3 Ways to Feel Calm when the World Feels Unsafe

A warm welcome to our live event today, which is all about how can we feel safe in what feels like an unsafe world. So thank you for joining us today on this livestream and this live event, and we'd love for you to share this with others. So if you are other people who you know could benefit from this livestream, then please do share that with them. So my name is Ashok Gupta. I'm the founder and CEO of the Gupta Programme. And I'm here today to really talk about how we've been receiving a lot of emails into the clinic about people feeling a little stressed, a little overwhelmed with what they're seeing on the news right now. And what they're telling us is that when they're watching the news, they're feeling like it's an addiction. They can't stop checking the news. They feel on edge all the time. And if people are experiencing a chronic condition, such as the ones that we treat in the Gupta Program, they're finding that their symptoms are flaring up as a result of what they're experiencing in the world right now. And they say, I don't feel safe, even though I know that I'm okay. And this is affecting people at a physical level, an emotional level, the mental level, and even the spiritual level. So physically, they might be experiencing these deep physical symptoms. They might emotionally be feeling like rudderless, feeling like the world is overwhelming. Mentally, they may be feeling that lack of mental clarity. And then spiritually, they may feel like they're questioning life when they see what's unfolding in the world around us. So this might be heightened anxiety or fear. It might be sleep disturbances that people experience, or you might be experiencing. It might be increased stress, emotional overwhelm. And of course, once again, going back to that compulsive news checking or doom scrolling. So in today's session, what we're going to do is talk about the neuroscience of how our brains respond to conflict, to challenges around us, and why it can make us feel unsettled, discombobulated, and what we can do about that situation. Because this is affecting people at a deep level. Now, I think the first port of call really is for us to realize that the nervous system is not designed for 24-hour news and information. So it may seem like, well, modern technology is great. We're getting all these modern streams. We're getting to know what's going on in the planet. When our psychology collides with the technology around us, yeah, our nervous system and our technology. This creates challenges and we see this with social media and screens. So our nervous system is not designed for 24-hour news and information, all right? And from an evolutionary biology perspective, we have this limbic part of our brain that is designed to protect ourselves and the tribe, all right? And so when we see images of war, images of suffering, images of negativity and conflict. It stimulates that deep tribal instinct within us to protect ourselves, our family, and our tribe, and to feel that we are living in a fearful world. All right? And the model that I want to kind of introduce that is essentially what we call this trigger-interpretation-response model. All right? So in this trigger, meaning, response model, the trigger is watching the news, seeing these negative images unfolding before our eyes. The meaning that we then attach to that is, this is bad. This is terrible. All is lost. And I'm under threat. And my family is under threat. Or my country is under threat. And the response is this overstimulation of our nervous system that then creates this cortisol. And this adrenaline in our body. So an emotional response is not just the cognitive aspect of the way that we think, but also the emotional physiological response in our bodies. And that's very important because that can get stored up and can make us feel on edge even more. And via the vagus nerve, that information from our body feeds back up to our brain to say, we're in danger, what should we do about this? So your brain is trying to protect you. But it's using an outdated wiring in a modern world. And the more that we respond, the more that we resist and fight what we're experiencing, the more we put that energy out there. And so yes, it's a logical neurological response, but it's not based on the reality of that particular threat that we are experiencing. So the brain is hardwired for threat detection and is biased towards survival. So in a lot of ways we can say, you know, is the glass half empty or the glass half full? That depends on your perspective. Well, obviously at the moment it's not. Hmm. But imagine if the glass was half empty. Our brains are wired towards the glass being half empty rather than half full. That is the way that it sees the world, and that is a protection response. That's hardwired into our evolutionary biology. So how do we respond to this? How do we deal with this situation where there are things and events unfolding around the world? There have been elections that certain people have had triggers from. There have been conflict that people have had triggered nervous systems as a result. And what we often find is people keep this to themselves. They keep quiet about it. And yet it is fundamental to the way that people are processing themselves and the world around them. Okay. So what I want to do is talk about how we deal with these particular situations. So I think the first one, and we're gonna call this the three sets of regulation models. So 3 ways that we can regulate when the world feels out of control or feels chaotic. So we've got that trigger, interpretation, response model, or trigger, meaning, response. And we're going to deal with all 3 of them. The first one is the trigger. And of course, this is about regulating what we consume, because we can have this perception that the world is really bad when we're consuming 24-hour news, and that becomes once again, a bias that we have in our minds. Now, what is the news? The news is, let's look at all the worst things that have happened on the planet in the last, whatever, 24 hours, and let's feed it to you in an emotionally overstimulating way. All right? And it's impossible to feel safe in the world when you're constantly feeding your brain that it's dangerous, because your brain can't tell the difference between a threat that's on your screen and a threat that's actually real in your environment. And what does the news do? It makes those images really bright and powerful. It makes them over the top. And in doing so, it makes you think that things are much worse than they actually are. And so that's really important that we don't watch 24-hour news. So instead, what we want to do is keep ourselves updated, read the news, but also look at distracting our mind away from the news. Now, of course, some of us might say, well, hang on. Don't we want to know what's going on? Don't we want to feel empathy for the people who are going through these experiences?

