In July 2020, Kyle Burgess was taking a run on a mountain trail in Utah when he stumbled upon some adorable baby animals. Knowing his family would enjoy a video, he pulled out his phone and started recording. At first he thought the animals were bobcats, but when their mother appeared on the path to chase him away, he quickly realized they were cougars. Amazingly, Kyle maintained his cool and kept filming while the mother pursued him for a terrifying near-six minutes.

Eventually Kyle gained some ground ahead of the persistent mother. When he saw an opening, he grabbed a rock and threw it at her. Finally she turned and ran the other way. (Check out this link for the full story.)

This is a perfect example of the amazing fight-or-flight response in animals and humans that kicks in when we are in life and death situations.

When we are truly in a life and death situation, the non-essential functions of our brain go off-line and our survival response kicks in.

We actually make pretty good decisions in this state as long as the choices are very concrete (can I run? should I try to fight?) and Kyle’s cool-headedness in the face of danger is a great example of this response.

Outdoor experts say that Kyle did exactly the right thing — his smart reaction allowed him to survive a situation which could have easily had a much more tragic outcome.

But imagine it’s a few months later. Let’s say Kyle is still rattled by this experience and has a bit of a flashback when visiting the zoo with his family. Let’s say there’s a cougar enclosure and a cougar begins walking his way. Remembering his experience, Kyle instinctively picks up a rock and throws it at her. After all — it worked for him before.

In this situation, Kyle’s actions would probably result (at best) him getting kicked out of the zoo or (at worst) having charges filed against him. Everyone knows you can’t throw rocks at animals in the zoo.

The same actions that are heroic, brave and courageous in life and death situations become excessive, too much (and sometimes even illegal) in ordinary moments.

When we operate out of a baseline state of fear and anxiety, we have a tendency to overreact to ordinary situations. Our brains perceive traffic jams, annoying people and minor inconveniences as life and death situations and cause us to react in ways that end up making the situation worse.

Just listen to the news for dozens of examples. (I recently heard of an assault occurring in a restaurant because the party did not like where they were seated.)

To function effectively in a stressful world, it is imperative that we learn how to calm our brains and bodies down and learn to operate from a sense of safety rather than life or death fear. You probably know from experience that when we over-respond to normal stressors, it almost always makes things worse.

In my last post I discussed a 3 step strategy for managing anxiety. These involve calming your body, reorganizing your thinking and responding more effectively.

Here are some principles from those strategies that you can start using right away:

Calm the body

When you are in a fight-or-flight state in a non-life or death situation, your body is poised for action. This action is generally unproductive when the situation is emotionally stressful. The body signals to the brain and the brain to the body via the vagus nerve cues of safety or danger. If you chronically feel anxious, you are more likely to perceive ordinary situations as dangerous. Calming the body will help reset the nervous system and allow you to see the situation more realistically and to draw on the skills that will help you manage the problem at hand.

Re-organize your thinking

Calming the body provides the space to reorganize our thinking from a more realistic perspective. When we overreact emotionally, it is usually because we are telling ourselves a story that isn’t true. In our hypothetical example of Kyle and the zoo, the story in Kyle’s head was that the cougar in the zoo was equally as dangerous as the one on the mountain trail. Challenging and changing negative thinking allows us to change the story and see things more accurately and thus behave differently.

Behave in a different way

When we have a more accurate story in our head, we are more free to ask ourselves how we can be most effective in the situation. We are more free to use problem-solving and communication skills, and to focus on the things that are in our control rather than the things that are not.

Using these skills consistently takes a lot of practice and are obviously easier said than done. To help, we have prepared a reference handout for you with practical ideas for implementing each of these skills into your life. For a free download, just email us at [email protected], or DM us on Facebook or Instagram @generationsindy.

If you are in the Greenwood/Indianapolis, Indiana area and are interested in learning more about how the therapy process works, give us a call at 317-743-8202 or email [email protected]. Even if you’re not in the area and have questions, we would be glad to help if we can.