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In the previous module (this blog is module 2 of the 10-module Surviving to Thriving Pathway online course), we introduced the survival mode and touched briefly on the thriving mode, and I shared with you that I would next be presenting a story to illustrate how quickly and easily things can spiral out of control when viewing life through the survival mode.
But first, a little more background.
Surviving can become our standard mode of the perceptual lens through which we filter present-moment stimuli.
This is unfortunate because the surviving mode has a built-in negativity bias.
It seeks to continually justify “the reasons” why we are suffering and filters all experiences through the “half empty” lens of “what can go wrong, will go wrong.” 

When this default mode is ON, we live our life defensively closed and reactive, instead of confidently open and creative.
Remember, the surviving mode has no concern for our “happiness” or emotional well-being.
In fact, the brain we were born with, I could argue, is designed to be UNhappy…
Look around: how many people do you that ARE, actually, HAPPY?
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The Brain In Thriving Mode
The brain in thriving mode, on the other hand, makes more accurate contact with what is actually the case.
It doesn’t treat the stick as a feather, and it doesn’t react to the stick as if it is a snake, so then it can choose to walk by the stick and leave it alone, or pick it up and build a fort with it it.
A useful theory suggests that this more primitive part of our brain evolved when threats to our safety were primarily physical and required immediate and conclusive reactions to secure our short-term survival.
We didn’t live nearly as long, for many reasons, so it wasn’t as big a deal that we burnt ourselves out in survival mode… we weren’t trying to keep our crackers until our 80’s and 90’s.
Michael Boyle LMFT, CDBT
Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist in New Mexico (pending in MA)
Certified in Dialectical Behavioral Therapy
Trauma/anxiety specialist trained in EMDR, somatic therapy, CBT, NLP
Advanced studies in yoga, Ayurveda, breathwork, meditation, optimal performance, biohacking, and just about everything you can imagine about healing and thriving.
Authorized in the work of Dr. Joe Dispenza.
Founder of the ALL Together Academy, author of the Creative-IAM, Facilitator of "The Future Now Project", "The Relating Renaissance" and Energy of Mind: Secular Spiritual Work for Practical People.
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Nowadays, for many of us, our primary “threats” are emotional, “mental” and social.
 Employing the surviving mode’s only options of fighting, running away, and hiding usually makes things worse and leaves us with scant neurological architecture to experience the safety, connection, inspiration, joy, and love we all desire.
We are living longer and this isn’t often going well for a lot of us. Survival mode takes its TOLL.
Nowadays, for many of us, our primary “threats” are emotional, “mental” and social.
 Employing the surviving mode’s only options of fighting, running away, and hiding usually makes things worse and leaves us with scant neurological architecture to experience the safety, connection, inspiration, joy, and love we all desire.
We are living longer and this isn’t often going well for a lot of us. Survival mode takes its TOLL.
It is really important to realize that the default mode of our brain has survival as a priority because it is not usually until we are utterly convinced of this that we are willing to do the work to upgrade our mode of being

Until we do this DELIBERATE work, most of us are stuck hoping this or that will finally make us feel better and fearing that it won’t.
The brain in survival mode is designed to assume the stick is a snake.
When, in actual FACT, it is a stick.
When we are in survival mode, which for many of us is OFTEN, i.e. any time we are upset, or “stressed out”, we do NOT perceive ACCURATELY.
I just want to pause there for a moment to make sure that sets in.
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Unless the saber-tooth tiger is breathing down our necks, surviving mode unnecessarily reeks all sorts of havoc with intertwining layers of complex justifications.
For example, this funny/not funny story I like to tell illustrates how our reacting to sticks as if they are snakes can very much generate REAL problems in our lives. 

What I can’t communicate in this story is the complexity and layers of living through the survival lens’s misperception as a way of being, interacting in a world where almost everyone else is doing the same, including people with significant amounts of power to influence the fate of ALL. 

