Why do you feel on edge even when you’re safe? Hypervigilance is a common trauma response that can make your brain and body stay alert for danger long after a stressful experience has ended.
In this video, we’ll talk about what hypervigilance actually is, what’s happening in your brain and body, and why worrying can feel strangely protective (even when it’s exhausting you). We’ll also explore gentle ways to help your nervous system recognize moments of safety. If you’re constantly scanning for threats, startled by small sounds, or struggling to relax, there’s a reason your body learned to respond this way—and change is possible.
The combination of hypervigilance and trauma can leave you drained. Just look at this poor horse.
(Screenshot from video by Happy Heart – Happy Home Farm and Rescue on Facebook. Original Reel available here: https://www.facebook.com/reel/3619607568178950)
He’s been through neglect, sold to a slaughterhouse and rescued. But he doesn’t feel safe enough to lie down, even when he’s exhausted.
In its essence, trauma is a protective response to danger. The body has learned on a deep level that something bad could happen, and you’ve developed a safety mechanism of constantly being on high alert. This is called hypervigilance.
You worry about what you said, or you overthink everything. Or your body seems to just alternate between being high-strung and exhausted.
Today we’re going to take a trauma-informed approach to figure out how to get your brain to quiet down. Because the good news is, just like this horse, you can gradually rewire your nervous system, your brain and body, to feel more safe, to relax. And I’ll teach you 3 practical skills to do this, plus at the end I’ll ask you one life-changing question that might help you finally see why you secretly don’t want to let go of worry.
Connections Between Hypervigilance and Trauma
So hypervigilance is when your brain and body are stuck in high-alert mode. Your brain acts like there’s danger nearby, even when you’re safe. Here’s how it shows up:
- Feeling always “on edge” or unable to relax
- Scanning people, environments, or conversations for problems
- Analyzing, planning and overthinking to prevent issues
- Jumping at small noises or surprises
- Constant muscle tension and exhaustion
- Difficulty focusing because part of your attention is always watching for danger
- Trouble sleeping or fully “letting your guard down”
Why you can’t sleep: Hypervigilance
Your brain’s threat-detection system (especially the amygdala) is overactive, while the part that says “you’re safe right now” isn’t fully overriding it. So your system keeps asking:
“What if something goes wrong?” even when nothing is wrong.
Constantly scanning or overthinking is your brain’s way of trying to keep you alive. (Thank you brain).
Now, short-term stress isn’t bad. If your house is actually on fire, noticing the scent of smoke and then hearing a smoke alarm trigger that physical rush of fear and adrenaline to help everyone run safely out of the house.
But when you’re weeks or months past that dinner that went up in flames, if you continue to scan for signs of a non-existent fire, that hypervigilance will burn you out—sorry for the bad pun!
Hypervigilance’s bff is hyperarousal, where your nervous system gets stuck in “on” mode. It keeps your body stuck in chronic stress, because to our nervous system, the perception of danger triggers the exact same physiological reaction as physical, present danger. Thinking about worries sets off cortisol and adrenaline and primes your body to take action to fight, flight, or freeze.
This is really common for people with unresolved trauma. So for most people listening to my videos, that chronic worrying doesn’t go away easily. You feel like you’re in danger when you check your emails, when you sit quietly with nothing to do, when you’re running late, when you try to lay down to sleep.
That’s when the what-ifs and the worries constantly creep in, even when you’re actually safe.
It might feel like your brain or body is broken, but it isn’t. Your brain is just trying to protect you. And somewhere along the way, your brain “learned” that staying vigilant protected you in some way.
- Maybe it helped you anticipate someone’s mood.
- Maybe it helped you avoid conflict or harm.
- Maybe it gave you a sense of control in uncertainty.
- Maybe you learned that if things were too quiet, something bad could happen.
But now, that same system is stuck in the “on” position, even when it’s no longer needed. Maybe feeling “on edge” feels normal, and you’re unfamiliar with what relaxed feels like.
Hypervigilance is like having a smoke alarm that’s too sensitive. It goes off not just for fires, but for toast. The goal isn’t to rip out the alarm.
It’s to retrain your nervous system to only go on high alert when there’s real danger.
Are you ready for the first skill to help you regulate and feel safe enough?
This is going to sound paradoxical, because even though worries and planning keep us stuck in a chronic fear response, I don’t want you to stop worrying yet, and that’s because hypervigilance thrives on vague danger. So the first thing is to…
1. Turn Chronic Worrying into Acute Action
Most people think that all stress is bad. But, our bodies are actually really good at handling acute stress. It’s the chronic stress that wears us down. So let’s lean into that.