Yes.

And at the same time, we can have a maladaptive empath response where we over-empathize in the sense that we then take on that negativity. And that isn't helping anybody. And if some of you may remember, recently I did a model called the Trauma Protection Matrix, and it was all about how trauma from our past can create these protection matrices and these layers of protection in our psychology. And one of those that we mentioned was safety. And if we grew up in an environment where we didn't feel safe as a child, the world will create, or our brains will create a world where we will see the world through that lens of a lack of safety to fit its narrative. So the brain is always looking at, how is the world compared to what I believe it is like? And if it's different, that's a threat. But if the world is the way that I predict it will be, then I am comfortable with that analysis. And that's why we can get stuck in our patterns from our past. In brain neurology, this is called predictive coding. The brain will want to see the world the way it's always seen the world, which is why change can be very different. The way to think about this is the lens. So our brains have got used to seeing the world through a certain filter, a certain lens, right? I'm sure these look quite comedic right now. And the brain is saying, this is the way the world is, right? I can see the world this way because that's how I learned to see the world. And when we see it in this particular way, if we've had trauma in our past, if we felt unsafe in the world in our past, we will then see these situations as much worse than they actually are in our current situation, and then it will be magnified and over-trigger and over-stimulate our nervous system. So once again, thanks to all of you who are joining on our livestream. We'd love for you to share, show us your emojis, share this with others, perhaps different feeds on your own Facebook or YouTube or Instagram. The more people that we can get this information to, the better. And of course, something that we notice a lot of people doing is the doom scrolling. Doom scrolling, you know, until a few years ago wasn't a thing. It's become this thing where late at night or at some point during the day, people start reading about news or something negative, and then they keep reading more and they keep reading more and finding different angles and different news sources, making themselves more and more anxious. And this is one of the most unhealthy things that we can do and yet people are addicted to doing it. And what I'd like to share with you today is actually some clues as to why that may occur and what the brain neurology behind that actually is. And I find it incredibly fascinating, actually. So I'm going to share my screen and share with you this particular diagram. So the neurology of doomscrolling. This is some research that I did and putting these different pieces together as to why we doomscroll. Why do we get addicted to the news? Because I think this is central to reducing these triggers around world events. So the first thing is the threat. So the threat is a trigger, which is watching the news, over-consuming the news. And that's a part of our brain called the amygdala, which when it hears this news, and it's constantly detecting threats in our environment, it says, "Is my tribe safe? Am I safe?" And it reduces or releases cortisol and adrenaline into your system. All right? And as a result of that, the brain says, "I'm receiving this information. There's uncertainty. Because there's uncertainty, I need more information." So the brain starts becoming hypervigilant and actually wants more information. And this comes back to our idea of predictive coding, that the brain says, well, the world was okay and now it seems unsafe. I need more information in order to update my predictive coding about the world around me. All right? So there's a hypervigilance on the news. Our third step, and this is where it gets very interesting. Do we notice that sometimes we can be addicted to the drama? Addicted to the emotional intensity. Well, this is where dopamine comes in. So there's a part of our brain called the ventral striatum. When there is a novel experience or an intense experience or unpredictable experience, it starts releasing more dopamine. So our brain says, hey, I'm going to reward you for this hypervigilance, for you doom-scrolling. And therefore, I'm going to release more and more dopamine the more you keep doom-scrolling. Because it's helping us deal with uncertainty. And in any way, anything that's novel and intense and unpredictable also stimulates dopamine. So that explains why we might feel this kind of, I suppose, an urge, an urge to continue with the doomscrolling. Then that fourth step is where we then lose that control over our ability to stop the doomscrolling, where the prefrontal cortex is overwhelmed with the emotion and can no longer fulfill its role of calming down these responses. And that's where you think, I know I should stop, but I can't, I can't. Because your brain is getting hits of dopamine as a reward for being hypervigilant in your environment and also the novelty of it all. And as a result of that, that hypervigilance continues and your anterior