.

Instead of sacrificing ourselves for others, let’s grow into our fullness. We can be legends in our own right, not because of what we give up, but because of who we truly are.

I’d love to hear how you connect with this message.

Until next time, take care of yourself.

Whisper into the void with me: https://rainbowafterdark.micro.blog

Podcast is on an indefinite hiatus

Healing isn’t linear—it’s messy, cyclical, paradoxical, and often feels like we’re back where we started. But what if we’re actually spiraling forward? In this episode of Rainbow After Dark, we explore the nature of cycles—how they show up in nature, our bodies, and our healing journeys. From the moon’s phases to the rewiring of old patterns, we’ll dive into why we revisit wounds, how our bodies process healing on their own timeline, and why self-compassion is essential when it feels like we’re ‘going in circles.’ Because sometimes, moving through is the only way forward.

Thanks for listening to Rainbow After Dark! If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss future ones. If something resonated with you, I’d love to hear your thoughts—feel free to leave a comment here, or on YouTube (I don’t use it much, but I exist!).

This podcast is a space for reflection and exploration—it is not a substitute for professional advice. Please take care of yourself and seek support as needed.

———

Transcript for Episode 4 — “Popcyclical”:

Last time, we got friendly with the dark, and today we’re going to talk more about cycles.

When you think about cycles, what comes to mind?

Maybe you think about life cycles, or the water cycle, or a washing machine, a bicycle, something like that. Those work, too.

I feel like as humans our brains often want to operate in a fairly linear fashion, and I don’t know, y’know this could be something that we’ve conditioned ourselves to do versus something that’s actually natural to us, but when it comes to healing we sometimes seem to think that progress and healing and growth are linear, but they’re not. Even if sometimes we wish they were.

If you think about nature, cycles are everywhere: the moon’s phases, the changing of the seasons, the way water moves through the earth and the atmosphere. There’s always a rhythm, a flow, even—the way things flow, it tends to come back around. It might be different each time that it does, but it still does it.

Spring this year might not be the same as Spring last year, but it’s similar enough for us to call it Spring, right? To denote on the calendar that we have an equinox for the Springtime and the Autumn, for the Summer and the Winter. To notice the phases of the moon as it waxes and wanes and becomes full or dark for the new moon.

When it comes to healing, just like nature, it works in sort of a cyclical-cyclical pattern. I don’t know why “cyclical” is such a hard word for me to say, but here we are.

When we experience trauma, y’know, any kind of trauma—big T trauma, little t trauma—if it’s wounding you, it’s trauma, you know? It can become something that cycles within us. I feel like a lot of the times we’ll experience the wounds externally in cycles, but it also is-it’s an internal process, right? We will revisit these wounds, both internally and externally, but each time it’s not exactly the same. It might feel really, really familiar—especially depending on circumstances, context, various variables—but it’s never exactly the same. I like to think of it like a spiral—you keep moving forward, even if it feels like you’re returning to the same place. But you’re not. You are shifting perspectives and you’re growing. Even if it’s just, you know, like a teeny tiny little bit, right? You’ve garnered some new information each time that will allow you to keep kind of moving in an upward sort of pattern. Moving through the different layers and, I wanna say it’s like distilling the distortion in a way—you’re moving through the distortion and seeing things with an increasing amount of clarity as you do it, if, hopefully you are growth oriented and doing your best to be aware of yourself and conscious of your patterns and behaviors and things like that. The way I think that—even if it’s not something that’s kind of like, in your conscious mindset, even if someone is deeply instilled in subconscious patterns, it’s probably something that’s still happening beneath the surface. It’s just, maybe, harder to see.

You can find yourself facing old patterns, old triggers, or even emotions about things that you thought you already worked through. I know I’ve experienced this a lot where it’s like, “I thought—I thought we processed this. Like, I thought we—we did this already.” But it’s coming up with new layers and I feel like, especially when you’re really deep in the trenches of something, especially—especially—if something that you are now processing has been deeply suppressed and/or repressed, then you kind of like bring it up in little bits. But you have more information each time you do it. And sometimes too, it’ll come back up so that you can actually see that you’re not in the same space. But when you’re really deep in those trenches, especially if you’re dealing with stuff that has been really deeply embedded and really deeply repressed or suppressed… then it tends to take a lot more time and more visitations. And that can feel frustrating or discouraging, and you might feel like you’re ’back in the past’ or that you’re just doing—rehashing things over and over again… that you’re not actually making progress, or you’re even backsliding. But I feel like the key is understanding that it’s actually a part of the process.