When you’re feeling anxious, stressed or vigilant –
Get clarity and ask, “Is there actually a fire? Am I actually in danger?” If the answer is no, then remind yourself that here in this moment, you are safe enough.
If the answer is yes, ask “Is there something I can do about it?”
The smoke alarm goes off. If there’s a fire burning in your kitchen, don’t try to sleep through it. Jump up, get the fire extinguisher out, spray it down.
If you notice a new health symptom like a weird mole, instead of fretting about it, schedule an appointment to see a dermatologist.
With hypervigilance, there are a few ways we take our constant worrying and make it more acute.
a. Schedule time for worrying
Write down your worries. It might be something like getting passed over for a promotion or missing the tax deadline. And then ask, “Am I actually in danger?” “Is there something I can do about it?” If there is a problem that you can solve, take some concrete and physical action.
This might look like speaking up for yourself, asking for a raise, or schedule in a time to sit down and deep dive into your taxes and get them done, or file an extension. You’ll notice how all of these are kinda anxiety provoking. But remember- taking action shows yourself and your nervous system that you can keep yourself safe. And it makes the stress more short term, instead of chronic. Again, you can handle acute stress—it’s the chronic that wears you down.
Let me give you another practical way to create clarity around these worries:
b. Healing trauma: “Actual Threat” drill
Ask yourself:
- What exactly am I afraid will happen?
- What evidence do I have right now?
- What’s a more likely explanation?
Example:
- Stimulus: they didn’t text back.
- What exactly am I afraid will happen? They’re upset with me and will ghost me.
- What evidence do I have right now? They didn’t text back.
- What’s a more likely explanation? They might just be busy. Or they didn’t see my message. Or their phone battery is dead.
- And going back to our first question, am I actually in danger? No; even if they are upset with me, that’s not dangerous.
Maybe your worries are about a situation that you can’t control. To get clarity on that, you can…
c. Calm hypervigilance by ending the “What if” game
This might be best done with a therapist. Essentially, you start with the worry that has been playing on repeat in your thoughts, and give voice to all the worries behind it. For example:
- What if I can’t find a job? Then what?
- Then I won’t be able to pay my mortgage. Then what?
- Then, after a few months, the bank would foreclose and I would lose the house. Then what?
- I would have to move in with a family member. Then what?
- I would survive. It wouldn’t be the end of the world, and I’d keep looking for a job.
It’s important to do this with a therapist, or at the very least, on paper because you don’t want to get sucked into a spiral, instead you want to remind yourself that you have options at every point, and you’re going to survive.
Okay, back to creating safety to tone down the hypervigilance. Here’s the next step/strategy:
2. Hypervigilance and Trauma: Scanning
Your brain has a natural default mode of scanning for danger. It’s called negativity bias. In order to keep you safe, it’s going to pay more attention to the mountain lion that might eat you than the delicious food you could harvest in a field. This mental shortcut keeps you safe, but left unchecked can make you kinda miserable.
Plus once we start scanning for danger, we’ll see it everywhere. “People aren’t trustworthy,” “Bad things are sure to happen,” etc. So then what we start looking for we see more of.
A wise therapist once told me the story of how he started shopping for a car for his family, they needed a suburban to carry his five kids. After they started shopping they learned about the color “pewter” for suburbans. They’d never heard of it before and thought it was a cool color. Now everywhere they went, they started noticing pewter suburbans. At the store, at the church parking lot, on the freeway. What you look for you get more of.
Traumatic experiences can be like this, once something scary happens to us, it’s easy to constantly scan for more scary or dangerous things. So you get stuck in hypervigilance, constantly noticing the smallest signs of danger, and then seeing danger everywhere because you’re looking for it.
But what if we look for safety and goodness instead? Will we see more of that? This is what I love about the brain.
So instead of constantly scanning for danger, first start scanning for safety.
a. Orienting to calm hypervigilance
This is called Orienting: Pause for a moment, look around, swivel your head, use your peripheral vision. There is no fire. Slow down. Say “I am safe enough right now.” Train yourself to notice how safe you are.
b. Hypervigilance tool: scan for glimmers
It’s easy to scan for triggers, start to scan for glimmers instead.