One of the most unfortunate outcomes of re-acting to sticks as if they are snakes is what happens in our relationships with the people we love… in arguments that often start because of things like caps off the toothpaste… because when we are in survival mode we actually perceive even the people we love as threats, and all we can do is attack and defend.
Since most of us are evolved enough to not get physically violent, we use the next option: psychological warfare as we go straight for the emotional jugular of the people we are closest to and hurt each other in ways that we sometimes can’t come back from.
But that is a digression into the whole world of ATA teachings called “The Relating Renaissance”, so let’s get back to how this plays out on an individual level.
Imagine you wake up to the smoke alarm in the middle of the night… 

The outer alarm activates the inner alarm, which shuts off your intelligent thinking capacities, allowing you to ACT FAST, without thinking, because that’s the way this system works.
You wouldn’t want to pause and think, “should I go left or right” when the tiger is coming at your throat. It’s already too late!
In your state of fear (FLIGHT) that there is a fire, you immediately grab the fire extinguisher and start spraying.
But after a minute you start to wake up a little more and you realize, there’s no smoke, nothing is charred, there was no fire after all.
Read More About Surviving Mode Here
Unless the saber-tooth tiger is breathing down our necks, surviving mode unnecessarily reeks all sorts of havoc with intertwining layers of complex justifications.
For example, this funny/not funny story I like to tell illustrates how our reacting to sticks as if they are snakes can very much generate REAL problems in our lives. 

What I can’t communicate in this story is the complexity and layers of living through the survival lens’s misperception as a way of being, interacting in a world where almost everyone else is doing the same, including people with significant amounts of power to influence the fate of ALL. 

One of the most unfortunate outcomes of re-acting to sticks as if they are snakes is what happens in our relationships with the people we love… in arguments that often start because of things like caps off the toothpaste… because when we are in survival mode we actually perceive even the people we love as threats, and all we can do is attack and defend.
Since most of us are evolved enough to not get physically violent, we use the next option: psychological warfare as we go straight for the emotional jugular of the people we are closest to and hurt each other in ways that we sometimes can’t come back from.
But that is a digression into the whole world of ATA teachings called “The Relating Renaissance”, so let’s get back to how this plays out on an individual level.
Imagine you wake up to the smoke alarm in the middle of the night… 

The outer alarm activates the inner alarm, which shuts off your intelligent thinking capacities, allowing you to ACT FAST, without thinking, because that’s the way this system works.
You wouldn’t want to pause and think, “should I go left or right” when the tiger is coming at your throat. It’s already too late!
In your state of fear (FLIGHT) that there is a fire, you immediately grab the fire extinguisher and start spraying.
But after a minute you start to wake up a little more and you realize, there’s no smoke, nothing is charred, there was no fire after all.
Read More About Surviving Mode Here
Unless the saber-tooth tiger is breathing down our necks, surviving mode unnecessarily reeks all sorts of havoc with intertwining layers of complex justifications.
For example, this funny/not funny story I like to tell illustrates how our reacting to sticks as if they are snakes can very much generate REAL problems in our lives. 

What I can’t communicate in this story is the complexity and layers of living through the survival lens’s misperception as a way of being, interacting in a world where almost everyone else is doing the same, including people with significant amounts of power to influence the fate of ALL. 

One of the most unfortunate outcomes of re-acting to sticks as if they are snakes is what happens in our relationships with the people we love… in arguments that often start because of things like caps off the toothpaste… because when we are in survival mode we actually perceive even the people we love as threats, and all we can do is attack and defend.
Since most of us are evolved enough to not get physically violent, we use the next option: psychological warfare as we go straight for the emotional jugular of the people we are closest to and hurt each other in ways that we sometimes can’t come back from.
But that is a digression into the whole world of ATA teachings called “The Relating Renaissance”, so let’s get back to how this plays out on an individual level.
Imagine you wake up to the smoke alarm in the middle of the night… 

The outer alarm activates the inner alarm, which shuts off your intelligent thinking capacities, allowing you to ACT FAST, without thinking, because that’s the way this system works.
You wouldn’t want to pause and think, “should I go left or right” when the tiger is coming at your throat. It’s already too late!
In your state of fear (FLIGHT) that there is a fire, you immediately grab the fire extinguisher and start spraying.
But after a minute you start to wake up a little more and you realize, there’s no smoke, nothing is charred, there was no fire after all.
Read More About Surviving Mode Here
Unless the saber-tooth tiger is breathing down our necks, surviving mode unnecessarily reeks all sorts of havoc with intertwining layers of complex justifications.
For example, this funny/not funny story I like to tell illustrates how our reacting to sticks as if they are snakes can very much generate REAL problems in our lives. 

What I can’t communicate in this story is the complexity and layers of living through the survival lens’s misperception as a way of being, interacting in a world where almost everyone else is doing the same, including people with significant amounts of power to influence the fate of ALL. 

