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Hey there.

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I'm Justin Sunseri.

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I'm a therapist, a coach, and the creator
of the Polyvagal Trauma Relief System.

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Welcome to Stuck Not Broken, where
I teach you how to live with more

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calm, confidence, and connection
without psychobabble or woo woo.

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I got a question here from, we'll
call her DL, from my private

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community, the Stucknaut Collective.

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DL has actually a bunch of
questions around sadness.

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She says, I experience waves of
sadness over the holidays that

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are a bit more frequent and
intense than the rest of the year.

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I understand sadness is part of
being human and having emotions.

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How do we know if sadness is maybe
subconsciously related to a trauma,

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or just natural, something just
to accept and let pass on its own?

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Am I correct in thinking that
anchoring in safety would be okay,

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be helpful for sadness of any origin?

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Or are we to grin and bear natural
sadness, in parentheses, non traumatically

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induced via cognitive acceptance?

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Or is it really best to develop
tolerance for all feelings of

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sadness via safety anchors?

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So lots of questions
here all around sadness.

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Let's try and break this down one by one.

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So the first thing she says, and yeah,
sadness is part of being human and

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it's, it's an emotion that we have.

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Sadness is not random.

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It doesn't come out of nowhere.

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I don't believe, I don't think
that we're simply born feeling

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sad and therefore we'll be sad and
depressed the rest of our lives.

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I don't believe that.

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I haven't seen that in my
clinical work as a therapist.

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It's an emotion and emotions don't.

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They're not, they don't
pop up out of nowhere.

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Emotions come from the state of our body.

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If you haven't heard of something
called the polyvagal theory.

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Look in the description.

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I have a link there for a deep dive
into it in my my podcast, the Polyvagal

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101 series, you'll get all the
foundational pieces, simple language.

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So give that a listen
and then come back here.

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Sadness and other emotions, they don't
just exist within us for no reason.

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They come from the state of our body.

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If our body is in more of a
state of like it's prepared

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for danger, like flight, fight.

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Then our emotions are going
to be flavored by that.

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They're going to be more anxious.

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They're going to be more
maybe, maybe more aggressive.

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If our body's in like a shutdown state,
we're going to have more sadness and

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depression and numbness and loneliness.

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If our body's in more of a freeze
state, then we're going to have

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emotions of panic and maybe even
explosive rage, overwhelm, stress.

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If we can change the state of our
body, then our emotions change as well.

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It's not easy, especially to
change the state of the body first.

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It's not easy.

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Usually, or the way that I work as a
therapist, the way that I work myself,

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the way that I teach in my courses is
to work kind of in the reverse, which

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is we start with our emotions and
then work backwards toward the state.

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So if we can notice our emotions like
sadness, Then we can notice what we

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might start to be able to notice what's
happening underneath those emotions,

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which are sensations and impulses.

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If we can feel those, mindfully
experience them, and even act on

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them, then our polyvagal state or
the state of our body can change.

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If we can notice our sensations
and impulses underneath the

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emotions of shutdown, for example.

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That can help us come out of shutdown,
at least little by little, we can come

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out of shutdown into fight and then
flight and then safety, but every step

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of the way, we have to notice what's
happening within us on an emotional level.

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But then the question is, well, what's
it feel like to have that emotion?

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So saying I'm sad is okay.

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I'm glad that you can recognize that.

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But what does your sadness feel like?

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How do you know you're sad?

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How can you tell?

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What does it feel like?

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Okay, so that's just the first part here.

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Sadness is part of being human
or I guess a mammal perhaps.

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It's not random.

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Our emotions, they're for a reason.

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They come from the state of our body.

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Sadness comes from shutdown.

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So then she asked, how do
we know if sadness is maybe

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subconsciously related to a trauma?

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Well, we, I guess don't I would
say let's not evaluate it.

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So the way that I work in with my clients
in therapy and coaching as well I have

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this three step process and that's
validate normalize and give permission

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So the first step is validation.

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Can you just validate?

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Can you name it?

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Can you recognize what's true?

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Do you already feel, do you feel sadness?

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Yes.

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So that's validation.

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You're just naming it.

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You're not dismissing it.

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You're not minimizing it.

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You're just saying, this is true.

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I feel sad.

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All right, cool.

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Check.

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The second step is normalization
and that involves asking yourself,

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does it make sense why I feel sad.

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The answer could be it makes sense that I
feel sad because today something horrible

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happened or today I just feel depressed
and I've felt depressed for years.

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It could be I feel sad and that's
connected to some horrible stuff

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I went through as a kid or that
was connected to my parents never

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building a healthy attachment with me.

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So the question is does it
make sense why you feel sad?

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Not is it good, not is it bad, is
does it make sense and I think a

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lot of people might say no, but
let me, let me put it to this way.

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If I had your life and I felt
sad, would that make sense to you?

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Would you say to me, yeah, I get it.

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Yeah.

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I can see why you feel sad.

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So that's the second part
is normalization, validate,

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and then normalize.

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The third part is give it permission.

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So if we can name it and it makes
sense why it's there, can you

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give it permission to be there?

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So none of this involves us
evaluating, is this a trauma sadness?

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Is this a life context sadness?

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Is this a seasonal sadness?

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It's just sadness.

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And can you be with your sadness without
judging it, without evaluating it?

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It's there.

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It's real.

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It makes sense why it's there.

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Now give it permission to be
there if you can handle it.

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If you can't, that's fine.

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Don't, that's fine.

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So validate, normalize,
and give it permission.

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So the way that I work, which is
very much present moment focused,

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therapy and coaching, my focus
is on what's happening now.

