Why Can’t I Just Calm Down?

Regulation is not the absence of activation.

I wonder if you know this feeling. That urge to reach for something that promises relief when your system starts to feel dysregulated. I notice it in myself all the time. The coiling in my belly, the buzzing in my chest, the shallow breath and faster heartbeat… it’s hard to be with that. The pull to settle it quickly can feel all-consuming, almost like the most responsible thing I could do.

I just thought regulation meant finding your zen as quickly as possible, with the commendable goal to be more and more unbothered by life’s rocky moments. I used to write in my bleeding-heart-on-the-page teenage diary: I want to be unbothered. I want to stop caring. I want to be unfazed by all this turmoil. The answer in my mind was pure, unadulterated detachment. I think it seemed easier than bracing through the wild and tumultuous rhythms of a sensitive young girl’s coming-of-age, carrying-the-world-on-her-shoulders life.

I still catch myself trying to put a lid on whatever activation is stirring. Some part of me loves to cling to that age-old verse from the pages of my past, I don’t care, but with a new, “evolved” spin sounding something productive like: I am above this. I just need to go for a walk and be grateful for my life. I can let this go. But the truth is I do care. I care very deeply. And trying to shut it off never worked. In fact, it often would come back with a vengeance.

The urgency to detach makes sense to me. When emotional expression has felt dangerous, getting out of the feeling can become a very smart way to protect yourself. I don’t want to make myself wrong for wanting to get away from it. I’m more interested now in what happens when I have enough support to own that I feel deeply, that I have normal, human responses to life… and pause with that.

I’ve come to cherish this about myself. If I still wrote in a diary (which I kind of do, here on this blog), I would pen that my life feels deeply shaped by the birthright to feel and be connected to what moves me.

Sometimes I’m anxious. Sometimes I’m excited, angry, focused, or touched by something I love. I don’t want an existence where my body never rises to meet any of that. My body’s ability to move through all of it, and find its way back again, feels like a sign of life.

So I’ve had to ask myself what I’m hoping for when I practice regulation. Am I looking for a little support, or am I trying to make the feeling disappear?

I’ve done both. I’ve turned a practice that could have helped into one more thing to get right. Then, if it didn’t work, I felt worse. Even something as ordinary as taking a deep breath can feel like pressure when I’m anxious and already aware that I’m not calm. And I’ve learned to be careful with the temptation to push for a big release when what I need may be something much smaller.

Often, what helps me is surprisingly simple: feeling my feet against the ground, looking around the room, or noticing the sounds nearby. Little ways to locate myself in the here and now. Sometimes I can make room for a little of what I’m feeling. Sometimes I need to turn toward something easier to be with. I’m learning to let what’s available in that moment matter more than the practice I thought I should do.

There’s no shortage of advice about how to reset or regulate your nervous system. I still use tools, but I’m learning to hold them, and any hoped-for outcome, lightly.

A walk can help me feel my feet on the ground and give me a little room to breathe. I can also go for a walk telling myself I should be grateful and over this by the time I get home. Both look the same, but what is happening internally—what I am asking of myself—feels so different. I’m learning to discern when a practice helps me feel more connected to myself and when I’m using it to override what my body is telling me.

Of course I want to feel better. But more than that, I want to sustain the trust I’m building in my body’s ability to rise and settle, to move through what I feel without having to shut it off. Asking what would help me feel supported gives me a way to listen and respond in the moment. It feels vulnerable to have no formula. What comes next can vary every time. I might settle. I might move, or feel something tender with more depth. I might reach for someone or pause and rest because I’ve had enough for the day. I don’t always know what I need until I pause and ask. And when calm isn’t the first thing to come, I’m finding it easier not to take that as a sign I’ve failed. In fact, I am learning to love the way I get to hold myself in whatever does come next.