Why meditation and journaling isn't working for you
An Interview with John Wood on Nervous System Healing
In this week’s newsletter I interview John Wood, the founder of Rageheart Academy. I’ve been taking his course for the last few weeks and have really enjoyed it, and think he has a message worth sharing. We dive into everything related to “nervous system healing” and how understanding it could very well be the missing piece to your overall wellbeing and happiness.
About John: John is originally from Australia and currently lives in Peru. He spent 10 years meditating consistently every day, but upon finding nervous system work made more progress in 2 weeks than in the previous 10 years meditating. Now he’s on a mission to get the word out about the power of healing the nervous system!
“To me, the nervous system is the root of it all… and if you don't understand your own nervous system, you're flying blind. You can be an amazing meditator. You can make tons of money. You can even be relatively healthy. But if you don't know how to work directly with your nervous system, you're missing a HUGE piece of the puzzle.” - John Wood
Q: Tell me about your journey and how you first got interested in the nervous system
It all started with a close friend. She'd started seeing a Somatic Experiencing practioner. When she explained one of her sessions, something sparked up in me and I knew I had to check it out.
I was playing with TRE (Trauma Release Exercises) at the time, where you learn to activate the body's natural shaking response (to release stress and trauma). When I heard about Somatic Experiencing, I went to Google and typed in "TRE vs Somatic Experiencing". That led me to an article titled There Is No "Exercise" That Heals Trauma by Seth Lyon.
Once I read that article, I was HOOKED. I don't know why. I'd done plenty of work on myself by that point. Daily meditation for most of the previous 10 years. Gratitude lists and apps. Wrote more than a million words in my journal. Breathwork. Ice baths. Stoicism. Affirmations. Fasting. Energy healing. On and on it went.
So by the time I stumbled onto that article, I already knew that the past was somehow living in my body and mind… and I knew that there were various techniques for releasing that "stuck energy" from the past. I also knew (thanks to psychedelics and self-inquiry meditation) that releasing that stuff from my system was the most fulfilling and satisfying thing a person could do.
The challenge was… not all techniques, frameworks and methods are created equal. For example, I noticed that staying at the level of mind, thoughts and mental analysis often didn't shift the energetic or emotional aspect of things… nor the physical aspect.
Anyway… something about the somatic approach resonated with me in a big way. I remember thinking… this sounds like it has the same goal or aim as all these other things I've been doing, but it's better. Same territory in other words… but different map and techniques.
So that's where it started for me. I read that article and I was hooked. I immediately took a few courses and I fell head-over-heels in love with it.
Q: You often talk about why journaling, meditation and breath work will only get you so far. I know from my own experience that meditation can have negative side effects which I’ve written about on Substack. There are lots of people who don’t seem to be better off even though they journal every day and have a strong meditation practice. What’s going on from the perspective of the nervous system?
By and large, the issue is that most tools and techniques don't get people actually feeling their bodies.
Journaling, gratitude lists and other classic self-help tools keep you lost at the level of thought. While narrative and how we understand and frame our past (and present) is important, it won't shift deep-set wounds that are stuck in the body.
That's the challenge with feelings. They need to be felt… and expressed. Anger or fear aren't simply meant to be witnessed (as in meditation). Very often they need to be expressed to be fully released, since that's what they were originally intended for. Anger was the fuel to attack and fear was the fuel to run away.
That's why most self-help tools don't work for shifting things at the level of the nervous system. Because they don't work at the level of the nervous system… but at the level of the mind and mental analysis.
Even meditation often fails at this. Why? Because people are (usually) taught to simply witness their feelings or sensations (if they're taught to focus on their sensations at all). And sure, sometimes that's necessary and valuable and effective… but there's also a lot of things that live in the body that don't simply want to be witnessed.
That's why someone can meditate for years (or even decades) without actually getting the results they want. Because they're not engaging with their body in the correct way. Or they're subtly activating the freeze response and dissociating from their body, which is why it can feel so peaceful.