cingulate and your insula said, keep monitoring, don't stop. Which then means you monitor more of that threat And around and around you go in this vicious cycle of doomscrolling. So your brain in this environment is not your friend when it comes to the doomscrolling. And we have to recognize that this pattern is going on. Okay. And so how do we— move on to our next step? How do we stop the doomscrolling? Well, this is resisting the urge to watch the news. As we said, read the news instead and becoming aware of why you're addicted. So when you're watching the news, you're doomscrolling, say, "What am I getting out of this?" Right? "Am I addicted to the drama? Am I thinking that this is protecting me, but actually it isn't?" And instead, can we focus on our own situation, what we are grateful for? Now, of course, when it comes to those in need, those who are suffering, those who are in those war zones right now, what can we do for them? Well, the mind wants to feel like I have some influence over this or I have some control over this. We certainly don't have any control. But often if it's about donating something to a cause that supports the people who are going through this, who are actually on the ground, or it might be sending your wishes and prayers to them as we all do, in our peace meditation coming up a little later on. So we talked about what can we do, the 3 ways we can regulate. The first regulation is regulating our consumption of content. So I think we're very clear on that. So recognizing our addictions and letting that go. We talked about the third aspect, which is response. So trigger, meaning, response. So trigger we've dealt with. The response, the regulation of our physical body. You can't think your way out of a dysregulated nervous system. And that's where self-care is so important. So what is it that helps you regulate when you feel overwhelmed with world events? So that might be breathwork, might be meditation, being in nature, physical exercise, making sure you're getting good sleep. And I think for a lot of us, co-regulation is very important. When we are with others, we tend to let go of that doom scrolling and that perception of the world around us. And it all depends on the field that we're in. So if we're in a field of positivity, if we're around people who are lighter, who are expressing that light, who are uplifting us, then that's where we can submit to that field. We can absorb that positive energy. But if that field is negative around us, then we want to stand in our own energy and not absorb the energy of those around us. So that co-regulation also depends on the environment and the situation that we're actually in. So how can you be around people that enable you to feel more grounded and more centered and more co-regulated? And something that we want to offer everybody here who's live streaming, perhaps please do share once again this video with your friends and family, support groups, so we can kind of let people know about the free offerings that we have. We have something called Daily Gupta Sais, and these are live streamed healing meditations which are fresh and new every day. They're presented by our lovely Gupta Program coaches. And once again, these are free. They're currently free right now to free trial members. So you can download our free app at the App Store or Play Store. Just type in Gupta Program Brain Retraining. And you can join these live events Monday to Friday. They happen at 10:00 AM Eastern or 11:00 AM Eastern in the afternoon for UK and Europe. And in these live group size, they're 20, 25 minutes where our team take you through perhaps some breathwork, some somatic technique, or some deep meditation. And we have 200 to 300 people a day coming on live. And we can't underemphasize how amazing it is to meditate with that collective intention, with a like-minded group. And I'd encourage you to join that when you feel you need that co-regulation and that support. And what's really interesting, we did a survey recently on GuptaSise, and we found that 90% of people reported that the GuptaSise meditations help them feel more relaxed compared to meditating on their own. And this is something that we'd like to study more and deeper, that meditating on our own is something very powerful and positive, But look, look at this, 90% of people saying group to size meditation is more powerful, deeper relaxation. I mean, that shows you the power of that group collective intention. And 84% of people rated group to size 8 out of 10 or higher. So the vast majority of people, 84%, rated group to size 8 out of 10, 9 out of 10, or 10 out of 10. So we'd really encourage you to join our daily group to size events and it can be something that you offer to yourself, to your friends and family, that's free Monday to Friday. And it's a great way of meditating with others, feeling that, that shift. So please do, please do join us for that each, each day. And our team have just shared that in the comments. So in the comments, wherever you're streaming this live, you can see free daily group exercise. Click that link, and if you haven't signed up to the free online program, you can join it there as well. So we'd love for you to join us for the daily Gupta Sighs. Let's get those