Attachment theory believes that humans are born with an innate drive to develop deep emotional bonds with their caregivers. A bond that exists beyond the basic fulfilment of physiological needs, but also of emotional needs. The safety or lack thereof of our early relationships go on to influence our psychological wellbeing and interpersonal-connectedness later on in life.

The acronym POC stands for Person of Color. This denotes a person who is not white. Although this term is increasingly common, it may still not be acceptable to all audiences and excludes the experiences of some marginalized communities within the substrata of racial and ethnic identities.

The acronym BIPOC stands for Black, Indigenous, People of Color. This term seeks to unite all POC in the work for freedom and liberation while acknowledging that not all people of color face the same level of oppression and injustice. This conscious awareness allows us to recognize that Black and Indigenous bodies face some of the worst injustices in society as a consequence of racism, classism, and settler colonialism.

LGBTQIA++ is an umbrella term that seeks to encompass all identities of the gender and sexuality minority. Some but not all of the identities include: Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans, Queer, Intersex, Asexual, Demisexual, Pansexual, Non-Binary, Gender Non-Conforming, Graysexual, and more.

The term Womxn is a powerful encompassing of a broader range of gender identities other than “woman”. It seeks to foreground transgender, nonbinary, and womxn of color.

Polyvagal Theory is a tool for working with trauma as well as understanding social connection and communication. The polyvagal theory posits how all of us experience some degree of trauma in our early lives. Whether this trauma was a singular event that brought great fear or a prolonged sense of feeling unsafe. Each of these experiences elicits responses that remain ingrained in our nervous systems and frequently emerge to add fear to situations experienced later in life. Polyvagal theory offers a precise science about the vagus nerve, which is one part of our autonomic nervous system (our control room).

The vagus nerve, is one part of our autonomic nervous system that connects the brain to the organs of the belly, and the heart. It relates to our human ability for connection and communication with others. Learning about the vagus nerve allows us to understand our human nervous system and how it predictably relates to stimuli in our environments and determines varying levels of danger and safety.

This system controls conditions inside one's body. Most activities in this system are done without any conscious control over them. It is interestingly divided into 2 main sections. The sympathetic nervous system (our hot system) and the parasympathetic nervous system (our cool system). These 2 systems are inclined to have opposing actions, where one system stimulates a response, and the other inhibits it.

The sympathetic nervous system guides our body’s swift involuntary response to dangerous or stressful situations. A flash flood of hormones heightens the body's heart rate and alertness, sending extra blood to our muscles, allowing us to be prepared for any perceived threat/danger.

The parasympathetic nervous system often called the rest-and-digest system, is tasked with saving the body’s energy by increasing the activity of the intestines and glands during periods of rest and slowing the heart rate. It inhibits the body from being overworked and restores it to a calm and regulated state.

This is a physiological reaction that arises when we are in the presence of something that may be psychologically or physically terrifying. This response is triggered by the release of several hormones that prepare your body to fight the threat, freeze or hide from the threat, fawn or convince the threat not to cause you harm or flee the threat.

The Psoas muscle plays a pivotal role in the functioning of the hips, as it connects your torso to your legs and helps you stay in an upright position. This area plays a key function in your fight or flight response and retains stress pockets, especially when dealing with overactivation of the nervous system. One way to release and break down these stress pockets is by engaging in yoga and other tension-release exercises.

The prefrontal cortex is a brain area that is involved in emotional and cognitive processing and emotion regulation. It regulates anxiety-like behaviors and stress-induced fear responses by enforcing inhibitory effects. It is our brains, chief executive officer, in charge of planning complex behaviors, attention, personality expression, memory, and decision-making abilities.

The amygdala, a marble-sized brain area, helps coordinate responses to things in your environment, especially those that trigger an emotional response. This structure plays an important role in fear and anger. Amygdala hijack happens when your brain reacts to psychological stress as if it's physical danger and triggers your fight-or-flight response.

The hippocampus is a key area of the brain involved in basic function. It is part of the temporal lobe and intimately related to the amygdala. The hippocampus is involved with memory retrieval and storage. When functioning optimally, the hippocampus is thought to create an appropriate context for memories, helping to support a coherent narrative of what is and isn’t dangerous, keeping the amygdala regulated so that it is active only when appropriate.

The anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) is critical for both stress and inhibitory control processes and has been implicated in childhood trauma. Sitting right under the top of your head, it serves to help us stay aware and take in stimuli around us to make informed-decisions. When impacted by trauma, this part of the brain diminishes in size over time and is unable to take in environment cues optimally, and instead relies on past learning data to make decisions.

Dopamine is a chemical messenger made by our bodies, and is controlled by our nervous system. It plays a primary role in determining how we feel pleasure. It guides our ability to plan, draw motivation, think, find things interesting, and focus.

Serotonin is another important chemical messenger. It helps us in regulating mood and social behaviors. It often guides our appetite, digestion, sexual desire, and functioning, as well as sleep and memory. Low serotonin levels are often linked with depression symptoms.

Cortisol is a hormone produced by the adrenal gland in response to stress and is one of the three hormones involved in the fight-flight-freeze-fawn response. Cortisol helps to regulate our blood sugar, blood pressure, and maintain our immune system. However, the issue arises when we are continuously exposed to stressful stimuli resulting in the overproduction of cortisol in our bodies, which may lead to health issues.

Epinephrine (also called adrenaline) is one of the three hormones involved in the fight-flight-freeze-fawn response. It is an evolutionary adaptation that allows us to cope with unexpected and dangerous situations. It increases our heart rate, and gives us a surge of energy and focus allowing us to brace for and/or confront a threat.