While you have likely heard the term “trigger” when discussing mental health, trauma, or emotional reactions, you may be less familiar with the concept of a “glimmer”. This termed was initiated by clinical social worker Deb Dana as part of Polyvagal Theory, understanding these two concepts helps us map how our nervous systems navigate the world.
Polyvagal Theory (PVT), was developed by Dr. Stephen Porges. PVT explains how our autonomic nervous system continuously scans for safety or threats and dictates our behavioural, emotional, and physical responses. It’s purpose is to aid and guide as a practical “science of safety” that helps us understand, regulate, and navigate our stress.
Understanding the Three Nervous System States
According to theoretical practices, our nervous system operates in one of three primary states:
- Ventral Vagal State (Safety and Connection): This is our “rest and digest” state, which regulates a feeling of being safe. It allows us to feel calm, present, and emotionally open, enabling us to engage socially and think clearly.
- Sympathetic State (Fight or Flight): When we subconsciously sense danger, the nervous system mobilizes for survival. This state triggers a faster heart rate, tense muscles, and racing thoughts to help us run from danger or fight off a threat.
- Dorsal Vagal State (Shutdown or Freeze): If a threat feels inescapable or overwhelming, our oldest evolutionary survival mechanism kicks in. The body conserves energy by slowing down, which can lead to numbness, dissociation, or a physical feeling of collapse.
Key Concepts:
1. Neuroception
Neuroception is our unconscious process(es) in which our body will scan environments for danger or safety. This happens automatically and often subconsciously, we are constantly scanning for cues from individuals facial expressions, the tone of their voices, and changes in the environment we are currently in. Before our brain consciously registers a threat, our nervous system has already evaluated the situation and shifted into our defensive state.
2. The Autonomic Ladder
Many practitioners use the metaphor of a ladder to describe these states. The ventral vagal state is at the top of the ladder, making it easy to connect with others. When triggered by a stressor, we slide down the ladder into the sympathetic fight-or-flight zone, and if the stress becomes too much, we collapse to the bottom, dorsal vagal shutdown (freeze). Healing involves building awareness of our position on this ladder and learning to climb back up to our safety zone.
3. Co-Regulation
As humans we are wired to co-regulate, which is the subconscious process of syncing up with another person’s stable nervous system. When a crying baby is comforted by a calm parent, or when a pet owner uses a soft, comforting tone of voice, these signals of safety down-regulate the stress response. Positive, supportive relationships act as a biological buffer, helping us build resilience to trauma and stress.
Why This Matters
Understanding Polyvagal Theory provides a physiological explanation for why our bodies react the way they do. Knowing that hypervigilance or freezing is an automatic biological survival response rather than a personal failing removes a lot of the self-shame and blame that often accompanies trauma or chronic anxiety.
Regulating Your Nervous System
You can help guide your nervous system from a defensive state (sympathetic or dorsal vagal) back to a regulated state (ventral vagal) using targeted somatic practices:
- Deep, Slow Breathing: Practices like box breathing help deactivate the fight-or-flight response.
- Grounding Techniques: Focusing on the physical sensation of the ground beneath your feet can help you return to the present moment.
- Sensory Input: Using cold water on the wrists can act as a quick reset button for your nervous system.
- Safe and Sound Protocol: This is a music-based listening intervention developed by Dr. Porges that utilizes the frequency of human speech to activate the ventral vagus nerve.
Fight, Flight, Freeze, or Fawn
When faced with danger or extreme stressors, our brains initiate our automatic survival response. These physiological definition for these reactions—fight, flight, freeze, or fawn—prepare you to either confront a threat, escape it, immobilize, or appease it in order to stay safe.
Understanding these responses can help you navigate daily stressors and recognize how your body protects you. No two people will respond the same way and now two situations will trigger your body in the same way. This is why understanding and then walking through reflective practice is so crucial to aid in regulating our mind and bodies!
Fight: Confronting the Threat
When the brain perceives a manageable threat, the fight response activates. You might experience a surge of adrenaline, clenched fists, or a flush of anger. In modern life, this response rarely involves physical combat; instead, it might show up as aggressive arguing, boundary-setting, or intense assertiveness.
Flight: Escaping the Danger
If a threat feels overwhelming but escapable, the flight response kicks in to help you flee. Your heart rate increases to pump oxygen to your legs, preparing you to run. Today, this response looks like physically leaving a stressful environment, avoiding difficult conversations, or procrastinating on anxiety-inducing tasks.
