I just had a conversation with a friend who, like me, is on a journey to heal from chronic fatigue using brain retraining and neuroplasticity techniques. (She’s amazing, and I have no doubt she’ll soon inspire many others with her story.) We talked about the delicate balance between engaging with the world and rewiring our nervous systems. For her, an unexpected surge in social activities posed a challenge. While being active and social is what we aim for in our healing journey—it’s why we’re doing this work in the first place—it can also trigger our nervous systems and distract us from our daily practices.

In my own experience over the past 18 months, I’ve had periods of increased socialising, meeting new people, and traveling. During these times, I sometimes put my brain retraining on the back burner. I noticed moments when I pushed myself too hard and relied on adrenaline to cope. I also found myself reacting impulsively instead of responding thoughtfully, indicating I still had emotional regulation work to do and that my nervous system was being triggered.

Is this a bad thing? Some would call this being outside my ‘training zone‘ (more on my thoughts on this term here) and that I should retreat. It’s true that being in a safe cocoon retraining for one hour a day gives the nervous system time to feel safe, move into a parasympathetic healing state and build its capacity and resilience. When I first began my brain retraining journey I was living with my parents, mostly isolated and I was able to give my absolute all to DNRS. I devoted 1-1.5 hours per day to my practice, I had no other commitments and was able to fully focus on redirecting my thoughts and elevating my emotional state. This time was incredibly nourishing for my nervous system.

But like beautiful butterflies (one of my favourite metaphors for healing and creatures I love to find in nature), we can’t stay in our cocoons forever. We don’t WANT to, we are training in order to be able to LIVE. Looking back, I can see that the times when I pushed myself – sometimes beyond what my nervous system was ready for – was crucial for my healing. These were opportunities to teach my nervous system that those situations are safe, and highlighted areas I still needed to work on. I am rewiring so that I can have the capacity to live in the modern world without having a chronically activated nervous system, and is there anything better than learning through experience?

It reminds me of the Buddhist story about a monk who spends time meditating alone in the mountains, but then returns to society to find himself losing his composure. I have definitely been in situations where my nervous system has been challenged and I have been that triggered, reactive monk (sorry family and friends!), but in doing so, I have learnt and grown. Sometimes this involved a conscious step back and re-dedicating myself intensely to rewiring and soothing my nervous system with extra rounds of practice, as well as the gentle acknowledgement and surrender to the idea that I needed a bit more time.

If I ever accidentally overdo things and trigger symptoms, I try to focus on the positive emotions that these moments gave me, redirecting away from fear and into joy, allowing the nervous system to perceive these triggers as safe. As someone who was isolated from the world for a long time, social connection and being out in the world feels very good for my soul. Sitting in these positive emotions is a balm for my nervous system. There is a tendency to ruminate and think “I shouldn’t have gone, I have been doing too much, I made this old symptom come back”, but instead the response to maximise our rewiring should be, “wow, that was amazing, how special was that experience, what a privilege to be able to experience such joy”. I also remind my body that nothing I am doing is ever ‘unsafe’, the human body is designed to be physically active or as my coach says, ‘cavemen walked over 20km a day’, my nervous system just needs reminding in these moments.

Another point is that we don’t need to isolate to heal. We can make do with the situations that are arising right now. Most retrainers don’t have the luxury of cocooning themselves because life happens. I have seen some incredible stories of people healing in less than ideal environments. My neuroplasticity coach also shared that she felt her healing was accelerated because she was in a stressful job during her retraining. We aren’t training ourselves to be in control of everything, but to have the capacity to be regulated in the uncontrolled reality of our everyday real lives.

In the practice of nervous system regulation there is no right or wrong, it’s a beautiful journey of trial and error and a dance between pushing ourselves and stepping back when needed. Much like life itself, it has its ups and downs, challenges and times of relaxation. We are training ourselves to surrender to the unpredictability of life and to let go of perfectionism and control. Leaning into what feels right for us in each moment is going to enable us to regulate, heal, and blossom into beautiful, regulated butterflies.

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