Like I said, I’ve noticed this for my own process, my own journey.

So… there’s a lot of—there’s a lot of paradox in—there’s a lot of paradox in the whole healing process. It’s very cyclical, it’s nonlinear. It’s… yeah. Healing isn’t linear—it is messy, it is cyclical, it’s paradoxical. Sometimes we expect or hope for one big moment of transformation or like we’re, quote-unquote “fixing” it… but it is not like flipping a switch. At least not in my experience. It’s more like a slow rewiring process of, like, you know, the whole thing. And you can think about it like wiring a switch, too—y’know, if you have these really deeply ingrained patterns, these really, really deep wounds and you’re learning how to be in a different way? You’re learning how to operate and function in a completely new way… like it, it is a process of, like, revisiting and just unwiring and rewiring and going through all of that. And, like, if you think about how if somebody is wiring, y’know, a light switch or something… like, please forgive me, I know basically nothing about electrical—y’know, electrical stuff—but from my basic knowledge if you are to wire a light to a light switch you have to have the wires wired a certain way, otherwise, it doesn’t matter how many times you flip the switch, it’s not gonna turn on. It’s just not. And you might have to, like, move the wires around until you actually have the configuration that allows you to finally flip that switch and turn the light on. I don’t know if lights are the best example ‘cause I feel like, from the little I do know, they’re fairly, like, it’s usually just a couple of wires. But, it’s beyond me. Point is it’s a metaphor. Hopefully it makes sense to you. It’s something that’s kind of helped me to make sense of the whole process because I often felt like I should just… be… done with it or something? But you’re never—you’re never really done with it. You know? You’re always going to keep finding new layers and uncovering new information for you to integrate throughout the entire process of you being alive. And that’s just the nature of the human experience.

Healing is very—it’s a, you know, it’s—you have seasons, like anything. Like nature, you have seasons, too. You know, sometimes it’s Spring and we’re full of growth, renewal, and… you know, all the—all the beautiful life that comes with what you think of Springtime. And then other times it’s winter, and you could feel dormant or lost or you might just need to hibernate.

Through the whole process, we’re gonna have setbacks. And… sometimes we might feel like those rest periods or setbacks or when we feel like regressing… is like a “bad” sign, but sometimes it—I feel like it’s actually a sign of progress. It’s like the ebb and flow of the tides—they come in and they go out, but they always return. What seems like regression might just be part of the rhythm. We go inward, reflect, and then come back out, and we have more clarity and understanding.

I feel like this is something I’ve noticed especially in regards to my body. Because as I’ve done a lot of internal work, I’ve definitely noticed that my body is not as badly “off”—it’s not… I, you know, I still have a lot of health challenges. This is, y’know, I’ve been dealing with chronic health conditions and things like that for basically my entire life, so it’s not a thing where I expect that I’m gonna wake up one day and just have everything be… y’know, what would be considered more “normal” or like a healthy person. If I did, like, that’d be amazing. But I’m content for the most part with where I’m at in this process because I do know that there has been a lot of progress and I’m not where I was a few years ago, or several years ago. But especially recently, I’ve gone through a lot of internal healing where I’ve really worked with a lot of my emotions in a, kind of a new way, and… while overall, I do feel better, both physically and, y’know, internally on like the emotional and mental level, there have been a lot of things that have been coming up physically and it’s kind of like they want to be, sort of fully processed out. Which I feel like makes sense if you think about the way energy works and you have more subtle energy levels like you’re emotions and your thoughts, and then you also have, like, the grosser energy levels that—that’s when you have stuff that’s in the physical, like your body. And that stuff is much denser—it’s much denser energy so it moves much slower and it takes a lot more time to process and so even though sometimes it can seem a little backwards, if you’ve gone through a lot of healing on an internal level, then you might actually have old—what seem like old symptoms cropping up physically because your body is finally processing out other layers, older layers, of this same energy.

I feel like one of the biggest things for me in this process, and something that feels really just kind of key for us as humans, is that you navigate cycles—these cycles of healing with self-compassion. When you recognize that it’s okay to revisit pain and discomfort, it’s not as uncomfortable. It doesn’t mean it’s gonna be comfortable, but, y’know, it doesn’t feel quite as overwhelming. We don’t have to judge ourselves or shame ourselves for feeling like we’re ‘going in circles.’ It’s like a dance. Sometimes you go in circles when you’re dancing. Sometimes you move in different ways. There’s tension and relaxation, there’s, y’know, an ebb and flow to dancing too, right? I would like to encourage you to embrace that ebb and flow—to embrace the rhythm of your own healing, just as you would embrace the rhythm of your breath. Right?