This is an example of the map issue I mentioned in the last question. Both meditation and nervous system work encourage people to pay attention to what's happening in their body… but meditation focuses on simply "sitting with it" or "witnessing it" while nervous system work would say to play with it. Try sitting with it. Try adding in movement. Maybe some growls or running with your feet. Or even a towel to rip.
The point is, with the understanding of the nervous system and the fight-or-flight response, we have a more nuanced understanding of what the body/mind system actually needs to heal and release. And a better understanding means better results.
Q: That’s super interesting. Can you simply explain nervous system work, the idea of “pipes being blocked” and how this works to a five year old.
Feelings are meant to be felt and expressed.
Anger is the fuel or energy of the fight response. It's what gets us to attack and fight in order to protect ourselves from danger.
Fear is the fuel or energy of the flight response. It's what gets us to run away - again, in order to protect ourselves from danger (and return to safety).
All of our feelings are like this. Shame, guilt, sadness, pain and more. They all have a purpose.
The problem is…
Instead of feeling and expressing these things, we often hold onto them.
Think about a 3 year old boy who is terrified of his abusive parents. That fear is designed to make him run away from the threat (his parents). But he's 3 years old. He can't run away. It's not safe to run away from home when you're 3 years old. As a result, the fear gets stuck in his nervous system. It doesn't magically vanish (his abusive parents are still around so it's not safe to relax).
Now multiply that over a lifetime.
Fear. Anger. Shame. Guilt. Pain. Sadness.
All stored in the nervous system of a person, waiting for the day when they can be felt and released.
Until then, they wreak havoc on the body and mind.
Think about it. The nervous system ties into everything in our body. Heart rate, blood pressure, respiration, digestion, sexual arousal, higher order thinking and more. So what happens when you plug up the nervous system with a bunch of stress from the past? All of those functions get all outta whack.
Our 3 year old boy might end up with an elevated heart rate, increased breathing, butterflies in his stomach and problems digesting his food. He may stop sleeping properly.
Hey! That sounds just like anxiety.
With all of that in mind, nervous system work is simply the work required to "clean the pipes" of the nervous system. Imagine a blocked toilet. Nervous system work is what's required to unblock that toilet and get it working beautifully once again.
Q: What are some ways that trapped nervous system energy shows up negatively in our lives?
Most "mental health" problems are nervous system issues… not simply "mental health" problems.
Anxiety. Depression. Insomnia. Digestive issues. Procrastination. Poor boundaries. Insecurity. Imposter syndrome. Lack of purpose and direction. Can't focus. Irrational fears. Burn out.
Even stubborn health issues like chronic fatigue syndrome, chronic pain, autoimmune conditions, fibromyalgia, migraine headaches, severe PMS, CFS and IBS can be traced back to problems in the nervous system.
For example, take anxiety.
Anxiety indicates that someone's nervous system is stuck in some amount of "sympathetic activation", which is a fancy way of saying that they're stuck in "fight or flight" or "survival".
In other words, their nervous system doesn't feel safe and as a result, it keeps the heart rate and breathing elevated, digestion slows down and it won't let them sleep. So anxiety, insomnia and digestive problems aren't the real problem. They are just symptoms of a deeper problem called "nervous system dysregulation".
Or take depression. Now think of the freeze response, the part of the nervous system that shuts everything down and makes us feel numb. Then think of depression again. Same thing right? When someone is depressed, they feel numb. Empty. Apathetic. No motivation. Therefore, depression is a symptom or expression of the freeze response.
Or take the high-functioning successful person. On the surface, it looks like they're quite healthy because they make a lot of money and have a great career or family or whatever. They also work really hard. But here's the thing… are they working hard because their body actually wants to work hard? Or are they able to work so hard because they're so disconnected from their body that they can't feel when it's telling them to slow down?
