What is Coregulation? 

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Show Notes:

Episode 2: What is Coregulation 

In this episode of Coregulation Conversations, the focus turns to the heart of what this podcast is all about: co-regulation.

From the metaphor of wind-whipped trees holding strong together, to migrating birds sharing the load, this episode explores how connection distributes the weight of life’s challenges, and why trying to go it alone isn’t enough. 🌬️🌲🪶

Highlights include:
🌿 The difference between coregulation and “self-regulation”
🤝 How support can come not only from humans, but also from nature, touch, animals, and even our own inner parts
🌀 A real-time nervous system practice for noticing activation and settling
🌙 Expanding the ways we think about connection – from pets to the moon, from podcasts to community care

Resources: 

Link to my Crisis to Calm free mini email course 

This conversation offers both grounding practices and big-picture vision for why these skills matter in times of change and uncertainty.

🎧 Listen now and explore the many ways we can lean into coregulation, together.

Transcript:

Sarah 0:14
So I was definitely going to record this episode today out walking like I did the last time, and kind of hoped to for the majority of these but I don't know if you can hear the sound of the trees around me. It's really windy out today, so we're gonna go with Plan B, and I am almost back to my car. I'm gonna hunker down in the car and keep talking to you, because I want to set up my vision for what we're doing here together with CO regulation conversations. Okay, now we're safe and sound back in the car, out of the wind, and hopefully this helps the audio be a little bit more manageable. One of the things I often do when I'm out walking is voice note my friends and listen to them on voice notes. And it's just been a really nice ritual for like, being able to be out moving, but then also be in connection with others. It's one of my favorite co regulation practices. So that's some of what I have in mind here with this podcast form, the format that I want to use here is it's like, we're we're kind of like in a voice note, kind of vibe. So I am here, I am sitting in my car sending you a voice note over the podcast, and I hope you enjoy it. And I'm just watching the trees just blow. Oh my gosh. I'll take a video and put it up on the page here if you want to see what I'm watching here. Well, while we're talking, because it's pretty impressive, very blustery today here outside of Anchorage, and I want to talk today about CO regulation because it's such one of the big themes on this podcast, and it's one of the ways that I'm hoping we can start to use like technology for good and access co regulation through this podcast form, and then also I can help, like, bring in some ideas about ways that you can work co regulation into your life, like in all the places outside of podcast, because it seems to me like the one of the things we need most In our world right now is the ability to be more embodied, know our nervous systems and support ourselves. Support our nervous systems well, so that we can rise to the challenges in our lives, so we can deal with the, you know, the all the change that's happening around us in as we watch our systems collapse and our environment change and deal with so many the poly crisis of being alive in I'm recording this in 2025 but I believe these issues will continue on for a while. So fortifying our nervous system skills through the foundation of CO regulation, because we really just cannot do this alone. I see this to be one of the like, foundational things that we need to navigate collapse and systems change and oh my gosh. I wish I could show you this wind. Let me see if I can get some audio for it.