Healing doesn’t have to be rushed. Sometimes, the best thing you can do is to slow down and embrace where you are in the cycle, even if that part of the cycle feels like you’re stuck. Something that I’ve been saying for a while is, y’know, they have, what is the saying? “Live fast and die young.” No, no. It’s “live slow and grow old.” If you so choose, right? Slow down, relax, don’t rush it. I find that for me personally if I’m rushing something, that is one of—it’s a big trigger for my nervous system. I tend to notice that it’s really dysregulating for me. So, as a general rule, unless it’s like, a life or death, really important kind of situation where I need to be rushing, you know, because it’s some sort of an emergency or something? I don’t rush. I do my best not to rush. I consciously choose to slow down. If I notice myself rushing—take a breath—you know? And I slow the heck down. So I would encourage you to do the same. If it feels right to you.

At the end of the day, cycles of trauma and healing do not mean failing. It means that you’re human. And if you are here, listening to me, I’m gonna assume you’re a human. And being human means experiencing being human. Through each of these cycles, we can closer to understanding ourselves and the healing process and… coming back to ourselves.

The time you feel like you’re ‘stuck’, or like you’re revisiting old wounds, remember that it is part of the dance. It’s part of the process. Do your best to let yourself flow with it. And remember that you’re not going in circles—it’s a spiral, and you’re moving forward. You’re leveling up. Just like Super Mario.

If you feel so called, you might take a moment to journal about the cycles you’ve noticed in your own journey. Where have you seen growth? Where have you seen reoccurring patterns? What are those cycles trying to share with you? And how can you practice more compassion for yourself if you’re feeling frustrated in those cycles? If you feel like you’re engaging in patterns that just aren’t shifting, or you aren’t able to engage with in a way that is ideal? There’s something there for you to look at—at least, that’s what I think.

Thank you for being here, I will see you next time—we’ll continue to explore the dark, the light, everything in between. And until then, keep dancing with the cycles. And remember, that I love you.

Whisper into the void with me: https://rainbowafterdark.micro.blog

Podcast is on an indefinite hiatus

What happens when we stop running from the dark—when we step into it, hold it, and let it hold us? In this episode, we explore the depths of darkness—not just as pain or suffering, but as a space for transformation. Through my personal reflections on trauma, identity, and healing, let’s examine how darkness can be a guide rather than something to fear. From childhood wounds and chronic pain to relationship patterns and self-abandonment, I’ll share how facing the unknown led to clarity and growth.

Healing isn’t linear—it’s messy, cyclical, and paradoxical. But in the dark, we find ourselves. Join me as we illuminate the shadows, embracing the unseen and uncovering the wisdom that waits within.

Don’t forget to give the darkness a hug, too.

Thanks for listening to Rainbow After Dark! If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss future ones. If something resonated with you, I’d love to hear your thoughts—feel free to leave a comment here, or on YouTube (I don’t use it much, but I exist!).

This podcast is a space for reflection and exploration—it is not a substitute for professional advice. Please take care of yourself and seek support as needed.

———

Transcript for Episode 3 — “Into The Dark”:

I’m sure you’ve been there. When you’ve felt that shift, when you realize you’re standing on the edge of something unknown. You might be scared to step forward, but you can’t go back. The dark is uncomfortable. It’s heavy. It’s full of everything we don’t want to look at, everything we’ve buried. And it’s where healing begins.

That’s what we’re talking about today—what it means to step into the dark, to hold it—to let it hold us, to learn from it instead of running from it. And just like anything else in healing, the dark is not just about pain. It’s paradox. Because when we feel lost? That’s when we find ourselves. When we feel alone? We begin to truly understand connection.

So let’s talk about it. Let’s talk about the dark—the ways it shaped me, the ways it shapes all of us.

I’ve had a complicated relationship with darkness. For a lot of people, it’s something you avoid and on a subconscious level I was conditioned this way too, even when, ironically, I didn’t really shy away from the dark aspects of being human most of my life—I almost seemed to revel in it. But we aren’t really taught how darkness can guide us. We’re taught to fear it, to avoid it, to reject it.

In a way, that makes sense. The unknown is, well, it’s unknown. Human brains and nervous systems aren’t big fans of that. And as a human, I can understand that.

