What is a Window of Tolerance?

Let's imagine just for a moment that our mind and body are kind of like a thermostat. When everything is just right, we're in this comfort zone, also known as your window of tolerance. In this window, we're able to manage our emotions, think clearly, and navigate stress without becoming too overwhelmed. But naturally, as life happens, stressful emotions will arise, and they can move the thermostat up or down. Let's say things begin to heat up, we start to feel overwhelmed, tense. Our heart rate increases. Our breaths are short and shallow. Our mind begins to fill with so many different racing thoughts. This is the red zone in the thermostat, letting us know this is too much. And then sometimes the opposite happens. Instead of too much heat, we move into the cold zone. Things begin to feel flat, heavy, numb, and disconnected. It's another way of being outside of our window of tolerance. Now, neither state is wrong. The thermostat is just moving up and down like it was designed to do. As we're responding to what's happening within us and around us, the hard thing is that when we go through traumatic experiences, our window of tolerance, that zone of comfort can start to shrink and become very narrow. And it doesn't take too much to move us into feeling too hot or too cold. This can lead us to avoiding anything that shifts our internal thermostat, keeping us in that narrow comfort zone and away from what we once loved. But the good news is we can expand our comfort zone, not suddenly, not all at once, but gradually with small, intentional shifts. Gentle adjustments can help us learn to be with different emotional states. Overtime, that can widen our capacity. And there are many ways that this can happen. Sometimes it's through taking small, manageable steps towards situations that bring emotions up a little, and discovering that we can stay with those feelings. Other times, it's through practices like mindfulness, meditation, rest, gentle movement, or even therapy. Each time you make an adjustment, we learn, ah, I can handle this. We learn we can feel our feelings and still stay grounded. We can stay present, we can think clearly, and over time we become more resilient and the window gets bigger. We're able to navigate life's challenges with more confidence and calm. Now, this doesn't mean that the thermostat needs to be just right all the time, but it means we can learn how to adjust it when needed. So as you work through this collection, keep your thermostat in mind. Pay gentle attention to when things start to overheat or when things start to feel cold. See if you can guide yourself back toward the balanced middle, with as much kindness, care, and compassion as possible. So take your time and with practice, you'll get more comfortable adjusting your inner thermostat whenever you need to, and strengthening that capacity within you....