Fight, Flight, Freeze or Fawn?

This is the “fawn” stress response which is a coping mechanism that’s often ingrained from a young age. It’s a reaction that involves hiding your true emotions and presenting a calm exterior, pretending everything’s ok - and while this can be a useful skill, it often leads to “people pleasing” and suppressing ourselves.

If your client experienced any sort of trauma as a young child, when they were still operating mostly unconsciously as they were learning, growing and developing in the world, and were put in a situation that they were not mentally, emotionally or physically able to handle, they would have experienced the “freeze” stress response.

In that split-second moment, the front part of their brain would have shut down and because they were so young (and “under-developed"), they would have made “assumptions” about themselves, others and the world. It’s like if they were a butterfly and forced out of the cocoon before they were ready and had to find a way to survive.

These assumptions became their deep, ingrained “truths” imprinted into their unconscious programming that shaped every thought, decision and behaviour from that moment on.

It means that their self-doubt, lack of confidence, and feelings of unworthiness (that are the real reasons why they don’t follow through with things and get the results that you know they could), are so deeply entrenched that simply doing affirmations or changing a belief is not going to be enough. 

Even if they didn’t have anything traumatic happen (and trauma doesn’t just mean verbal, physical or mental abuse - it can also come from an accident, loss, health problems, rejection or being excluded), the science of Epigenetics is proving that we are inheriting past stresses and traumas from previous generations that then play out in our lives when we’re triggered. This is why we don’t understand why we feel the way we feel because there’s not a big significant event that we can link it back to, to "logically" make sense of it all.

I spent decades trying to understand “why” I felt not good enough despite having a wonderful childhood and never wanting for anything. 

It didn’t make sense that I would feel that way, and so I resigned myself to having to live a life where I was never truly happy. 

Thankfully I didn’t fully give up and my deep desire for happiness prevailed and today I know that I’m good enough, in every cell of my being, as sure as I know my own name and never have to “convince” myself otherwise.

When you do, you’ll be better able to help her by understanding the deeply ingrained patterns and cycles that will cause the sabotage and stop her from achieving the results from your program, that she desperately wants, and you want for her. 

It will show you the mindset barriers that need to be addressed FIRST, so that the “doing” part becomes easy.

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