My earliest experiences with the dark weren’t exactly safe. I was adopted from birth, and from the outside, my family looked… fine, I guess? For the most part. I came from a family of seven—I have four brothers and some people even seemed to envy having a big family. They’d tell me how wonderful it must be, but, y’know, people have their own perceptions of what a family like mine must be like. In one of my classes when I was in high school, my family issues ended up with the word “family” being embraced as “the f word”. My family was deeply dysfunctional and I consistently felt disconnected—I felt like I had to be something other than myself in order to be loved. I was usually the “good one,” “the golden child”, I was generally well-behaved—I was the one who didn’t cause problems. You know, that’s where you get perfectionism. And at the same time, I was a “black sheep”—I never belonged, I was unseen by my parents, I was ostracized by my siblings, and I felt things too deeply and saw things that nobody else wanted to talk about.

I learned early on that connection didn’t always mean being seen. Sometimes, it meant playing a role. Sometimes, it meant keeping parts of myself hidden. I felt like I had to stay in the dark to survive.

And that kind of disconnection? It does not stay in your mind. It lives in your body.

I was diagnosed with Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome in 2018–for reference, I graduated high school in 2008–but my body had been hurting for a long time before that. I’ve dealt with chronic pain since I was a teenager. I dealt with a lot of darkness when I was growing up, even before the pain started to present itself physically. I thought at one point that physical pain might actually be easier to deal with than the emotional pain I felt when I was younger, but once the physical pain became constant I was often looking to escape from myself, from my experiences… I wished I didn’t have to have a body, or that I didn’t have to exist at all.

I’m pretty sure my body has been telling the same story that my heart has—instability, unpredictability, everything falling apart at the seams. My physical pain was mirroring my emotional pain, but I didn’t have words for that. I just knew something wasn’t right.

It seemed like I didn’t need much to sustain me. I felt like I’d done a lot with neglect. But what would happen if I got what I needed to truly thrive, and not just survive? If I was nourished enough to flourish? Who could I become? What could I do? And what if everyone else was given what they needed to thrive, too?

The thing about living in the dark is that, eventually, you forget that there’s anything else. Or maybe you never knew that there was. You have to adapt. You normalize it. You don’t question it. It just becomes the way things are.

Until something happens and you are forced to see it differently.

A few years ago, I hit a turning point that made all of this painfully clear. It wasn’t the first time I realized that things needed to change, but it cracked me open in a way that nothing else had.

It was a relationship—one of many that followed a similar painful pattern. If you know, you know. You know, the kind where you’re doing everything you can to be enough, to be what they want and need, to prove that you are worthy of love. The kind where you lose yourself and don’t even realize it. Or you wonder if you ever even knew who you were to begin with.

I wanted so badly for it to work. I thought if I wanted it enough, it would just work somehow. That I could do whatever it took to make it work. But it wasn’t working—not just the relationship, but me. The way I moved through the world. The way I was being in connection. The way I ignored my own needs. The way I believed love meant sacrifice, that love meant enduring. That love meant pain.

I couldn’t run from myself anymore. I had to sit with all of this. I got to choose to sit with it—to stop looking outward—at what they or anyone else was or wasn’t doing, at what I could fix or change—and to face inward, to look inward. Into the dark.

When you’re in the dark and you see a sudden flash of light, it’s disorienting. The contrast makes shadows seem deeper and darker. Your eyes have to adjust. Maybe that’s why we resist clarity—why we resist healing. When you’ve adapted to the dark, light can feel less like illumination and more like exposure.

But once you have clarity—once you see, you can’t unsee. I mean, I guess you could try, you could pretend… but… I feel like in most cases that ends up a lot more painful than going through it. I know for me, once I really saw myself—my patterns, my fears, my pain—I couldn’t keep moving the same way.

I had to change everything.

It was terrifying. And it was liberating.

Just like a seed has to sit in darkness before it sprouts, I see the process as cyclical. Darkness is not an interruption—it’s integral. Every time I’ve needed to face uncertainty, grief, deep rest; I changed—I softened, I was restructured, I became ready for something new.

I used to think healing meant reaching a state of constant clarity. But light can be overwhelming—you give a plant too much sunlight and it burns. If you sit in the sun you can get a burn, too. If you try to come out of darkness too quickly, it’s disorienting, like when you go outside after you’ve been sitting in a dark room. Brightness can distort before it illuminates. I’ve learned to move between these states with more grace, to trust that retreating and going into my inner world doesn’t mean I’m regressing, and emerging does not mean I have all the answers.

Healing isn’t linear. It feels messy and chaotic. Sometimes it feels like you’re going in circles, but it’s a spiral, and each time you return to the dark, you’re not starting over—you’re leveling up.