numbers up. Let's get hundreds of people, we could have thousands of people joining us for a brand new fresh meditation live on Zoom every day. We'd love for you to join us. So we've looked at the 3 aspects. The first aspect, the trigger, let go of the news. The third aspect, that physical response in the body. So looking at that co-regulation, that aspect of regulating your nervous system through breathwork, meditation, calming things down. And you know, in the modern world, it's so important. I think a daily practice is mandatory for all people living through uncertain times like we're going through. Now, the third aspect of regulation, so regulating the news, regulating your physical body, is regulating the mind. And in our stimulus-meaning-response model, our mind is constantly making meaning of situations around us. So no situation has a meaning until our brain superimposes its own meaning based on its experiences, its personality traits, and its past and its memories. Just like we said, the mind has its way, its lens that it looks at the world through. It's a meaning that the mind creates. And so I think what's important here is having a philosophy on life. Now, you know that big question that we all ask, why does bad stuff happen? You can imagine this kind of archetype of a man shaking his fist at God saying, why are you letting this happen? And how can we shift our perspective in this particular situation? And what I notice is that a lot of people are not only doom scrolling, but doom— what can we call it— doom judging. Judging the world through this lens of doom. I hear so many people saying, "Oh, I wouldn't want to bring a child into this world," or, "The world's already going downhill," or, "What's going to happen in the future?" And it can feel like the world in its current situation is much worse than it ever has been. And I would like us to reflect on that. Is that because actually objectively the world is getting worse across so many different parameters? Or is it actually that we are consuming more news? We're consuming more of the negativity that's going on around the world. What is actually going on here objectively? And so we want to retrain our minds by having these new perspectives, not only from a cognitive level, but also an emotional level as well. And I think that, you know, it's recognizing that because our brain is trained for survival, it has a cognitive bias. And its cognitive bias is focusing on what is bad about humanity and what we see around us. And no doubt, there's nothing here that's minimizing how challenging and terrible the situation is for those in the Middle East, for those being caught up in the conflict right now. There is no underestimation of how challenging that is, how fearful that is for the people living there, many people losing their lives and so on. So we're not in any way minimizing or underestimating that. But for us who are away from that situation, this can be yet another bit of information that the brain then starts judging the entire world. We call it doom judging, as bad and negative. And actually what we want to realize is that Throughout human history, there have always been wars, conflicts, yeah. And yet, even though we see this in the news, we are living through times which are actually the most peaceful. And you might find that's really bizarre and kind of contradicting what we may feel or experience. But here's a few little bits of evidence that I want to share with you just so your cognitive approach to this can be shifted and changed. So let me just add this bit of information that I want to share with you. Okay, so we went through this particular cycle here. So here is a graph that represents global deaths in conflicts since the year 1400. Okay, and this is actually a logarithmic scale on the left-hand side. So actually, the shifts in here are even more than what you might perceive in the y-axis of this graph. So what it shows is that the number of deaths per 100,000 people on a logarithmic scale, and throughout all of human history, you can see the red line there. And you can see in the last 50 years or so, there's a dramatic reduction in the number of military deaths, civilian deaths as a result of war and conflict. And because this is a logarithmic scale, the number of deaths that we see now, let's say, take the year 2000 as an example, is a hundredth or two hundredth of where it has been at peak times during human history. And so this isn't to, once again, minimize what's going on. It's simply to show us that actually, despite what we see on the television, the world is safer and has less conflict and less death and destruction than it ever has in previous generations. And this is also another graph showing the death rate in conflicts by conflict type over the last 50 years or so, last 70 years, 80 years, dramatically going down over the last 50 years. Life expectancy increasing from, you know, by 10, 20 years over the last 50 to 60 years. The percentage of people living in extreme poverty and relative poverty also coming down. That doesn't mean, once again, that we become complacent, but it's showing that despite our perception the world is becoming worse, we're all working together as a civilization to try and improve things