Sean Feit Oakes gave the sixth talk in a speaker series titled "Everyday Dhamma." He explained that when we feel threaten, our sympathetic nervous system kicks in two modes: fight or flight. We get activated when we perceive threat, but our usually body calms down once we perceive that we are safe. Anxiety, stress and vigilance are symptoms of trauma. To use the language of Buddhism, restless mind, anxious mind, and fearful mind are minds that got stuck in the activated mode, instead of being reset to neutral. In other words, trauma happened when at one point in our lives we felt threatened, and we never felt safe again. Purification comes when we can learn to turn off the activated mode, and work through the aspects of our conditioning that are painful and let go, so we can return to balance.
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