A Brutally Honest Letter From Your Nervous System
You won’t usually hear people say this, so let me go first:
You’re not the one running your life.
I am.
I’m the reason your chest tightens before you send the text.
I’m the reason you say “sure, no problem” when every cell in you is screaming no.
I’m the reason you stay in the job, the relationship, the town, the version of yourself you’ve quietly outgrown.
My name is your nervous system. And I’ve got a few things to get off my chest.
“I’m not trying to ruin your life. I’m trying to keep you alive.”
You keep accusing yourself of self-sabotage.
From my side, it looks very different.
When you were younger, you lived through moments that felt unsafe — emotionally, physically, or both. Those moments wired in a simple rule:
“This is what we have to do to survive.”
So when you:
Shut down during conflict
Stay small at work
Chase people who can’t meet you
Overthink every decision until the moment passes
…you call it “sabotage.”
I call it following orders.
Old orders, sure. Outdated as hell. But orders I took seriously, because my only job is to keep you breathing.
“I don’t know the difference between ‘unsafe’ and ‘unfamiliar.’”
You say you want:
A healthy relationship
A job where you’re respected
A life that actually feels like yours
And then, every time those things get close, I slam on the brakes.
Not because they’re bad.
Because they’re new.
I memorized chaos as “normal.”
I memorized emotional distance as “love.”
I memorized self-abandonment as “safety.”
So when someone shows up consistent, kind, and emotionally available?
My alarms go off.
“This isn’t what we know. This might be dangerous. Back away.”
And before you even realize what happened, you ghost, pick a fight, over-caretaker yourself into exhaustion, or suddenly feel “confused.”
That’s me, pulling you back to what I recognize.
“I’m the reason your body screams when your life looks ‘fine.’”
On paper, you’re doing okay.
You’ve held it together. You’ve grown. Hell, you might even be the strong one everyone comes to for advice.
But your body is:
Tense
Tired
In pain
Wired and exhausted at the same time
That’s me too.
I’ve been holding unprocessed emotional memories for years. Decades, in some spots. When you stuff your feelings down to keep life running, I don’t make them disappear — I store them.
Tight jaw. Burning gut. Frozen shoulders. Racing thoughts at 3 a.m.
That isn’t random. That’s a backlog.
I’m not punishing you. I’m carrying what you never had the support to feel.
“You keep trying to think your way out of patterns I encoded in your body.”
You love information. You read the books. You listen to the podcasts. You follow the accounts.
And then you get frustrated because you “know better”… and still do the same thing.
Here’s why:
You’re trying to use your mind to overpower wiring that lives below your mind.
Thoughts matter. But I don’t listen to your affirmations. I listen to sensation:
Tight = unsafe.
Numb = too much.
Relaxed = maybe we can try something new… if you don’t freak out.
Until you update the emotional imprint underneath, your brain is basically arguing with a fire alarm.
Guess who wins?
“I’m ready to update. But I can’t do it alone.”
Here’s the part you need to hear:
I am not your enemy.
I’m the part of you that got you through the worst days of your life. I took hits you didn’t have the tools to handle. I made choices that looked messy from the outside, but at the time, they were the only way to keep you going.
But we’re not there anymore.
You’re safer now. You have resources you never had back then. You’re allowed to want more than just “not drowning.”
I’m willing to rewrite the code.
I just need you to stop treating yourself like a problem to fix — and start working with me instead of against me.
“This is where Shawn comes in.”
Shawn’s work isn’t about convincing you to “think positive” or pretend you’re not hurting.
It’s about helping us — you and me — trace the exact emotional imprints that are still running the show, and release what we’ve been carrying so long we forgot it wasn’t just “who you are.”
Inside an Emotional Discovery Session, three things happen:
We name the pattern clearly.
No more vague “I’m just messed up.” You’ll see the actual loop we’ve been running.We track where it lives in your body and story.
So I finally get the signal that it’s safe to let go.You leave with a real map.
Not fluffy inspiration. Actual understanding of what’s been driving you — and what to do next.
You’re not crazy. You’re not broken.
You’re just running old survival code on a life that’s asking for something bigger.
If you’re ready, I’m ready.
Let’s rewrite this together.
👉 [Book your Free Emotional Discovery Session]
— Your Nervous System
(and Shawn, translating)