And healing doesn’t happen in isolation. Or, you know, it’s not meant to. It’s all in relationship, even with ourselves. But when you’ve been hurt in relationships, connection doesn’t always feel safe. It can feel really risky. It feels like the most unsafe thing you could possibly do, even if you aren’t consciously aware of it.

I’ve struggled with that a lot—the push and pull between wanting to be close to people and being afraid of what closeness could mean. Between craving connection and needing distance. Between loving people and not knowing if I could trust them. Not knowing if I could trust myself.

For most of my life, I didn’t even realize I was struggling with this. I just thought I was anxious. Traumatized. I couldn’t see the depths of it when I already felt like I was in over my head. Sometimes it felt like I was the only one who hadn’t learned how to breathe underwater.

Years ago, when I started doing shadow work, I realized just how much of that fear came from inside of me. From the parts of myself that I hadn’t faced—that I couldn’t, that I wasn’t able to face before then. Because the relationships we attract—the ones that challenge us, that hurt us, that reflect our deepest wounds—they’re mirrors. They show us what we need to see in ourselves, even if it’s painful. Especially if it’s painful. Or they can reflect our growth if we’ve taken the time to look.

And maybe that’s why we attract the people we do—not to challenge us, not just to hurt or to heal us—to help us see ourselves more clearly. To illuminate the dark and allow us to embrace our shadows.

It makes sense that I saw so much darkness when I was the light. It took me a long time to understand that. I wasn’t lost in the dark—I was illuminating it. The shadows I saw weren’t signs that I was broken; they were invitations to integrate so that I could bring the unseen into my awareness.

For a long time, I unknowingly feared darkness—not just the absence of light, but the unknown, the unknown inside myself. I thought it might swallow me whole. It meant loss, isolation, shame—it felt like a void I had to escape. But the dark doesn’t consume us and it’s not emptiness. It’s like fertile soil; seeds soften and take root, growth begins before we see it. Periods of loss and withdrawal aren’t failures—they’re phases in the cycle of growth.

Shame, though… shame told me otherwise. It told me retreating and reflecting meant something was wrong with me. That my pain and stillness proved I was unworthy and undeserving. That I was unlovable. I hid my most vulnerable parts, believing that being fully seen would lead to rejection. I feared abandonment so much that I abandoned myself. I tried to control how others saw me, and I curated the things that I shared. I was managing my emotions and trying to manage other people’s emotions too, because I didn’t want to be seen as “too much.” But control is fragile. We try to control things in an attempt to mitigate our pain. And as I tried to hold everything together, I became more fragmented. At some point, I realized that shame was actually trying to protect me, as counterintuitive and dysfunctional as it seemed.

I’ve always been sensitive—and like anyone who is sensitive, I was often getting messages, if not being told outright, that I was “too sensitive,” that I was “too much,” or, conversely, “too little.” Eventually, I leaned into sensitivity and I embraced it. Sensitivity is not weakness—it’s listening. It’s awareness. It allows for emotional attunement and for us to recognize that fear isn’t something to suppress—it’s wisdom. Fear is often protective. So is shame. It was urges us to pay attention, to tread carefully. I’ve been learning to distinguish between fear that is a warning and fear that is restricting.

Hiding parts of myself does not make them disappear. We are most controlled by what we refuse to see. What we can’t see. The stuff that’s in the dark. Shame grows in silence, but by naming it and turning toward it, I reclaimed the rejected parts. I realized that they weren’t my enemies.

That’s why the dark matters. Dark matter. Not because it’s a place to stay, but because it’s a place where we can see ourselves clearly. Where we meet the parts of ourselves that need us to acknowledge them. The parts that are scared. The parts we’ve rejected and disconnected from. The parts that have been protecting us, even when that protection has looked like self-sabotage or shutting down or staying in cycles that cause us harm. That perpetuate our pain.

The dark shows us what we need to heal. It’s a process, not a destination. And we can befriend it.

Through that—through facing ourselves, learning to hold our own shadows with compassion, maybe even giving them a little hug—we can start to build authentic connections. Connections that don’t require self-abandonment. Ones where we can show up as whole people, instead of fragments. We get to take our masks off and stop playing roles that never quite suited us anyway.

Stillness is the way to knowing. And maybe that’s why darkness has always held wisdom. It’s not so much a void, but a space. A container where the light takes form.

We spend so much of our lives trying to fight the dark. To resist pain. To force understanding. But what if we stop trying to fight it? What if, instead, we hold it? Give it a little hug?