Freeze: Immobilization
When neither fighting nor fleeing is an option, the nervous system hits the brakes. The freeze response immobilizes you, causing a sudden drop in heart rate, muscle tension, and a feeling of being “stuck.” While this evolved to help animals “play dead” to avoid predators, in daily life, it manifests as mental blanking, dissociation, or the inability to make a decision.
Fawn: People-Pleasing for Safety
The fawn response is a trauma reaction where an individual attempts to soothe a threat by appeasing others. Coined by trauma therapist Pete Walker, fawning involves immediately surrendering your own needs to gain the approval of a potential aggressor. It often looks like excessive compliance, perfectionism, or struggling to say “no.”
Recognizing Your Patterns
These responses are entirely automatic, managed by the amygdala and the autonomic nervous system. While they are designed for life-or-death situations, modern stressors can trigger them inappropriately.
Here is a breakdown on what they are and how they differ.
Triggers vs. Glimmers: How to Balance Your Nervous System
What is a Trigger?
A trigger is an internal or external cue that your brain associates with a past distressing experience or trauma. In just a fraction of a second, your system is flooded with stress hormones (like cortisol and adrenaline) to protect you from perceived danger. A trigger is a stimulus—a sound, a smell, a phrase, a place—that your brain associates with a past negative or traumatic experience. When triggered, your nervous system hijacks your senses within the present moment, acting as if the danger is happening right now.
Common Signs of a Trigger:
A sudden spike in your heart rate
Shallow breathing.
The feeling or immediate urge to run away, snap at someone, or completely shut down (freeze).
A knot in your stomach, that numb but piercing rock hard lump in you may get in your throat or feeling intense dread.
Regrouping Check: Triggers are valid, and are our automatic survival responses. You can’t always stop them from happening, but you can learn how to manage your reaction to them.
Examples of Triggers:
- Hearing a specific, sharp tone of voice.
- Smelling the cologne of someone who passed away.
- Seeing a sudden missed call from your boss after hours.
- Experiencing a sudden change in plans.
What is a Glimmer?
A glimmer is a small, everyday moment that sparks a sense of calm, safety, or joy. Instead of activating a survival response, a glimmer acts as a cue of safety that calms your nervous system, allowing you to feel grounded and connected. A glimmer is a micro-moment of awe, safety, connection, or peace. It’s not about toxic positivity or pretending everything is perfect; it’s about noticing the tiny, beautiful things that already exist around you. Often glimmers can be behaviours, actions, skills that help us come back down into our rational minds to then move into a safe mindset.
Glimmers gently spark the parasympathetic nervous system, sending signals throughout your body to your brain to ultimately send the message: “You are safe. You can relax.”
Tip: Carry a citrus fruit with you, in your car, in your purse/bag. If you are feeling like you need something to immediately stop or redirect the anxious spiral of your brain, the citrus acts as a sensory grounder to help calm and shock your brain out of spiralling, fuzzy mindsets.
Examples of Everyday Glimmers:
- The warmth of a morning cup of coffee against your hands.
- Spotting a dog looking ecstatically happy on a car ride.
- A perfectly timed song playing on the radio.
- The dappled sunlight filtering through tree leaves.
- A genuine smile or brief, kind interaction with a stranger.
- The warmth of a hot mug in your hands on a cold morning.
- Hearing someone you trust say, “Take your time”.
The Core Differences
Triggers and glimmers are two sides of the same coin—both are cues that our nervous systems continuously scan our environment. Their impact on the body and mind, however, differs fundamentally:
| Feature | Triggers | Glimmers |
|---|---|---|
| Nervous System Response | Activates the sympathetic or dorsal vagal systems (Fight, flight, or freeze). | Activates the ventral vagal system (Social engagement, calm, and safety). |
| Emotional State | Evokes feelings of danger, anxiety, tension, or sadness. | Evokes micro-moments of joy, peace, gratitude, or relaxation. |
| Attention Focus | Narrows your attention toward tension or a painful past pattern. | Widens your attention toward the present, making you feel present. |
Why Understanding Both Matters
Because of our brains’ natural negativity bias, we tend to notice and remember triggers far more easily than glimmers. However, glimmers are everywhere. By intentionally learning to spot and “wire” these tiny, restorative experiences into your mind, you can build emotional resilience and help regulate an overwhelmed nervous system.
