Your Survival Instinct is Keeping You Stuck

9/2/2020

The job of your survival instinct is to keep you out of danger and alive. But what happens when the information to keep you alive is confused?

Learn about your survival instinct and how it makes you feel stuck when you want to improve your life.

The survival instinct

Through the sympathetic nervous system your brain is always receiving information from your senses to determine whether you need to fight, freeze/hide, or flight.

The survival instinct is about the survival of your body and the survival of the species. This survival instinct has been recorded as a program in the cells of your brain and your body since the beginning of existence.

As we live we continue to add more information to our cells so we (humanity) continue to stay alive. Then, that information, which we believe to be essential to staying alive, is recorded in our cells and passed down to our descendants.

Programming our survival instinct

During the cave man era, anyone who had an experience that brought him close to death had that experience recorded in their cells. Do not eat those berries. Do not wander too far off the cave. Do not get close to those critters. Do not trust the people from the other cave.

Any experience that comes with a very strong negative-feeling emotion gets recorded in our cells because to the body it means harm and possible death.

This recording of programs in our bodies is very helpful information that’s passed down to our descendants’ cells. It instinctively tells them to stay away from those experiences that could cause them harm or death. They don’t know how they know, but they know.

In our current time we don’t experience death threats that often. But our brain is still looking for them and recording what feels agonizing whether that’s physical or emotional.

Confusing our survival instinct

Every time you feel a very strong negative-feeling emotion, the survival instinct says “Oh, oh. This does not feel good at all. In fact it feels horrible as if I’m about to die. That’s it! I’m categorizing this experience, and more experiences like this one, as a death threat.”

Some of the current painful experiences that felt like you were dying could be:

It has to be perfect… if not I’ll get punished like I used to and that felt like I was dying
I can’t swallow… otherwise I’ll die as I almost died in the ocean/swimming pool
I have to fight… otherwise I’ll be abused again and every time it felt like dying
I have to attack… otherwise I’ll be humiliated again as when I was criticized/judged
I can’t love… because last time I did my loved one abandoned me or died as a part of me did
I can’t do it… because if I do it will hurt so much like it did when I did it before.

Any these stories that were experienced with tremendous hurt are considered death threats to the body even when they are not. They all got recorded because the pain was so strong that we tied it with the feeling as if we were about to die. The survival instinct is only doing its job—trying to keep you alive.

As soon as you start to tell yourself in your perception that you can’t do something anymore, then your biological system will adjust to prove you right. You will not do what you think you can’t do.” –Bruce Lipton

What’s keeping you stuck?

Your survival instinct is very strong. You might have noticed that whenever you want to do something new to improve your life, your brain and body see it as a possible threat. No matter how much you want it, you will be held back by your humanness. Good to know, uh?

Now, you don’t have to go on a witch hunt trying to find those programs tied to your survival instincts. It’s too much unnecessary and untimely work for nothing. The best way to deal with those programs that are keeping you stuck is to deal with each one of them as they come out to the surface.

Follow these steps when you notice that “something” is preventing you from moving forward:

Pay attention to your desire (what you want to be/do/have/change) and make sure it is well defined.
Pay attention to the images/beliefs that come to your mind as you focus on your desire (warning, it will not feel good. Allow yourself to feel the emotions but don’t do anything. Just observe it and feel it).
As you focus on the image/belief that came to your mind, identify the sentence that is at its core and feeds it.
Accept the sentence. Don’t judge, analyze, or discard it.
Understand where the sentence is coming from by allowing your body-mind to tell/show you where it originated. Understanding where they come from sometimes is enough for them to dissolve. Observe the entire process as if a child is the one uncovering their hurts to you.
Once you understand the origin of the sentence that was holding you back, ask your body-mind to show you moments from your past when that statement has not been true.
Continue with the empowering images that came to your mind until the old belief is dissolved or until it is no longer relevant.

Once your empowering images become more dominant, use the Harmony Scale to help you return and stay in a positive place where you can see more options, possibilities, and opportunities, to go after your desires.

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Claudia LeBaron Islas

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