We’re often taught that fear is something to, y’know, fear. Something to rid ourselves of. Something “bad” or “low vibrational.” That it’s “an illusion” or any number of things that encourage us to bypass it. But what if our fear loves us? What if it illuminates what we truly love? What if we could go farther by sitting with it and considering it then we ever could by dismissing or rejecting it?

Learning to befriend my fear—learning to be in companionship with the darkness—with the unknown, with my shame, with my anger, with all of it—learning to truly embrace it all instead of running from it, avoiding it, fighting it, pushing against it… that’s when I really started healing.

Healing isn’t always beautiful. It’s painful and it’s messy. You lose a lot. You learn to let go of identities, relationships, versions of yourself that you needed to survive. You figure out how to honor them and be grateful for them and also acknowledge that they might not be part of your journey anymore. It’s about allowing space for all of the parts of you, especially the parts you’ve been rejecting.

I’ve had to let go of people I loved—people I still love. I’ve had to let go of beliefs that were keeping me small. I’ve had to grieve not just what happened to me, but what didn’t happen, too—the safety I didn’t have, the childhood—the life—I didn’t get, the love I didn’t receive in the ways I needed it.

And that’s hard. And necessary. In that loss, there’s space for something new.

I used to think healing was about becoming someone new. I realize now that it’s about becoming more of who we’ve always been. We reclaim the parts of ourselves we abandoned and rejected so that we could feel accepted.

If you’re in this place right now—the space between what was and what will be—know that you’re not alone. I’m in here, too. The dark isn’t something to escape. It’s something to enter. To sit in. To move through. To learn from. To embrace—it needs a hug, too.

What would it be like to sit in the dark, to sit with fear, to sit with all the things you feel that you don’t want to feel, and really listen to what they have to say?

Wherever you are in your journey, I invite you to take a moment. Notice anything that’s stirring in you or asking to be seen. There’s no rush.

If you’re standing at the edge of the dark, uncertain and maybe a bit scared, I’d like to remind you that you’re not lost. You’re on the path. Your path. And even if you can’t see the way forward, even if everything feels uncertain, you’re where you need to be right now.

You’re not alone in the dark. You are not alone in finding your way through it. Granted, this is a whole other paradox that I’m not gonna get into right now. But it is okay to accept that that’s the way it might feel right now.

Thank you for being here. Thank you for listening. Thank you for being willing to go into the dark. Until next time—keep going. Even if “going” means sitting still.

Whisper into the void with me: https://rainbowafterdark.micro.blog

Podcast is on an indefinite hiatus

In this episode, we’re going on a personal journey through chronic pain, illness, and the revelation that these struggles are more than just physical—they’re neurological. After being diagnosed with hypermobile Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome (EDS) at 28, I thought I had the answer, but years of persistent pain led me to a profound realization: the root of my discomfort wasn’t just my body, but my nervous system.

I explore how disconnected, survival-driven societal structures contribute to widespread nervous system dysregulation, leaving many of us stuck in a state of arrested development. I reflect on my own experiences with chronic illness, mental health diagnoses, and trauma, revealing how our nervous systems adapt to unsafe environments, often carrying invisible wounds that we can’t recognize. I’ll dive into the science of epigenetics, the link between trauma and physical health, and how this systemic disconnection can shape our biology in ways we might not expect.

This episode is an invitation to rethink how we view mental and physical health—not as isolated issues, but as interconnected expressions of the trauma and disconnection we’ve inherited. It’s a reminder that healing requires more than just a change in mindset—it calls for a deeper, body-based connection to ourselves and others. Tune in for an exploration of resilience, survival adaptations, and the urgent need for healing that goes beyond symptoms.

Thanks for listening to Rainbow After Dark! If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss future ones. If something resonated with you, I’d love to hear your thoughts—feel free to leave a comment here, or on YouTube (I don’t use it much, but I exist!).

This podcast is a space for reflection and exploration—it is not a substitute for professional advice. Please take care of yourself and seek support as needed.

———

Transcript for Episode 2 — “Connecting the Dots”:

Since you’re here, listening to me, I’d like to tell you a story.

For nearly as long as I can remember, I’ve lived with chronic pain and illness. By the time I was a teenager, pain had become a nearly constant companion. I spent years being treated like a medical mystery—like a guinea pig, or a puzzle that no one seemed able to solve.

When I was 28 years old, I was finally diagnosed with hypermobile Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome, also known as EDS, a genetic connective tissue disorder—and I thought: this is it. I finally have the answer.

But that was only the beginning.

Fast forward to 2024, and I was in physical therapy for my shoulder pain. Again. I had spent years working on my body—building strength, stabilizing my joints, doing everything I was supposed to do.