Triggers vs. Glimmers: A Quick Comparison
| Feature | Triggers | Glimmers |
| Nervous System State | Fight, Flight, or Freeze (Survival) | Ventral Vagal (Safety and Connection) |
| Physical Sensation | Tension, high heart rate, constriction | Softening, deep breath, release of tension |
| Focus | Scanning for threats | Noticing micro-moments of peace |
| Impact | Draining, exhausting | Restorative, grounding |
How to Shift Your Focus to Glimmers
Our brains have a natural “negativity bias”—we are evolutionary wired to look for threats (triggers) to keep ourselves alive. Finding glimmers requires a little bit of intentional practice. Here is where you can start:
1. Set a “Glimmer Intention”
When you wake up, tell yourself, “Today, I am going to look for three small moments of joy.” Just by priming your brain to look for them, you’re more likely to notice them.
2. Savor the Moment
When you catch a glimmer, don’t just rush past it. Pause for 10 to 15 seconds. Truly feel the warmth, notice the colour, or enjoy the sound. Let the feeling sink into your body. Just like a hug, on average we need four of them for our emotional survival, eight to keep and maintain balance, and twelve to begin psychological growth.
3. Keep a Glimmer Journal
Instead of just writing down a standard gratitude list, write down the specific micro-moments that made your nervous system sigh with relief today.
Moving Forward
Embracing glimmers doesn’t mean triggers magically disappear. Life is a blend of both and finding how to create and manage with balance. However, by actively hunting for glimmers, you build emotional resilience. You begin to teach your nervous system that while the world can be stressful and triggering, it is also full of moments that are safe, beautiful, and healing.
Keep your eyes open today. What’s one small glimmer you can find right now?
Why the Brain Needs Both
Many of us get trapped in the loop of managing our triggers, but recognizing the absence of danger isn’t enough for the brain to truly relax. We must actively feed our nervous system signals of safety.
Because of our brain’s natural negativity bias, we are instinctively wired to spot threats. However, glimmers are all around us—from the smell of a warm cup of coffee to a sudden laugh, or a patch of sunlight on the floor.
How to Start “Glimmering” and Rewiring Your Brain
Each time you consciously acknowledge a glimmer, you practice a form of self-directed neuroplasticity. You are firing and reinforcing neural pathways that expect and recognize your overall safety and well-being.
Try these actionable steps to start your glimmer practice:
- Start a Glimmer Intention: Begin your day by deciding to look for at least one glimmer. State it simply, like, “I am open to noticing what feels safe and good today.”
- Stop and Name It: When you experience a moment of peace, stop. Notice where it is in your body (e.g., a softening in your shoulders or warmth in your chest), and actually name it: “This is a glimmer.”
- Appreciate and Let It Land: Don’t let the feeling pass by quickly. Sit with it for a few seconds to let the brain physically mark it as a positive association.
- Create a Glimmer Folder: Use your phone to your advantage. Save a folder of screenshots, encouraging texts, favorite playlists, or photos that immediately make you feel grounded.
- Review the Day: End the day by recalling the glimmers you experienced. This helps shift what your brain expects from the world and builds a “toolkit” of neurological resilience.
This process isn’t about ignoring hardship or toxic positivity; it’s about training your system to know that, even in the midst of a difficult day, your body is exquisitely capable of finding and holding onto moments of safety.
To help you get started, we can tackle both sides of your nervous system.
Here is a tool to help you identify your unique glimmers and navigate your triggers.
1. Building Your Personalized Glimmer List
Glimmers are highly personal. They are micro-moments that make you sigh with relief or smile involuntarily. Check any of these that resonate with you, or use them as inspiration:
- Micro-Sights: Sunlight filtering through tree leaves, a pet sleeping peacefully, or a clean kitchen counter.
- Micro-Sounds: The sound of rain on a window, a specific nostalgic song, or a friend’s laughter.
- Micro-Sensations: The warmth of a hot mug, a heavy blanket, or a cool breeze on a warm day.
- Micro-Connections: A wave from a friendly neighbor, a kind email, or locking eyes with a cute dog.
2. A Strategy to Navigate Triggers
When a trigger happens, our brains go into high-alert survival mode. You cannot always stop a trigger, but you can change how your body recovers from it using the “A.C.E.” Method:
- Acknowledge: Notice the physical shift. Say to yourself, “I am feeling triggered right now, and my body feels unsafe.”
- Choose Safety: Bring yourself back to the present room. Look around and name three things you can see, or touch something physical and cold.
- Enter a Glimmer: Once your heart rate begins to slow, intentionally think of or look at one of your pre-planned glimmers to signal to your brain that the danger has passed.
Concluding Thoughts
To personalize this for your life, let me know:
- Which senses (sight, sound, touch) usually calm you down the fastest?
- What is one common trigger you face often that you want to apply the A.C.E. method to?
We can use your answers to build an exact, step-by-step nervous system reset plan for your daily routine.
Narissa