Window of Tolerance
You’ve just opened Outlook and there’s an email marked URGENT from your boss. Someone sees your status circle turn green and calls you on Teams (you hear the “boo boo boobooboo boo boo” in your sleep).
You glance at your phone and see a text message from your sibling – sh*t, your elderly parent had a fall for the second time this year and is in the hospital.
At least the kids are on the way out the door on time with your spouse. Scratch that, they’ve all just come back into the kitchen: the youngest has a temperature and can’t go to daycare.
Are you chilling calmly within your Window of Tolerance? Hard no?
Maybe you’re in the fight or flight zone. Or maybe there’s just been one. thing. too. many. And now you’ve completely frozen and shut down.
Ok, my babe. The bad news is that you’re never going to eliminate all stress from your life.
The most excellent news is this: there are ways to reduce stress, and many things you can do to process daily stressors to avoid overwhelm, burnout, and negative impacts on your health.
Contact me to talk about managing stress and preventing burnout.
Polyvagal Theory was developed by Dr. Stephen Porges, to explain how our nervous system responds to stress – when we’re in the Window of Tolerance, we’re calm, and we feel safe and connected. We’re able to effectively manage and respond to stress.
If our sympathetic nervous system is activated, we enter a state of hyperarousal and get flooded with adrenaline – that URGENT email just told our brains that it’s time to fight for our lives or run as fast as we can.
However, if the threat to our safety seems completely overwhelming, we go into the dorsal vagal state: there’s nothing more to be done, and the only option is to shut down.
Chronic stress or trauma can shrink the Window of Tolerance and send us more quickly to a dorsal vagal or sympathetic state.
Widening the Window of Tolerance requires ongoing, intentional effort, but it’s doable and well worth the effort.
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