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What are you currently feeling
and can we let it be there?

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Especially can we let it be there
while anchored in safety, which D.

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L.

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brings up in her question here.

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She says, am I correct in thinking that
anchoring and safety would be okay?

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Of course it is always okay.

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It's always okay to anchor
in your safety state.

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Am I correct in thinking that
anchoring and safety would be okay?

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Be helpful for sadness of any origin.

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Yeah.

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To allow yourself to feel sadness or other
emotions that come from a defensive state,

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you kinda have to be anchored in safety.

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If you feel sad without safety.

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then it's just sadness.

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It's you'll probably isolates in the dark.

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Maybe you're going to reject people.

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But if you have access to your safety
state, then you can allow yourself

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to feel sadness with compassion.

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You can allow yourself to
feel sadness with curiosity.

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And yeah, maybe you'll still, you'll
still be by yourself, but it won't

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be like in the dark, in the closet,
isolating and rejecting the world.

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It'll be more like recognizing, I need
to be alone and giving yourself solitude.

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It might be saying, I need to be immobile.

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I need to be still.

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I need to just be and
have low stimulation.

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And so I'll put the right lighting on
maybe, or I'll have the right kind of

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music that works for me or just quiet.

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So I need to be alone.

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I need to be still.

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I need the right kind of environment.

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And that's just what I need
without judgment or evaluation.

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That's different than I'm terrible.

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I'm horrible.

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I have to hide in my house with
the lights off and ignore people.

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That's isolation.

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That's more like dysregulated
sadness, I would say.

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What I'm talking about, the
sadness from safety, it has

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a much different look to it.

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a lot more self compassion, although they
both involve sadness and they both stem

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from the polyvagal state of shutdown.

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But the sadness without safety
has dysregulated shutdown.

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The sadness with safety
has regulated shutdown.

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It has safety plus shutdown.

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That allows the shutdown to be there,
but with all the self compassion stuff.

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DL goes on to say, are we to
grin and bear natural sadness?

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That to me, I don't know if DL means
it this way, but that to me means

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dysregulated sadness and we're just
sort of like white knuckling it.

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We're just tensing our way through
it and there's no compassion.

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There's no curiosity.

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And, you know, look, if you
need to do that to get through

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the moment, that's fine.

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I'm not going to judge you.

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If you want to get through your
sadness by some sort of coping,

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like distracting yourself okay.

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Like, sometimes you might need to
do that, especially when it's more

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the dysregulated sadness flavor.

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But ideally, no, we don't
want to just grin and bear it.

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There might be times where you need to.

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Ideally, there are times where you're
truly anchored in your safety state

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and then you can choose, you can allow
the sadness, you can allow the shutdown

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to be there from your safety state.

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That's the ideal, and that's for my
courses, that's really what I stress is,

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in phase two we learn how to anchor in
safety, in phase three, that's where we

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learn how to, or I teach, how to anchor in
safety and then mindfully, compassionately

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allow the defensive state activation.

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And we start with emotions like
sadness, and then we work our way

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down to sensations and impulses.

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So she says, are we, are we to
grin and bear natural sadness

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through cognitive acceptance?

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I'm not quite sure what that means.

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Just accepting that like, Hey, I'm
sad and I have to deal with it.

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That's just dealing with it and that's
fine, but that's not anchoring in safety

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and then allowing yourself to feel it and
actually climbing your polyvagal ladder.

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So I, the ideal is
something much different.

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And then the last thing she
says is, or is it really best to

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develop tolerance for all feelings
of sadness via safety anchors?

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And yeah, I think so.

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Sadness is sadness, but it
can have different flavors.

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So someone might say I'm sad.

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Someone else might say I'm sad, but
they might not mean the same thing.

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The first person might say I'm sad,
but it's flavored by loneliness.

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The second person might say I'm
sad, but it's flavored by rejection.

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The person, the first person's loneliness
might be more about abandonment.

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The second person's
loneliness is like rejection.

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So they're sad, they're lonely, but the
flavoring of those could be different.

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So, you know, sadness is sadness,
but it has different flavors to it.

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Yeah, you can anchor in safety, no matter
what the sadness is, you can first anchor

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in safety, then mindfully, compassionately
choose to allow that sadness, but it

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won't be dysregulated at that point.

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It should be a healthier.

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more regulated experience.

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And then if you can do that, then you
can eventually work your way down and

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notice the sensations and impulses.

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That's the stuff I teach
through phase three of my

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Polyvagal Trauma Relief System.

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If you're interested in being a part
of my courses, you can subscribe

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to my courses and my private
community, just like DL here.

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You can subscribe to those through
my total access membership.

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It gives you all three of my trauma
recovery courses and my private community.

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We meet up twice a month
for open Q and A's.

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The courses have numerous lessons
teaching you how, teaching you all

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this stuff, but it takes that next
step of like, how do I do this?

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Not conceptually can I understand this,
but what's the application of this?

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And that's what the courses do.

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If you're stumbling in the courses,
you're not getting something.

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Or if you're.

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getting some ahas and loving it.

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Either way, you can share
that with the community.

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And there's a really cool, great,
supportive, small group of people

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there that are encouraging each other
and giving, sharing their thoughts.

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And every now and then just
sharing pictures of their pets

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or a coffee in a coffee shop.

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It's a wonderful little community.

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And I invite you to be a part of it.

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I hope to see you there.

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If you wanna learn more about it,
go to justin LMFT.com slash total

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access (JustinLMFT.com/totalaccess).

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Again, JustinLMFT.com/totalaccess.

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I'll have a link for
you in the description.

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Bye.