How Our Nervous Systems Create Our Future (Part 2: Sympathetic)

Most people we work with report living big chunks of their lives in an activated Sympathetic nervous system state, commonly known as our Fight/flight response. Big and small fear responses to life, trigger hormones being released into our bodies to energise us to safety.

It's a remarkable survival mechanism to have energy pumped into the body, but we were never designed to stay in this state for long.  Today, it seems as though we have not only normalised living and working this way, but we have even made it a status symbol to be exhausted and burnt out. We are effectively driving these incredible bodies of ours in first gear the whole time, burning out the engine.

Here's what ChatGPT said the impact would be if people remained stuck in their sympathetic nervous system state (fight or flight):

⚡️ Individually: Living in Urgency, Disconnection, and Exhaustion

• Constant alertness becomes the norm. In a sympathetic state, the body is wired for danger. Even when there is no actual threat, the mind scans for what’s wrong. This creates a baseline of anxiety, irritability, and tension.
• Rest becomes inaccessible. Even when tired, the system stays "on." Sleep becomes shallow, rest feels unsafe, and spaciousness can feel intolerable.
• Identity fuses with doing. Worth becomes tied to output. Slowing down feels like failure. Pausing feels unsafe. People live as if they’re always behind, always catching up.

🤝 Relationally: Reactivity Replaces Connection

• Communication gets sharper and shorter. Conversations become transactional or defensive. There’s little space for nuance, humor, or vulnerability.
• Boundaries become rigid or non-existent. Some people lash out (fight), others over-please or over-perform (flight), often without knowing they’re doing it.
• Intimacy becomes threatening. Being seen — truly seen — requires safety. In sympathetic, even closeness can feel like pressure or invasion.

🌍 Culturally & Systemically: A Society Built on Speed and Survival

• Busyness is glorified. Whole cultures begin to equate urgency with importance. “I’m slammed” becomes a badge of honour. Time becomes something to dominate rather than partner with.
• Systems mirror dysregulation. Institutions run on efficiency, competition, and control. Burnout is not the exception, but the expected cost of participation.
• Polarisation deepens. In sympathetic, people seek certainty, not complexity. Us/them thinking, snap judgments, and moral panic become standard.

🔁 And perhaps most heartbreakingly:

• We lose access to joy, creativity, and compassion. The parts of us that dream, connect, and imagine new futures are only available when the body feels safe. In sympathetic, we’re locked out of those states.
• The nervous system becomes the leader — not the self. And when the nervous system is stuck in survival mode, it can’t lead with love, only with defense.

❗In short:

If people stay stuck in their sympathetic state, the world speeds up, but becomes harder to live in.
We move faster — but with less meaning, less connection, and less repair.
We get things done — but we forget why they matter.

The cost isn’t just exhaustion.
It’s a quiet forgetting of what it means to feel safe, seen, and whole.

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Stay tuned for Part 3 that describes our Dorsal nervous system (shutdown/collapse).