And then I realized something:

My brain hadn’t updated to recognize that I was safe. My nervous system was still responding as if I was injured—even though, logically, I knew I wasn’t.

And then, something clicked:

The same way my body had held onto old pain, my nervous system was holding onto old fear. I was responding to connection as if it were still dangerous—even when, logically, I knew it didn’t have to be.

When I realized this, I felt two things:

And then I started to wonder:

We hear a lot about mental health. About trauma. We hear about depression, anxiety, loneliness.

For years, I was told my struggles were mental illness. Depression. Anxiety. PTSD. At one point, I was taking multiple psychiatric medications. But what if these weren’t just ‘chemical imbalances’ in my brain? What if they were signs that my nervous system had adapted to an unsafe world?

So maybe these aren’t just personal struggles.

We live in a world that expects people to function in ways that don’t match how humans actually develop.

There’s a concept in urban planning called desire paths. If you’ve ever seen a dirt trail cutting diagonally across a manicured lawn—one that people clearly use, even though the “official” sidewalk is somewhere else—you’ve seen a desire path.

Desire paths show us something important: people move in the ways that feel natural to them, not in the ways we design for them.

And our nervous systems are the same way.

They don’t develop according to how we think they should. They develop in response to the conditions we actually experience.

And here’s the problem: Most people never had the conditions they needed to develop a fully mature nervous system.

Western culture is built on disconnection. It values: Self-sufficiency over interdependence. Productivity over well-being. And emotional suppression over attunement.

From childhood, we’re taught to: Override our feelings. To suppress our needs. And to perform independence, even at the cost of our emotional and physical health.

We call this resilience. But really? It’s just disconnection.

When a nervous system doesn’t get what it needs to fully develop—when it never gets to experience consistent safety, attunement, and co-regulation—it adapts for survival.

That means most people are stuck in some stage of arrested development—stuck in a nervous system state that was meant to be temporary, and is now their default.

At first, I only saw this in myself—I had this unshakable feeling that something was missing.

Most of us are carrying an invisible weight we don’t have words for.

Mental health is just as much a reflection of our nervous system’s state as our physical health. I was diagnosed with major depressive disorder at 15, PTSD at 21, and at one point I was having panic attacks every single day. Most of my life I received messages that my brain was broken. I’d done a long list of therapies including talk therapy, CBT, DBT, EMDR—basically the therapeutic alphabet. But when I realized most of my interventions had been top-down processing, I shifted gears and I started to work with my nervous system through bottom-up, body-based healing, and the more I did this, more things started to change.

Now, I rarely have panic attacks. I no longer take psychiatric medications. And I’ve gone from being housebound and relying on a caregiver to living independently. And it’s not because I ‘fixed’ my brain or my body. It’s because I learned to give myself something it had been searching for: self-connection. But self-connection doesn’t mean isolation—it meant learning to listen to myself so I could begin to build relationships that would support my nervous system.

We already know that trauma can be passed down epigenetically. Epigenetics is about the way our environment and experiences influence the expression of our genes, without altering the genetic code. Factors such as stress and trauma can impact how certain genes are turned on or off, affecting our health and behavior across generations—so generations of stress, survival-based adaptation, and relational neglect leave marks on the body—not just psychologically, but biologically.

So what if conditions like Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome, ADHD, and autism—just to name a few—aren’t just random genetic mutations?

What if they are biological adaptations to a world that has been relationally unsafe for generations?

I’ve seen this in myself in multiple ways.

For most of my life, I had severe arachnophobia. I knew spiders generally weren’t dangerous, but my body did not care. No matter how much I learned about spiders and logicked my way through it, the moment I saw one? Panic attack. My nervous system overrode everything.

This is what happens when fear becomes automatic.

And isn’t that exactly what happens with connection?

We know we need it. But if our nervous system was shaped in an environment where connection wasn’t safe? It doesn’t matter what we know—our body will still respond as if it is unsafe.

Consider that: Connective tissue is what holds our bodies together. It provides structure, flexibility, and resilience.

So what happens when connection itself is unstable?

Maybe the body reflects that instability.

Connective tissue disorders affect the body’s structural integrity—its ability to hold itself together.

Research and anecdotal evidence both suggest that there’s a strong link between connective tissue disorders like EDS and neurodivergent conditions like ADHD and autism. Many people who have hypermobile connective tissue also have differences in sensory processing, emotional regulation, and cognitive function.

I know this firsthand.