Think of the entrepreneur who sleeps 6 hours a night. Is that because they only need 6 hours a night? Or is it because they're so shut down and disconnected from themselves that they're not actually feeling their body's natural impulse to sleep?
In the nervous system world, this is called functional freeze. Someone has a lot of freeze in their nervous system… but they're highly functional. In fact, the freeze actually allows them to get more done than someone who isn't in freeze because they can override their natural impulses more than a healthy person might.
Q: What do most people misunderstand about nervous system healing?
They underestimate it (or they think it's just like meditation or mindfulness).
For example, it's easy to hear about some of the techniques (like looking around and feeling the ground or tracking sensations within the body) and think it's the same thing as meditation.
To be fair, nervous system work HAS a lot of similar techniques as meditation…
…however, the subtle differences make a WORLD of difference in the result.
Think back to the map example.
If you have 2 maps of a place, even small, subtle differences can determine whether or not you get where you want or you get lost. For example, if you turn left instead of right, you could end up walking off a cliff or running into a bear. Even slight deviations in the map can get you lost. Maybe there's a choice to walk into a ravine or along the top of it. Both trails go in roughly the same direction… but maybe one gets you stuck and trapped at the other end of the ravine while the other gets you to your car.
All that is to say that while nervous system work and meditation/mindfulness seem similar, the subtle differences make a world of difference in outcome.
That's why people underestimate nervous system work. Depending on how it's explained, it sounds like meditation… or if not meditation, then it sounds too simple to be effective.
Really? You're telling me I can look around and feel the ground and do some other basic stuff and totally shift my nervous system? Whatever man.
Q: I think it’s fascinating that we can hold on to a lot of our addictions in our nervous system. Can you talk more about the source of our addictions?
While there are all sorts of surface-level reasons and stories about why we become addicted to various things, I find addictions are mostly tools that we use to regulate and balance out our nervous system.
For example, if we tend to be Sympathetic-dominant (we spend a lot of their time in fight-or-flight), we will gravitate towards substances and addictions that relax us out of Sympathetic Activation (ie. that bring us down):
Alcohol
Weed
Heroin
Fentanyl
Barbiturates
Tranquilizers
Low stress lifestyles (living in the woods or on a farm, away from people and "potential threats")
On the other hand, if we're overly dorsal vagal parasympathetic (more stuck in freeze), we'll find ourselves more drawn towards substances and lifestyles that stimulate us and make us feel alive (ie. that wake us up):
Cocaine
Speed
Ice
Ecstasy (MDMA)
Dangerous sports (racing motorbikes, bungee jumping, etc)
High stress lifestyles (high powered executive, busy busy busy, go go go)
In addition to that, addictions are a form of "resource". In other words, we feel bad and we use something to feel better.
If we're stressed and we don't know how to soothe and settle our nervous system in a healthy way, we'll resort to unhealthy ways (like the drugs mentioned above or even things like porn, yelling at our kids, and compulsive spending).
It all comes back to not knowing how to feel our feelings.
Q: From my own experience, I have done a lot of work with past trauma, but you purposefully avoid this word “trauma” and instead use the word energy or healing. Why is that?
I don't like using the word "trauma" because it's so loaded. What does it even mean?
Most people seem to think "trauma" means severe, life-threatening trauma… such as war, rape or a horrific car crash.
With that in mind, if I used the word "trauma" to promote nervous system work, I'd attract only the most severe cases.
But in the world nervous system healing, "trauma" isn't about the event. It's not about what happened to us. It simply refers to the "survival stress" (ie. the energy) that was generated at the time of the event and that failed to release or complete.
By this definition, all kinds of things can be "traumatic" and most people have some amount of trauma in their nervous system.
It also depends on the person.
One person with solid wiring due to good early parenting might bounce back easily from a dog barking at them or biting them… but another person who had prenatal stress from their mother, then intense abuse for the first few years of their life (while the foundational wiring was being put in place) might fall apart if a dog barked at them or bit them.