Glimmers is a term coined by Deb Dana, a Trauma therapist and educator. Glimmers are small, micro-moments of joy, safety, or connection that calm the nervous system and foster positive emotional responses.
What we look for we get more of, here’s a couple ways to to draw attention to the fact that here in this moment, you are safe:
- Scan for the good each day and have a place to write it down. This might be a gratitude journal like gratitude plus, or day one on your phone can prompt you to add in a picture of something good that day.
- Take time to share the good that you see, maybe it’s just sending a picture of something to a friend or family member.
- Supportive connection is the best antidote to the perception of danger. Hang out with safe people, make eye contact with them. Hug them.
- Write down three good things you accomplish each day.
By paying attention to the good things, to the actual safety you experience you can start to shift your nervous system to feel safe when you are actually safe.
OK, the next one is a powerful way to SHOW your brain that you are actually safe.
c. Stop worrying: Prediction vs. Reality Log
Write down: What you’re worried will happen – “I’m going to embarrass myself in front of my peers
Later, record: What actually happened – I didn’t embarrass myself, we had fun.
Over time, you’ll see a pattern: your brain overpredicts danger. When you start to pay close attention to the positive outcomes, you re-wire your brain to trust that you are safe, you are capable, and you don’t have to worry all the time.
Okay, here’s my third skill for you to turn down hypervigilance and hyperarousal
3. Combat Hypervigilance by Relaxing
Hypervigilance lives in our nervous system. When we have tense muscles, it sends a message to our brain that we are in danger. Rushing, multitasking, and keeping busy all the time sends messages that there’s a fire when there isn’t.
Your nervous system listens more to what you do than to what you say. You might be saying “Calm down, I’m safe, I don’t need to fear”, but your body is saying, “I’m keeping busy, I must be running from something.” Staying busy and tense tells your brain and body that you must be in danger.
So instead, one of the most effective ways to decrease hypervigilance is to send your mind a message of safety from your body.
a. Hypervigilance and trauma reset: “Drop Your Shoulders”
Several times a day:
- Drop your shoulders
- Unclench your jaw
- Let your hands hang loose
- Exhale slowly
Then say out loud, “I don’t need to brace right now.”
You’re teaching your brain that you’re not under attack. You’ll probably need to set multiple reminders on your phone to do this.
Your body is one of the most powerful messengers to your brain, so use it to send a message of safety. My free Grounding Skills course will teach you more ways to do that.
OK, so what if you’ve tried all this and nothing helps? Let me ask you a hard question.
Does Worrying Secretly Serve You?
Maybe you hate this hypervigilance smoke alarm, you wish it would go away. But be real with me for a minute. Is there some part of you that finds worrying is actually helpful? Maybe pause the video and write this down. What are you afraid would happen if you stopped worrying? Who would you be?
Most people resist the skills I just gave you because they secretly have a rule somewhere that says “Worrying keeps me safe. I have to keep doing it.” If you don’t check yourself for these mental rules, then when you try to implement the changes, you will subconsciously undermine them.
So I want you to check yourself right now for any superstitious beliefs around all this worrying. When I learned a system to actually decrease my worrying by like 90%, I caught myself thinking, “What if I stop worrying so much, and then God has to send me trials to keep me humble?” That’s a superstitious thought. Here’s another one: “If I worry about it, then it won’t happen.” This trains your brain to think that worry is a lucky rabbit’s foot that magically prevents bad things from happening.
Here’s another sneaky thought: “It’s better to expect the worst and be pleasantly surprised, than to hope for the best and get disappointed.” It’s like you secretly think that expecting the worst will protect you emotionally from feeling sad or surprised or hurt. But expecting the worst is keeping you stuck feeling anxious and stressed.
Are you clinging to worry because you secretly think it keeps you safe? Ask yourself: Is this working for me? Is this how I want to live my life?”
Most people would say no.
Overcoming Hypervigilance
Re-wiring hypervigilance takes some time, but it is something that you can do with practice.
So if you’re willing to let go of your constant worry, here’s a recap. When you do notice that you’re feeling tense, armored, jittery, take the time to ask:
- Am I safe enough right now? Is there an action I need to take? If you’re safe enough then…
- Scan for safety. Take special notice and write down the good that happens to you each day.
- Take the time to slow down and soften your body.
You don’t need to force yourself to calm down, you don’t need to force your brain to be quiet. You can just gently remind it that you are safe enough, you are capable in this moment, and little by little you can wire new pathways to let go of hypervigilance for your nervous system to settle down and feel safe.
