Show Notes
In this episode, Michael shares a deeply personal experience from his somatic therapy studies: feeling calm and articulate in small classes, yet anxious, self-critical, and dysregulated in larger group settings. Together with Nikolas, he explores this contrast through the lens of Polyvagal Theory, unpacking how the nervous system perceives safety, threat, and social connection.
The conversation moves beyond theory into lived experience—touching on fight-or-flight responses, faulty neuroception, self-regulation strategies, and why intellectual understanding alone often isn’t enough to calm the body. They discuss practical approaches such as breathing, leaving and re-entering situations, nervous system “priming,” vulnerability, co-regulation, and the limits of exposure-based methods.
A thoughtful, honest exploration of social anxiety, embodiment, and what it really takes to retrain the nervous system—especially when you already “know better,” but your body hasn’t caught up yet.
Timestamps 00:41 – Introduction and framing the episode 01:35 – Overview of Polyvagal Theory: ventral vagal, sympathetic, dorsal vagal 03:35 – Michael’s experience: small classes vs. large classes 05:35 – Nervous system threat perception and fight-or-flight in social settings 07:18 – Safety, self-monitoring, and why “just focusing outward” doesn’t work 09:54 – Breathing and self-regulation: what helps and what doesn’t 12:34 – Why self-soothing techniques can fail in high activation 14:53 – Leaving situations to reset the nervous system 16:50 – Priming before stressful situations (movement, yoga, routines) 19:39 – Hidden triggers: commuting stress and activating content before class 21:45 – Reducing shame through understanding nervous system patterns 23:35 – Designing an ideal program for social anxiety 25:22 – Exposure vs. skill deficits: where the real issue lies 27:04 – Does exposure actually teach safety to the nervous system? 28:38 – Relief after leaving situations and what the body learns 30:08 – Holding it together vs. genuine regulation 31:36 – Vulnerability as a way out of incongruence 34:22 – Acceptance vs. forceful self-regulation 35:55 – Co-regulation, empathy, and being seen in anxiety 37:02 – Behavioral therapy: when it helps and when it doesn’t 38:54 – Closing reflections and wrapping up
More from Expanding Consciousness
Nikolas and Michael get personal about masculinity and the father wound: how boys are quietly taught to suppress emotion, the difference between inheriting a parent's fear and reacting against it, and what it takes to change a pattern carried since childhood. They talk about parenting the way they wish they had been parented, loving a child for who they are rather than what they do, and the hard question of whether a relational wound can be completed without the parent. It ends on blame, grief, and the good memories worth holding onto.
Nikolas and Michael turn the lens on themselves and the podcast itself: the quiet fear of saying the wrong thing, where self-censorship comes from, and what honest conversation actually costs. They trace their path from software engineering into psychology, move through charged territory like COVID and polarization, and get into the strange discomfort of hearing your own voice. Nikolas introduces the "true mirror," and they land on podcasting as a kind of shadow work and a practice in staying present.
Michael brings his first experience of Hakomi, a gentle, mindfulness-based somatic therapy, and the two of them unpack what actually happens when the body starts to unwind on its own. They get into following impulses instead of forcing them, why a guided container helps, the discipline of allowing rather than controlling, and how exaggerating a tension can be the thing that finally releases it. Along the way: repression and chronic pain, fascia and non-directive movement, and where Hakomi sits next to TRE.
Megan's Website: https://unitybreathwork.com/
You can do years of inner work, but if your nervous system is still organized around threat, the body keeps paying the price through stress, inflammation, and chronic pain. In this episode, trauma therapist Shari B. Kaplan (LCSW) joins Nikolas and Michael to explore how trauma lives in the body, why the nervous system holds the key to lasting healing, and what it really takes to move from surviving to thriving.