So it's not about the event. It's about the fear, anger, rage, shame, guilt and more that gets generated at the time of the event but that doesn't get released or completed (ie. the person runs away and then calms down).
Based on that definition, most people alive today have some amount of "trauma" in their nervous system… but if I use the word "trauma", I'll scare a lot of them away (because they'll think they don't have "trauma").
Q: Some of the techniques to regulate your nervous system are so simple it’s almost hard to believe. For those who are skeptical, can you give me an example of one of your techniques and what would you say to someone who is not convinced that this works?
Orient to the safety in your environment. (video on that here)
That's ground zero for nervous system work.
All humans have an internal map of what safety looks like. We also have a map of danger. The challenge is that when we've had a lot of trauma in our lives (see my definition of "trauma" above), we often become very attuned to danger in our environments and either forget or misunderstand what safety looks like.
But if we don't know what safety looks like, we'll always feel like something bad is about to happen.
And if we always feel like something bad is about to happen, we'll feel anxious (due to Sympathetic Activation), depressed (due the freeze that helps us cope with feeling activated all the time) and more.
Our nervous system won't start healing and releasing things while we feel threatened. Because think about it. If a bear's chasing you, it's a terrible time to have an emotional release. You need to run. NOW.
That's why everything starts with safety. Learning to orient to the safety in the environment. Cultivating a FELT sense of safety in the body (not simply an intellectual understanding of safety). Practicing it so it becomes unconscious and automatic.
Q: What is the difference between emotional catharsis and nervous system work?
Done properly, they're the same thing… but often emotional catharsis is misunderstood and disconnected from the nervous system.
For example, you can't simply go punch a pillow to discharge rage from your life.
It needs to be organic and spontaneous.
That is, as you engage with your nervous system and become more connected and embodied, "things" from the past will start to arise in their own time. You'll get a feel for when anger and aggression starts to move through the system… and that's when it's a good time to punch a pillow or use an emotional catharsis technique.
Q: How do you integrate the use of psychedelics with this sort of nervous system healing?
The simplest way to understand psychedelics and nervous system work is speed.
In other words, psychedelics will speed things up. It's easier for emotions, feelings, sensations and memories to move from our unconscious and arise into our awareness. Psychedelics soften the wall that keeps all our "stuff" buried so that we can finally face it.
This is a beautiful, magical thing but it also presents certain risks.
For example, what if something comes up that we're not ready to handle?
To be more specific, what if - all of a sudden - we start remembering being raped as a child?
I don't say this to scare people. I say it so that they treat psychedelics with respect and understand what they're getting themselves into.
I'm not saying don't use psychedelics. I use psychedelics quite a bit… far more than the average person. I love them. They have changed my life in all kinds of fascinating, hilarious and magical ways. But they do need to be approached with respect and understanding.
This is one reason I'm so bullish on nervous system work. Because with an understanding of your nervous system and fight-or-flight response, as well as tools and techniques for working with it, it becomes a lot easier to engage with the material that arises on psychedelics. Instead of being flattened and overwhelmed by it, you have a map and tools for the journey.
Q: Talk to me more about The Rageheart Academy and what people will get from it!
The Rageheart Academy is an online school where I teach people how to work with their nervous system as I've described here. It's part theory and part practical. In other words, you get a map (the nervous system framework and theory) plus techniques for navigating the territory of your nervous system (like the safety exercise described above).
If what I've said resonates with people and they want to actually learn how to do this for themselves, The Rageheart Academy is the place to do it. And while I like to make fun of meditation sometimes, the truth is that working with your nervous system will make your meditation deeper, better and easier (if you continue meditating).
Check out The Rageheart Academy here.
If you're not ready to sign up for a paid program yet but you want to learn more, join The Weekly Growl here. It's a mostly weekly newsletter on how to use your nervous system to silence your mind like never before.