Visibility as a Threat

When someone wants to share their voice publicly, whether through speaking, storytelling, creating art, or taking a stand, it often activates the nervous system. Especially when what we are saying is vulnerable, personal, or challenges dominant norms.

For survivors or anyone carrying trauma, it can feel safer not to speak at all. The physical sensations that come with being seen can be overwhelming. That pain deserves compassion, not shame.

I recently received wisdom from Luna Dietrich and Simone Seol about nervous system states and the experience of using your voice publicly.

Simone reminded me that visibility can feel dangerous to the body.

(In a fascist white supremacist patriarchal capitalist society, sometimes it is unsafe. We have to discern what threat is real and what threat is imagined.)

Luna helped me understand that thawing from a freeze state around self expression is not a straight path. It moves like a plant, leaning toward the light, curling back, swaying as it grows. That movement through fight or flight and back again is often the rhythm of returning to voice.

Here is how some of those responses might show up in regards to using your voice:

Fight​
Urgency, defensiveness, agitation
Arguing with imagined critics
Over-scripting or over-preparing to maintain control

Flight​
Procrastinating or saying you are not ready
Researching instead of creating

Freeze​
Going blank while trying to speak
Forgetting your words
Feeling shut down or ashamed

I think a lot of my fear in public speaking is that I will go blank while I am in the middle of speaking. That I will freeze and not be able to find my way back.

As a survivor of DV and SA, I used to have recurring nightmares where I was trying to defend myself and no words would come out. I would pour all my energy into trying to speak, but nothing emerged. It felt like yelling through a wall of molasses.

Over time, with practice and support, I have grown more trust in my voice and in my body’s ability to move through moments of intensity. I have learned how to tend to myself when the charge is high, how to see that intensity of charge as a wave that will rise, crest, and fall, and how to root into purpose when the words matter most.

This process of thawing freeze is still unfolding. It is a process I continue to meet with courage and care.

Through small and doable steps that stretch us just enough, we can teach our nervous systems that we are still here. That we made it through. And over time, visibility can become not only bearable but deeply alive. It can become something that brings pleasure and even joy.

Here are a few practices that help me return to voice:

• Ground your body. Press your feet into the floor. Feel your spine. Breathe. Meet the tension in your body with a loving breath.
• Orient to safety. Look around and remind yourself you are not in danger.
• Choose a phrase you can return to if you go blank. Something like “Let me take a breath” or “What I want to say is…”
• Practice in safe spaces. Voice notes. Low-pressure storytelling circles. Conversations with someone who can hold what you share.
• Start small. Share in doses. Let your body learn that it is safe enough to speak.
• Root into the earth, your ancestors, your community, and your own soul. You are not alone.

Fight, flight, and freeze are not failures. They are your body’s way of trying to protect you. Especially if your voice has been shamed, punished, or ignored, it makes sense that your nervous system would brace itself.

But your body is not the enemy. It is wise. It remembers.

With care and support, you can teach it that things are different now. That your voice matters. That it is safe enough, little by little, to be seen and heard. Even if your hands shake. Even if your mind goes blank. Even if your heart races.

This is the heart of Inviting Liberation, a storytelling offering I will be sharing soon. We will meet for a one-hour Zoom conversation, and I will create a set of short videos shaped from your words that you can share with your community if or when it feels right.

I want to be a loving witness to your voice. To beckon your truth forward. To ally with your body and spirit. To help you share what only you can share.

Together, we can give birth to our voices and strengthen each other’s courage to speak for what we believe in and for the world we know is possible.

More soon.