Polyvagal Therapy
Polyvagal Therapy Overview
Much of what shapes our emotional experience happens outside of conscious awareness. Just like breathing and pumping blood, the body is constantly working to keep us alive, adjusting moment to moment through the autonomic nervous system. These processes influence how we feel, how we relate, and how we respond to stress, often without deliberate thought. When the nervous system detects danger, it can shift into fight or flight, or move toward shutdown, making it difficult to access a sense of connection, safety, or ease.
The Polyvagal Therapy Process
Emotional distress is not always something that can be resolved through thinking alone. At times, automatic negative thoughts persist despite insight or effort because the underlying activation is happening at a physiological level. Chemical signaling, nervous system states, and implicit memory can keep the body organized around survival, even when the present moment is safe. In Internal Family Systems terms, these experiences are often connected to exiled parts that carry unresolved emotional pain and remain outside of awareness, yet continue to influence mood, perception, and behavior. A polyvagal-informed approach works directly with these underlying processes. Rather than trying to override the mind, this work supports the nervous system in shifting states.
Benefits of Polyvagal Therapy
Practices such as breath work, body awareness, and sensory grounding can help regulate the nervous system, creating an off ramp when the mind is caught in repetitive loops that do not lead to relief or meaningful change. As the body settles, access to social engagement increases, making it easier to feel connected, present, and capable of experiencing joy. Over time, this can support greater flexibility in the nervous system, reduced reactivity, and an increased capacity to move toward a life that includes connection, meaning, and more frequent access to a sense of well-being.
Our Approach to Polyvagal Therapy and What to Expect
Active imagination offers a bridge into the unconscious where these exiled experiences live. Through guided imagery, visualization, and meditative awareness, it becomes possible to gently enter this inner landscape and develop a relationship with what has been held outside of conscious awareness. Imagination is not separate from the body, it has measurable physiological effects and is closely related to the mechanisms behind the placebo response. When engaged intentionally, it can support shifts in both emotional experience and nervous system regulation. This approach allows for change that is not just cognitive, but embodied. In sessions, you can expect a gentle, polyvagal-informed approach that supports regulation, helps bring unconscious material into awareness, and creates more space for connection, presence, and a sense of well-being.
