Mindfulness is the practice of nonjudgmental, intentional awareness of the present moment. When you encounter a perceived threat, your sympathetic nervous system kicks in, releasing stress hormones that help you either run or fight back. Once the danger has passed, your parasympathetic nervous system activates and allows you rest and relax. Sometimes our perceived threats are from experiences in our past that our mind and body continue to respond to, even if those responses are no longer useful.

Mindfulness can help deactivate your sympathetic nervous system, which lowers your flight/fight response. When we take a moment to notice our thoughts or what is happening in our body, a pause gets inserted between the threat and our response—it’s in this pause that we can then CHOOSE our response based on what we know about ourselves and the current situation.