Sarah 3:53
I don't feel like that was as dramatic as it as it looks. Just imagine lots of sound, lots of wind blowing the trees nearly over. Really impressive. Is there a metaphor here? You know, like, you know how trees let's do this. Let's make a metaphor. Because you know how one tree on its own is like when, when it's in heavy wind is much more likely to be blown over than trees in a forest when there's a heavy wind, and the you know, because it's blowing through the whole forest, they're all absorbing some of the brunt of the force, but it's not all landing on the single tree. Oof, it's good. It's a good metaphor for CO regulating, and the way that when we are connected to each other, the force is distributed, so we're able to carry it together, or, you know, navigate the brunt, navigate the load without it all, without it breaking us. Because we're each carrying a piece of it. I'm thinking too of like the migrating birds right now. We're like, here, it's in the fall, and birds are migrating south from the Arctic down to wherever they go for the winter. You know, some of these amazing birds go all the way down to South America, and it just blows my mind. We were up in the Arctic just a month and a half ago watching them make little nests on the tundra and sit on their little eggs in the middle of not like just just amazing little ground nesting birds up in the Arctic, and then this time of year, they're flying and flying and flying all the way down to, some of them, all the way down to the tip of South America, and spending the winter down there. It's just incredible. But you know, when they're those of them that fly in V's, they're doing that same thing. They're they're sharing the load, and one of them is at the point of the V for a while and taking up the bulk of the airflow resistance, working a little harder than the rest. And then it gets a break, and it gets to go to the back and cruise in the draft of the other ones. Oh, man, you know nature really knows how to co regulate and to lean on community care, and we as humans, I really believe, like we know this too. We just have it's been kind of like conditioned out of us because of our western culture. You know, not everyone was born in like Western culture that's been so insistent on individualism and on getting it right, in doing it yourself and pull yourself up by the bootstraps. But for those of us that were we are having to, like, really intentionally, unlearn those ways of taking care of ourselves and relearn what we at our bodies really know actually is what works, which is receiving, giving and receiving support and doing it together. So let me tell you why I made this whole podcast around the idea of CO regulation and what that means to me, because I see a lot of in the like online, social media, nervous system space, there's a lot of different takes, as You can imagine, and the way I see this is is quite different from what I see in most of those places. Some people tend to elevate the idea of self regulation over co regulation, and think that, like the ideal is to be able to self regulate, but from the perspective that I want to float here to you that there really it's almost like there is no such thing as self regulation, because the things that help us feel supported and regulated and move out of safe enough to move Out of activation cycles, they always include a form of relationship where we get hung up on this is that it's not always relationship with other humans. Sometimes it is, and it's amazing when it can be because, you know, it's great to be able to co regulate with other humans. That does kind of ping our attachment systems. And so, you know, depending on how we're feeling or what our history with humans has been, because many of us, you know, humans can be really supportive, but they can also hurt us. And so we have, many of us have different relationships with receiving support from others. You know, for good reason, I will just put a pin here, because I do want to do an episode or multiple episodes on Attachment, because the our ability to co regulate does ping off of our attachment system. So as we're working to build or earn secure attachment, we might find that initially we're maybe not as able to co regulate with other humans, and maybe that even the idea of CO regulation, like lands as something that feels inaccessible because we've had attachment ruptures that get in the way. So, so we can sort of pin the idea that we're going to be working towards secure attachment and building the capacity to receive that from safe, secure humans. And maybe that's like a destination down the road. But. It. But if we expand our idea of what we can co regulate with, we can approach and receive co regulation through a ton of different ways. And even if you have, like, been in this world and been thinking about, like, learning different ways to quote, unquote, self regulate, a lot of people teach like breath work practices or movement practices or grounding, all of these different strategies rely on the relationship of you and your nervous system to your breath or to the earth or to your touch, like the touch of the your hand on your body. Ah, oh my gosh. I just caught myself talking really fast. Okay, take a breath with me. Maybe let your hand come onto your body. See if there's anywhere where you notice any tension or any charge or activation. See what it would be like to bring a hand there and then. Let's just notice what the impact of that is on the body. See what it's like to let the body be touched, and feel the way there's touch support available for it,

Sarah 11:34
and notice what might be there as an impact I'm noticing under my hand a bit of, like a slowing down, there's a little bit of warmth and space opening up in my chest, under My hand. Oh, and I'm just noticing, like, some bigger exhales, my whole system slowing down a notch. And that feels a lot better. Feels like, okay, maybe I was like, a little bit nervous starting this. Maybe I got like, a little bit thrown off by the wind, like, who, who knows why, but I was coming in with some activation one, really wanting this recording to go well, wanting to share with you how much I love these concepts and believe in What we're doing here, and all of that might have spun me up a little bit, so I am feels good to have noticed that there was some activation, some co regulation available through slowing down and taking some time to notice My touch. And now we're landing in like a little bit of a slower, more deactivated place, which feels like a way better place to be talking to you from. So yeah, thanks for coming with me on that little journey. Yeah, I suppose that is just an example of how I expect to be here with you, just like showing up as myself and modeling navigating nervous system cycles in real time. And I'm curious, actually, to kind of toss it back to you and see how you re how you experienced, or are experiencing right now that wave? Did you also feel some of that activation and the speediness of it? And how are things feeling now that we've paused to slow down and check in and tend to our bodies a little bit more, seeing how that's been for you, because that potentially, is the arc of a nervous system cycle and the descent from activation to a bit more supported place. And I'm curious, I'm hopeful that you were able to feel some of that too, and we can be in practice of that here together. Okay, so there is an example all regulation is CO regulation, because what our nervous system needs to move out of an activation cycle is support and safety. And what creates support is the awareness of some kind of presence. And it can be as simple as the presence of a supportive touch like. We just did.

