Heal Your Nervous System by Linnea Passaler

Heal Your Nervous System
by Linnea Passaler

ISBN-13: 9780760385654
Hardcover: 288 pages
Publisher: Fair Winds Press
Released: Jan. 9, 2024

Source: ebook review copy from the publisher through NetGalley.

Book Description, Modified from Goodreads:
Dr. Linnea Passaler has helped thousands address a wide range of symptoms associated with nervous system dysregulation—from mental symptoms, including anxiety, burnout, and brain fog, to physical symptoms, such as digestive issues, chronic inflammation, and fatigue. In Heal Your Nervous System, Dr. Passaler presents her 5-stage plan, developed over the last decade, to equip you with the knowledge to understand and regulate your unique nervous system.

Instead of merely treating the symptoms, Dr. Passaler shows you how to make a profound shift from reactive treatment to proactive healing. Grounded in recent scientific advances in neurobiology, chronic stress, trauma, and sensitivity, this is not a short-term or one-size-fits-all solution, but a comprehensive strategy to tackle the source of your symptoms, and restore your physical, cognitive, and emotional health.

In Heal Your Nervous System, you will discover how to assess your current level of nervous system dysregulation, why nervous system dysregulation can cause both mental and physical symptoms, how your individual sensitivity profile and past experiences came together to tip your nervous system into a state of dysregulation, the four most common mistakes people make in their healing journey and how to avoid them, and simple practices, exercises, and routines that progressively reverse nervous system dysregulation.


My Review:
Heal Your Nervous System provides a 5-step program to help your nervous system shift back into relaxed states and become more resilient. There wasn't much science in the book beyond talking about the different states of the nervous system, from relaxed to fight/flight/freeze states. The author did refer to some studies about how different actions can help you change how you react to stress and be able to handle more stress.

She started by talking about signs of nervous system dysregulation (including a quiz to indicate where you are on the scale) and factors that affect how your nervous system responds to stressors and trauma (like how sensitive you are, genetics, childhood safety levels, and bonding to your caregivers). She then covered each step in a 5 stage program. She suggested small actions or contemplations that take 5-15 minutes She stated you shouldn't make too many changes at once, and many of the activities fit into daily life rather than being things you need to find time to do. The 5 steps involve learning awareness of your reactions, regulating your nervous system, restoration of healthy patterns, connecting with others, and expanding your capacity to handle stress. At the end, she told more of her story and how Buddhism influenced her life (and her program). Overall, I felt like she had helpful advice.




If you've read this book, what do you think about it? I'd be honored if you wrote your own opinion of the book in the comments.