on the planet. Once again, more graphs showing that conflict is actually decreasing. And I think that The reason we show that once again is to shift that perspective cognitively, that whilst it feels like things are worse, actually, could it be our own consumption of the news? And there's actually something called the Good News Network, GNN, Good News Network, which is all about helping us not only watch the kind of significant things happening on the planet that are negative, but also looking at all the positive things that humanity is doing. And unfortunately, that isn't something that stimulates our dopamine system, but is so important for us to consume. So can we balance these things out. Yeah, it can be a romanticization of the past. The past was much better. Think about our ancestors. Think about our recent grandparents. They had to live through the First World War, the Second World War, where the situation was much worse. Yeah, where it literally was a world war and everyone was living through deep insecurity. And so therefore, let's feel grateful for what we do have and also look to how we can support people going through that suffering. It doesn't help us to go through the deep negativity and depression that might come from these situations. Humanity will get through this. We've got through wars, conflict, massive challenges in the past. And let's just believe in the power of the human spirit to get through this and to see that positive things or certainly new ways of organizing ourselves can come out of this. So in terms of our go-home tools, I think the— First thing is, when we become aware of the agitation, we can ask ourselves, what needs regulating right now? What within me needs regulating? And that's where we can go into nature, breathe, meditate. Do you need to do some physical exercise to remove that cortisol and adrenaline that's getting stuck in our physical system? And I think that self-awareness is absolutely key. Key. Everything begins with awareness. That second aspect of reducing the triggers, how do we reduce our triggers and reduce our consumption of the news? So that is once again something that we can invest time and energy in, reducing news consumption and focusing on positive things, focusing on things that we can be grateful for in our lives and that we see around us. In our lives, we're very lucky. Think about the The fact that previous generations did not have guaranteed access to at least basic healthcare. I appreciate not everyone has full healthcare, but basic healthcare, to education, to clean water, to food. Some people on the planet don't even have that now. So thinking about what we can be grateful for that we take for granted in our lives and switching to uplifting content so that if we keep ourselves uplifted, then we can be a support to others who are finding the current conflict challenging. We can send donations, we can send our prayers and best wishes, and not underestimating how powerful— if our consciousness and our vibration is higher, that can make an impact on this planet when we meditate. How can we have peace outside if we don't have inner peace within ourselves? So developing a deep sense of inner peace is the transformation to the outer peace on this planet. And finally, if your mind does get caught up, then journaling, reflection, looking at how you can move towards or step towards acceptance and letting go around your perception of the world around us. And finally, practice for our response. Joining us for Daily Gupta Sighs or whatever it is that you need to do to help calm your nervous system. We'd love for you to join us each day on Daily Gupta Sighs. Our team will check in with you. Share the link as well. Okay, so I think that we've been through a lot of content there. I'd love for you once again to share this content far and wide with your friends and family, support groups, people you know who are finding it hard to deal with the current situation. And once again, we're not being Pollyanna about it, we're not saying that this isn't something that is minimizing in any way, but at the same time putting it all in perspective and understanding our own brain neurology and how it might be magnifying this to our own detriment. Okay, so what we're going to do is we're going to now go through our short peace meditation, and after we do that, we're going to go on to Zoom where I'm going to be doing a Q&A. So our team are going to share with you the link to our live Zoom, and on the Zoom call, I'm going to answer any questions that you may have about nervous system regulation, around the Gupta Program or indeed how we can shift our perspective on the world around us. It's about asking the challenging questions. I don't shy away from that. And I'm just here to support you in terms of a deeper understanding of our psychology and our neurology and how we can biohack the threat response systems to make sure that they don't overwhelm us and we can keep calm and centered and be a boon to society. Okay, so we're going to go through our live meditation right now. So I'd like you just to get comfortable and make sure that you're not going to be interrupted. Okay, and I'd love for you to just gently close your eyes, and let's take a slow, deep breath in.