Sarah 15:07
So I back to, you know, the vision for this podcast, because I have been in the nervous system world for quite a long time. My I've been a therapist for over a decade, but never really felt like, um, talk therapy was quite right for me. And when I started receiving Somatic Experiencing sessions, I realized that that this work inside of the nervous system, which is like the physiological structure that runs our body's stress responses. It's has kind of an energetic aspect to it, because it overlays with a lot of the energetic systems that you might have learned about, if you're in any sort of like yoga community or spirituality space that uses energetics, but inside of the nervous system, we're talking about the actual physical structures of the nerves that you know, connect our brain stem down our spinal cord and our vagus nerves, And it connects to our digestive system and all throughout the nerves that give us sensory experience throughout our whole body. So if we were to like, be in a cadaver lab, we could like, die, digest. That's not the right word. We would be able to like, actually see the physical structures of the nerves, and in realizing how impactful it was to be able to be able to support the smooth process of my nervous systems, ability to move in and out of stress cycles, the physiology of it is what made what like shifted things for me hugely, just on a personal level, after a lifetime of navigating anxiety and depression and managing that through, you know, without notice, knowing it, I was managing that through exercising, through accomplishment, through starting a business, through over exercising, through managing food. Have you know, orthorexia at some point. Anyways, I have a whole list of things I will here's another little pin, because I will tell my story here in one of these upcoming episodes, what brought me to this work, but the the short version is that coming into learning about the nervous system and the physiological aspects of being able to actually like shift the way the body relates to stress has changed everything for me. My whole nervous system has changed, and my life has changed as a result, and my mental health, of course, completely as part of that. So I'm very excited about these topics. Can't wait to share more. And through that, it's been really clear to me that there is a need for ways to help this information get out to you, outside of a one on one therapy session, which are amazing, by the way, I have done a lot of one on one Somatic Experiencing therapy, and I'm a huge fan. I still offer one on one therapy to a limited caseload, but the the and it's very important and critical, and so no shade to that modality and the basics of it, the basics, foundation of helping your nervous system operate as smoothly as possible are accessible in a lot of different ways. So this is some of what I'm working to develop are these different formats to access this powerful body of work. And circling back to co regulation, this feels like one of the one of the big ones. So I started to realize that when I was that I was starting to reach for podcasts when I was in need of some kind of CO regulation support, and I have a couple favorite podcasts I listen to regularly, often, you know, while I'm doing other things or to kind of help the i. Sometimes it's when I'm like, doing a hard workout and or when I'm like, at the gym, or doing chores often to like, kind of help the more annoying parts of life go by a little faster, and realizing I was actually like getting a version of CO regulation through the podcasts I was listening to, because I was feeling less alone, more engaged, more alive inside of the ventral vagal branch of the nervous system, which is one that comes on and opens up when our bodies are feeling safe and we're able to feel like we're in relationship with others. So that was a piece of the puzzle. And then just this summer, I was on a backpacking trip with a couple girlfriends, and I'm often, I often like backpack alone, or often I'm with my husband, who's a pretty quiet person, and we we connect a lot, especially like on breaks and, you know, in the tent and stuff. But like, usually, while we're hiking, it's pretty quiet, we're kind of in our in our own space, unless we're, like, navigating together. But these girlfriends were a lot more social, socially oriented, and I realized that especially when we started to, like, do a hard climb up to a pass or, you know, just had a tricky section that we had to work hard during, that's actually when they would get more chatty. And I kind of couldn't believe it, because that's the hardest part aerobically, you know, you're like working hard to climb up a slope, and so you're like running out of air. But when I was able to engage with them in the social nervous system and in the story and in the chatty ventral vagal place, those climbs went by like so fast, and all of a sudden we'd be at the top, and not because I wasn't present, but because I was also feeling engaged, less alone, more supported, more like In entertained and in like a more connected, joyful place, instead of like in the struggle of one foot after the other, and it's just me in this like, endless climb, which is somewhere sometimes how it feels when it's by me, by myself. And so then I started to, like, kind of connect the dots and realize that the CO regulation experience of being with friends and socializing while you're doing hard things or, you know, if you're not with friends, sometimes we can get a lot of that same quality of support through listening to a podcast or accessing, you know, I think that's some of Why we listen to music too. We get that, that sense of like connectivity and creativity going when we're together.

