A three strand cord
body, mind, and soul
I’ve just finished pouring coffee - decaf - and made sure all the children are downstairs before breaking into the dairy free chocolate chips. The baby is asleep in the carrier and the dishwasher hums. Naptime was less of a fight than usual, though the toddler is still attempting to fix his crib with his tools instead of sleep. These days I count anytime he stays in bed as a win. I woke up overwhelmed this morning, already feeling behind. Disciplining myself to write three pages of nothing felt silly, but somehow it still helped. “I just need to get my body and brain to get with the program so I can be a needless robot” I write. As soon as I’ve written it I know that it’s both true and untrue. On some level robotic productivity is what I expect of myself. But I know there’s more to it than that.
Stephen Borges proposed something called polyvagal theory in 19941. The basic premise is that people experience a whole spectrum of nervous system activation on a continuum from parasympathetic…