And breathe out. Another energizing breath in. And let go. And with our eyes closed, just tuning into our physical body and noticing if there's any parts of us that feel tense. Is there any part of us that feels overwhelmed by world events? Just noticing where that tightness or tension might be and observing the sensations in that part of our body. It might be sensations of fear. It might be sensations of anger or frustration. Whatever you're noticing is okay. We accept those sensations, and we think of our representation love. For you, this could be a figure from your religion or spirituality, or someone that you feel deeply loved by. And this is about us shifting our perspective as we think of the world events unfolding on our screen, and we observe how it impacts on our bodies. Just notice any sensations of agitation or anxiety and just place a warm, loving hand on that part of your body. It might be in your throat area. It might be in your chest area or stomach area. In a moment, we're going to be feeling those sensations, and we're going to take a deep breath, and we're going to surrender it. We're going to let it go. To our representation of love. By connecting to our representation of love, which could be, as I said, a figure from your religion or spirituality, it could be nature, could be your pets, just something that makes you feel loved and connected to something bigger than yourself. Let's take a slow, deep breath in, feeling those sensations, and let go. Once again, feeling that connection to something greater than yourself. Could be a beautiful nature scene, like looking out over the ocean, whatever represents love and expansion to you. And once again, we observe any fear or agitation within us as a result of world events. We take a deep breath in, and with a smile, let go and surrender all of that at the feet of your representation of love. Coming to a place of acceptance and peace with what is unfolding. Once again, taking another deep breath in And breathe out. And keeping our eyes closed, realizing that peace is our very nature at a deeper level. Feeling centered and still is our deepest nature. Feeling calm is our true deepest nature. I am peace. I am that stillness. Taking a slow, deep breath in and smiling with a gentle exhale. And recognizing ourselves as the source of peace, may we send these peaceful vibrations to those caught up in the conflict. Those who are living in fear, uncertainty, may we send them the vibrations of peace. May we send them our empathy. And best wishes. May we send them our compassion. Or what they are experiencing, knowing that we are the source of that peace. And through sending our vibrations of compassion and love to our fellow man, woman, and child. We wish for them whatever can be the best outcome. And when we recognize ourselves as the source of that peace, we stand in our own power and in our ability to be of service to our fellow humans. Let's take a slow, deep breath in and breathe out with a smile. Another energizing breath in and let go. And when we feel ready, when we feel complete We may gently open our eyes. Okay, everybody, well, thank you so much for joining us on our live stream today. Please once again do share this with other people you know who are finding the current climate challenging politically, militarily, or caught up in the conflict. Please send them this video, and there may be things that they can benefit from. And also you can tell them about our Daily Gupta Sighs. Our team can once again share that in the chat, the Daily Gupta Sighs, which can be, which is free, free to the whole planet, something you can join Monday to Friday, livestreamed on Zoom, where you can join hundreds of others in that collective intention of wishing peace, calm, and centeredness for ourselves and also for everyone else. And as I mentioned, here at the Gupta Program, we're now going to be going on to a Q&A with myself on Zoom. So our team will share the Zoom link.

In the chat.

Please do join us for that Zoom call. So we'll see you there in a couple of minutes.

Thank you once again for everyone for joining, and we look forward to seeing you at another live event.

Bye everyone.