Sarah 23:09
Let me I'm putting a lot of pins in this one. I want to circle back to in this conversation, though, because I for sure want to talk about how, more about why we don't have to always be co regulating with humans. For those of you that that's a tricky concept for but first, I want to tackle this question about when we are engaging with things like podcasts or even with TV, because I think there actually is a co regulation potential inside of even like watching TV, because your nervous system is engaged with all of these different formats. But there is a nuance there in because there's a way that we can numb out to those that type of media as well. And so my question here is, I like if something is CO regulating, or is it numbing? The big question here is going to be, does it connect you more to your body, or does it disconnect you and put you in a state where you're not present to your body? So the same thing has the potential to impact you in either a numbing way or a dis regulating way. And really the only difference is if we're paying attention to our to ourselves and our nervous systems during the experience or not. So that's a pretty simple thing. Well, simple, but not easy. Let's say, because the skill of learning to notice your body, notice the impact of your of something on your body, and particularly, many of us are really good at noticing activation. We notice when we get stressed. We notice when tension and discomfort shows up in the body. But the skill of noticing deactivation in the backside of the wave. When things start to feel better, when we are in pleasure, when we are settling. That is a skill that has to be developed. We've probably spent, you know, many years, our whole lives, developing the skill of tracking activation. But tracking deactivation, for many people, is a newer concept, so that, again, that might be some of what is available when you are in CO regulation through technology like this, like podcasts, like TV, but we either are missing it because we're not skilled at tracking the impact of deactivation, the experience of deactivation, or we are just like, numbing out completely. So we might be getting some relief from our activation, but it might be something that we're not noticing, as in, like we're not noticing the body relax or soften or feel a little bit more relieved, and instead, we're just note just like, No, there's just less activation so and we're just not paying attention to the body anymore. So my question for you here is, as you as we play around in this space, is, can you notice the impact that listening here is having on your body? And particularly, we'll be looking for any settling or deactivation signals, and that might mean that you notice yourself taking a deeper breath, not that you're getting yourself to take a deeper breath, but as your body settles, do you find yourself breathing deeper? Like that's a bottom up concept, that as the nervous system settles, there'll be some things that arise inherently in the body that we want to be noticing. So maybe there's a deeper breath. Maybe there's a feeling of like settling back into your seat a little bit more sometimes, like earlier in this episode, I noticed my thoughts slowing down, my speech slowing down. Yeah, sometimes I notice I can, like, take in what I'm seeing a little bit more, feel a little bit more present. Sometimes we notice that the digestive system comes on board a little bit, because maybe it had been a little bit frozen. So we might get some digestion, some girdles, sometimes a little more salivation in the mouth. So anytime we've got any of those deactivation signals coming on, we want to really notice them and enjoy them. Be in the pleasure of the backside of an activation wave. So that's a way to help the impact of CO regulation land in the body. And rather than being becoming more numb through engaging with some co regulation, we're actually like noticing the resource that's landing in the body and the way that that's impacting us. Okay, so now let me go back to my latest pin, which is talking about how there are so many different ways that we can co regulate, and many of them don't require us to engage with other humans, and the ones that do that are human oriented, we can, for sure, receive co regulation, support from caring, supportive Human through, you know, hugs or touch or conversation in real time. That would be like, really direct, you know, therapy, hopefully you're getting some co regulation through if you're going to therapy or if you're having great conversations with your friends. There's also this, like, slightly removed way that we're playing with it here inside of this podcast. Can we co regulate together through this medium? That feels like an inquiry to me, because the real answer to that is going to come through your system and seeing if you feel your system shift while we're here together in conversation, and I'd love to hear what you notice as you we ride these waves together, and what kind of shifts you are starting to track inside of your system as we play with this type of CO regulating together, and then the many different ways of CO regulating that I will be bringing in. Here, throughout this podcast, are the if we think about, like, animistically, maybe, about the different types of relationships that we live inside. Nature is one of the greatest examples, to me, of a way that we can co regulate with the more than human, the non human world. I think that's why so many of us are drawn to being outside in nature, because we feel the way it lands inside of our nervous system, our nerve we subtle. We feel better when we're outside and after we've been outside. So the impacts are undeniable, and our nervous systems are often able to experience some kind of settling or deactivation inside of their relational experience with nature. Sometimes, you know for sure, going on a hike and moving outdoors are some of my favorite ways to co regulate with nature, but I also love to just go sit with my back against a tree when I'm really feeling like I like need some serious support. I have a couple favorite trees that I go to, and just like that support of that tree at my back, it also reminds me of the time that I had a scary bee sting anaphylaxis incident, which many of you might know the story of already. If you've been around my world for the last little while, we have a mini course, actually, that we created that's an email mini course that will tell you that story and give you the nervous system rundown of the way I navigated that. Yeah, we can call it a near death experience and helped it transform into a post traumatic growth and empowering experience, rather than a traumatizing one. So I'll link that in the show notes, if that's something you haven't looked at before. But I will also tell that story on one of these episodes, because it's a good one. Okay, so during that experience, we just like happened to be in this creek bed, and when I started to lose consciousness, I sat down, and there was this like perfectly shaped rock that was just what I happened to lean up against. And through that whole experience, I was so connected to this rock and really feeling the support of the earth and of this rock that was holding my back the whole time, and it, honestly, it made a huge difference to have that kind of CO regulation support through that super intense experience. So co regulating with nature. We love it