One of the most unfortunate outcomes of re-acting to sticks as if they are snakes is what happens in our relationships with the people we love… in arguments that often start because of things like caps off the toothpaste… because when we are in survival mode we actually perceive even the people we love as threats, and all we can do is attack and defend.
Since most of us are evolved enough to not get physically violent, we use the next option: psychological warfare as we go straight for the emotional jugular of the people we are closest to and hurt each other in ways that we sometimes can’t come back from.
But that is a digression into the whole world of ATA teachings called “The Relating Renaissance”, so let’s get back to how this plays out on an individual level.
Imagine you wake up to the smoke alarm in the middle of the night… 

The outer alarm activates the inner alarm, which shuts off your intelligent thinking capacities, allowing you to ACT FAST, without thinking, because that’s the way this system works.
You wouldn’t want to pause and think, “should I go left or right” when the tiger is coming at your throat. It’s already too late!
In your state of fear (FLIGHT) that there is a fire, you immediately grab the fire extinguisher and start spraying.
But after a minute you start to wake up a little more and you realize, there’s no smoke, nothing is charred, there was no fire after all.
More About Surviving Mode
Unless the saber-tooth tiger is breathing down our necks, surviving mode unnecessarily reeks all sorts of havoc with intertwining layers of complex justifications.
For example, this funny/not funny story I like to tell illustrates how our reacting to sticks as if they are snakes can very much generate REAL problems in our lives. 

What I can’t communicate in this story is the complexity and layers of living through the survival lens’s misperception as a way of being, interacting in a world where almost everyone else is doing the same.
Because your brain is in a state where you assume the stick is a snake, you start getting scared (FLIGHT) about the sensations in your chest and you become convinced you are having a heart attack. 

You call an ambulance, which terrifies your kids (FLIGHT), and your partner, knowing it is a panic attack because this has happened before, is forced to go along with it all, but really inside is feeling disgusted with your weakness (FIGHT) and you sense this and feel ashamed (FREEZE) also knowing deep down that you are having a panic attack.

Realizing how much the ambulance ride is going to cost because of your high deductible, crappy, insurance you get really pissed you off (FIGHT).
But you quickly turn that anger in on yourself and start feeling like a real piece of shit (FREEZE). 

After you are medically cleared you gain some sense of relief, and you have a few moments of clarity, but then you get home and see all the stuff you ruined and the shame sets back in (FREEZE). 

And now that your partner knows you are medically okay for sure because she was scared too (FLIGHT), she now gets super pissed off (FIGHT). 

In this state of anger, all of the feelings of love, trust, and appreciation she has for you are inaccessible and as her anger (FIGHT) turns to hopelessness (FREEZE) she wonders inside if you aren’t just better off getting a divorce.
Okay, let’s wrap it up there. 

I could go on, and on, and on, about the ripple effect on the kids, the future, the connections to the past, etc. 

But, let’s suffice it to say: some people live almost their entire lives in a state of survival mode re-action.(link mechanical vs conscious evolution blog)
Blaming Others
You wouldn’t want to pause and think, “should I go left or right” when the tiger is coming at your throat. It’s already too late!
In your state of fear (FLIGHT) that there is a fire, you immediately grab the fire extinguisher and start spraying.
But after a minute you start to wake up a little more and you realize, there’s no smoke, nothing is charred, there was no fire after all.
When We Are Upset
When we are upset – for any reason - valid or otherwise,
Or when we are “stressed out” for any reason, valid or otherwise,
We are activating that part of our brain designed to help us survive a tiger jumping at our throat - NOW.
We see, taste, feel, and “KNOW” “our truth” that the stick is a snake when it is ACTUALLY a stick.

We are convinced we are absolutely right, and all the “reasons” why we are upset about anything and everything, are the real and actual reasons why we are upset. In fact we don’t even consider whether we are “right” or “wrong” - its just the way things ARE. 

After all, “its my TRUTH,” isn’t it?
This is not our fault. (link blog by same title). Our brains were bon this way. But if we want to a better life, it is our responsibility, to train our brain or remain the same.
The surviving mode turned on too much, too often or all the time is the origin of all suffering and physical, mental, and emotional disease.
No exaggeration.
In the next module, we will get specific about what happens in our body-mind when the survival mode is activated.
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The surviving mode turned on too much, too often or all the time is the origin of all suffering and physical, mental, and emotional disease.
No exaggeration.
In the next module, we will get specific about what happens in our body-mind when the survival mode is activated.
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