Erin Butters, Registered Psychologist

12/06/2025

From A Joseph Campbell Companion: Reflections on the Art of Living

11/20/2025

Most people think storytelling is powerful because it lets you “express yourself.” But the impact goes far deeper than expression: your brain changes when your story is witnessed.

When someone is present with you—really present—your nervous system receives signals it never had during the original experience: You’re safe. You’re not alone. Someone sees what happened.

That shift matters, because the memory that once lived in isolation finally has a new context. That’s what rewires the brain.

And here’s the other half we rarely talk about: witnessing changes the listener too.

When someone hears your story with openness, their own system softens. They recognize parts of their pain in yours. Your honesty gives them language, permission, and a sense of safety they didn’t even know they were missing.

This is the science of why healing is relational.
We don’t just tell stories—we co-regulate, we make meaning, and we reorganize our internal worlds through connection.

11/14/2025

There’s a difference between acknowledging what hurt you and rehearsing it until it becomes who you are.

At first, reliving the story feels protective. Your mind thinks, If I can just understand it enough, I’ll finally feel safe. But the brain learns safety through experience, not rumination.

Each time you revisit the wound without resolution, your nervous system fires the same survival pathways - tightening the loop between what happened then and what you feel now.

Sometimes we replay the story because we still feel unseen. When justice never came, when no one protected you or believed you, retelling it can become the only way your pain feels real.

In that sense, holding on isn’t weakness - it’s belonging. It’s your system trying to say, This mattered. I mattered.

But over time, that survival loop can start to shape how you see yourself - organizing your life around the very wound that deserved care, not identity. You start anticipating rejection, mistaking vigilance for strength, confusing protection for personality.

The way out isn’t erasing the story - it’s helping your body learn that being seen now is possible. Every moment of calm, connection, or self-compassion teaches your system a new truth:

The danger is over.
You made it through.
You’re safe to be witnessed in the present, not just remembered in the past.

11/07/2025

We all have behaviors we can’t stand but can’t seem to stop: numbing, overworking, controlling, people-pleasing, shutting down, lashing out.

The details differ, but the shame feels the same.
Most of us try to change by getting tougher: I hate this about me. I have to stop.

But here’s the paradox: hate and harsh judgment keep the pattern alive.

🧠 When you attack yourself, your nervous system registers threat.

🧠 Threat turns on the amygdala, narrows attention, and drives you back into the same automatic habits you’re trying to escape.

🧠 Shame floods the system with stress hormones and quiets the part of your brain that allows choice, flexibility, and self-control.

In short: you can’t rewire from a state of self-attack. Real change happens when the body feels safe enough to try something new.

💭Disliking a behavior and wanting to change it can be productive. It means you’re noticing what no longer serves you.

💔Hating the behavior - and by extension, yourself for having it - keeps your system on guard.

Guarded bodies don’t experiment; they defend.
So when you feel that familiar frustration rise, try curiosity instead of contempt.

👉 Ask, “What was this behavior trying to protect me from?”

That’s where real transformation begins. Because you can’t change behaviors you hate, but you can understand the ones that once kept you safe.

10/23/2025

10/17/2025

10/11/2025

Most of us try to get rid of painful thoughts:
“I shouldn’t feel this way.”
“Stop overthinking.”
“Just move on.”

But here’s what neuroscience shows us—
the more you fight a thought, the louder your brain makes it.

That’s because your amygdala interprets that inner struggle as danger, and your prefrontal cortex—the part that helps you regulate—temporarily shuts down.

So instead of calming your mind, you end up reliving the same emotional loop.

Those thoughts that keep looping aren’t random.
Many were formed in moments when your brain was trying to protect you.

That’s why healing isn’t about forcing positive thoughts—it’s about changing how you relate to what arises inside you. When you meet a thought with curiosity instead of judgment, you send a powerful signal to your body: “I’m safe now.”

Your body doesn’t know the difference between an external threat and an internal one. So if you meet your thoughts with fear or frustration, your brain reads that as danger— and your amygdala, the part that scans for threat, amplifies the sense of threat.

But when you pause, breathe, and simply notice what’s happening—without trying to fix or silence it—your nervous system receives a different message.

The amygdala quiets.
The prefrontal cortex—responsible for reasoning, reflection, and choice—comes back online.
And that’s where neuroplasticity begins.

Your brain starts building new connections that link awareness with safety instead of threat. Over time, that repetition teaches your mind:

“I can think and feel difficult things without being in danger.”

That’s what true rewiring looks like—not controlling your thoughts, but creating safety inside your relationship with them.

So the next time an old thought shows up— “you’re not enough,” “something bad will happen,” “they’ll leave”— pause. Notice it. Soften your response.

You don’t have to believe it or banish it. You can simply get curious about it—maybe even listen to what it’s trying to protect.

That’s where healing begins.

09/09/2025

08/02/2025

07/28/2025

Quote from recent discussion between of the and . Check out the full conversation - link in bio 👈✨💡💡 #