Sarah 32:58
more of this. Let's explore that more together. CO regulating with touch is another that we played with here on this episode. Already a little bit. I hope you can get the sense for the potential power for your own touch. And this is often in in this modality. It's often just the the presence of touch, not necessarily trying to like, change anything of the body, inside the body, but what is it like to just like, have a hand come to an area that's experiencing activation, and be there with it. That's That's often enough to like, create that feeling of less aloneness, more presence, and then that can often change the direction of an activation wave in itself. I also really love the practice of havening. Oh, havening is another really nice, gentle touch practice where you just kind of stroke your face and then cross your your arms and stroke your shoulders. And yeah, I have a practice, a video practice for that too, that we'll have to link up for you, adding it to the show notes if you haven't done havening before. Really nice practices for the way we can receive touch and feel that as a sense of CO regulation. For those of you that are familiar with internal family systems or parts work, one of my go tos that I practice myself all the time and teach inside of my deeper dive containers is CO regulating with your inner child. Again, like there's a way that people sometimes can, like, think of this as self regulation, because it's like you tending to your inner child. But for me, it helps so much to think of. About this as a co regulation practice in which we have the part that's hurting or scared or like feeling really overwhelmed is supported by the part of you that is an adult that is capable, and that is also there at the same time while there's something big and scary going on, and then it's this relational experience that can develop over time, where in the young parts start to realize that they have the support, and they're able to co regulate with the adult part of you, so they don't have to change, they don't have to mature or grow up or see it any differently. They can just be there, and they can be supported by you. And in that way, there are no bad parts, and every experience that you're having is welcome. It just is also able to be held by these the container of your own adult nervous system. It's very cool stuff. Excited to explore that more with you, co regulation with animals. Let's talk about that because, oh my gosh, pets are so good for this. This is why we have pets, because they help us feel better. And that's what we're after, you know, bringing that into nervous system language that is CO regulation and deactivation. And we get that from the experience of petting our animals. I'm thinking about my sweet cat friend Emmy, who actually belongs to belong to my friend Heather, who she used to travel a lot, and I used to be able to Emmy just passed away this last spring, so we're missing her a lot. But when she was around, she would lay on my lap, and she has this purr that is like the loudest purr you can imagine. And she would just vibrate with her, like purr of contentment. And I couldn't help but feel the way that my whole body would just relax, in tune with feeling her purr on my body like it. That was some powerful stuff. Heather calls her a medicine woman, and I completely agree she was, she was and she'd purr a lot. She was like, pretty satisfied to be on your lap purring. I also have some people in my life, and some teachers and me too, who are really into the cycles of the planet, including the cycles of the moon and the stars. There are ways that we co regulate with these cycles and with the moon, the different energy that it brings out in US and in our world. So those of you who are into astrology and these other systems, that's some of how you are likely co regulating, and maybe we all are, whether or not we know it consciously, you know. But yeah, there's lots of different co regulation avenues out there. I'm curious if any of the ones I've mentioned have lit anything up in you, and if I've missed any, I would love to know, because I think there's many different avenues here that we'll be able to explore together, when we start to think about CO regulation outside of the box of like you and your therapist, or even you and your best friend, can we realize that we're accessing it in lots of different ways and bring intentionality to that, bring attention to it, and through that, amplify the impacts, because these days we need everything we can get. And so here we go together, amplifying the impacts of CO regulation, of community care, and kicking off this project together. So thank you so much for being here with me today, sitting in my car, watching the wind blow. I look forward to next episode. Please reach out if any of this resonated with you. We're shaping this podcast as we go. So leave a comment in the platform where you're listening to this, or jump on over to Instagram and say hello over there at Sarah M his stand always, and I look forward to next time, until then, happy co regulating. Take really good care of yourself and each other, and I'll see you next time you.