Before I was diagnosed with EDS, I recognized myself as neurodivergent. Although I was never able to access the kind of assessment that would give me a formal diagnosis, I saw myself in those traits.

Since the origins of humanity, if people did not receive consistent attunement and connection, their nervous systems had to find ways to survive.

Some became hyper-aware—constantly scanning for danger, attuning to every shift in energy.

These adaptations eventually became traits. And over time, traits became neurotypes.

We know that there’s a strong link between ADHD and autism—sometimes even called AuDHD. Many people experience a blend of these traits, rather than fitting neatly into one category.


I’ve had moments where I’m hyper-aware and deeply attuned to the smallest shifts in my environment. And I’ve had moments where I completely shut down and withdraw. These adaptations are not fixed categories.

We are not “one way” or “the other.” Our nervous systems are responding in the way that makes the most sense for the conditions they were given.

So what if ADHD’s difficulty with sustained attention is an adaptation to an environment where attunement was unpredictable?

And what if the fluidity between these states—the shifting between hyper-awareness and shutdown—isn’t dysfunction, but a natural response to an unstable relational blueprint?

This isn’t dysfunction.

Because here’s something important: our nervous systems don’t just adapt behaviorally—they adapt chemically.

From birth, the way we connect with others literally shapes our brain chemistry.

When we experience consistent, attuned connection, our brains release: Dopamine, which tells us, this is good, seek more of this. And Oxytocin which tells us, this is safe, you can relax.

But if connection is inconsistent or absent, our nervous systems adjust—they have to.

So whether we develop patterns of avoidance or anxiety, or both, it isn’t just psychological—it is a neurobiological imprint of what our nervous system has learned about connection.

And the nervous system doesn’t function in isolation. It’s connected to the endocrine system through what’s called the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal, or HPA, axis. I think I said that right.

Cortisol is our body’s primary stress hormone. It’s meant to rise in moments of danger and fall when the threat is gone. In a world without consistent connection, cortisol can stay chronically high leading to anxiety, insomnia, gut issues, chronic inflammation, and immune dysfunction.

Again, I know these effects from my own experiences. I was diagnosed with type 2 diabetes—suddenly, and without warning, like, any warning—when I was 23 years old. I wasn’t prediabetic. There was no gradual increase in blood sugar levels. At an appointment to discuss the side effects of a new antidepressant, my doctor took my blood sugar levels, and it was over 400. My A1C was above 10%. For those of you who don’t know, normal blood sugar levels are usually less than 140, and normal A1C is less than 5.7%. The strangest part? No one even told me I had diabetes. I found out when a random scheduler called to sign me up for a diabetes education class. That was how I learned my body crossed a threshold it could no longer compensate for.

We tend to think of diabetes as just a metabolic disorder—something that happens in isolation. But research shows us that chronic stress, nervous system dysregulation, and HPA axis dysfunction can directly contribute to insulin resistance. Long-term nervous system dysregulation can throw off the delicate balance of cortisol, blood sugar, and metabolism. The body stays in survival mode for so long that eventually, it starts to break down.

This is why disconnection doesn’t just affect mental health—it manifests in digestive issues, skin issues, autoimmune conditions, and chronic pain—it affects our entire body.

When connection is missing, the body knows.

If our struggles are adaptations to generations of disconnection, then healing isn’t just about managing symptoms.

It’s about creating the conditions our bodies and nervous systems have been searching for.

Because healing isn’t just about thinking differently—it’s about experiencing something different on a nervous system level.

If early connection shaped our brain chemistry, then new kinds of connection have the power to reshape it.

It’s not about fixing ourselves.

It’s about giving ourselves access to the kind of attunement, connection, and stability that we were always meant to have.

For some, that could mean intentional enmeshment: a consensual process of deep mutual attunement—usually temporary—designed to provide a missing imprint of safety. It’s not about losing yourself in another person; it’s about experiencing the kind of secure connection our nervous system needs.

For others, it could mean:

We don’t just need more self-care. We need better ways of being together.

Because the truth is that we were never meant to do this alone.

So, what if we chose connection?


In a disconnected world, everyone’s nervous system is affected to some degree.

But if disconnection is learned, then connection can be re-learned.

How would your life change if you felt deeply connected—to yourself, to others, to life itself?

Imagine a world where we don’t dismiss our longing for connection.


Imagine if we designed a world not around productivity, but around how humans actually function.

A world that supports the most sensitive, most disconnected, and most overlooked—that would be a world where we all could thrive.

We heal when we finally receive the connection we were always supposed to have.

Maybe—just maybe—connection was never the problem.

Maybe it was always the answer.