Presence.
In a trauma-informed school and classroom, it’s about more than just being there. So much more.
If you have been following the work of the ESSDACK Resilience Team, you’re probably aware of the idea of how we, as educators, want to respond rather than react when something is going on around us. When we react, it’s often because we don’t feel safe and we’re in our Fight/Flight/Freeze/Fawn mode, ie, our brainstem. And when we respond, we’re working from a rational prefrontal cortex mode. We have talked about the pause button and using two feet, one breath in this blog post. These are both forms and actions of mindfulness.
Responding vs Reacting is all about the person who is dysregulated and their response to a trigger.
But there’s another piece we want to talk about and to consider as we find ourselves working through conflict, as we’re in big conversations, as we’re asking curious questions, as we’re listening deeply and intently. And that is presence.
Presence.
We all have a presence, right? Simple enough. But what is presence, really?
Sure we’re familiar with the term when talking about “stage presence” or having a strong or weak presence in a room or in a conversation. But still, rarely do we ask ourselves what presence is.
Presence is about how we show up to and how we exist inside a given situation, dysregulated or not. And it’s different from mindfulness, which some people use interchangeably with presence. While mindfulness is about focusing our thinking and awareness of where we are in the moment, presence is about how we’re showing up and what we’re communicating with our bodies, our words, our mannerisms, our vocal tones and inflections. It’s different.
5 ways to be present:
Presence of the Mind: Being in the moment now. Not thinking about the past or about the future. Here. Now.
Presence of the Body: Being Aware & Purposeful in movements, stance, & positioning.
Presence of the Voice: Being aware of tone, volume, pitch, & speed.
Presence in the Space: Being Inclusive. Know who/what is around you for felt-safety*.
Presence toward Others: Being Open.
In short, our presence in a room, how we show up, can either create or kill “felt-safety” for others, causing dysregulation to set in as they seek safety.
But wait a minute, what is this felt-safety stuff? I’m glad you asked! Let’s get a little brainy with some basic brain science.
Nearly every brain has the ability for neuroception, which is a fancy (and shorter) way of saying “the ability to register safety or danger in any given situation” on an autonomic level to ensure personal safety at all times. “On an autonomic level” means it happens without us even thinking about it. Like heart beats, digestion, or breathing.
Let’s do a little exercise:
Think back to a time, to a memory you have of being someplace where, at a glance, nothing seemed to be wrong, but yet there was someone, or something about the space that made you uneasy. That put you on alert. That unease, that alert was your neuroception in action. It’s always working in the background of our brains, always there, waiting to sound the alarm if something seems off so we can get ourselves to safety, whether or not we notice that thing at first.
Now think deeper into that same situation. You felt that something was off, and so then you probably started looking around for what that was. Was it that person over there? Was it a smell? What was it? You “knew” something was off (your brain sounded a general alert) and so then you started searching for what was unsafe. Maybe you found it. Maybe you didn’t.
A personal example: One time in Ft. Smith Arkansas, I paid for and started to check into a hotel room, only to leave the hotel without ever taking my bags into the room and without going to the desk for a refund. My neuroreceptors were screaming at me to GET OUT! And I’m fairly certain that because I listened and drove away, I didn’t become a death or trafficked statistic. And there was absolutely zero evidence in front of me that I might die that night. No one threatened me. I didn’t see any weapons or blood that might show a previous struggle. But still, I just knew this place wasn’t safe to be in for another moment. I dropped my keys in the room and walked straight back to my car and drove away.
We say things like, “Trust your gut.” What we’re actually referring to is the neuroception that’s been built into us over the millenia to keep us safe. Have you had prickly hairs on the back of your neck? An uneasy feeling in your gut? A tightness in your chest, causing shallow breathing? That’s neuroception at work. For me, that hotel desk clerk in Ft. Smith was asking the wrong questions at the wrong pacing and the room was all wrong, even though nothing was technically out of place. I was on HIGH alert.
And again, every brain has this ability. So as we start to think about our own presence in a classroom, do we inadvertently create alarm bells in students with how we show up? In how we’re talking? In how we’re moving? Each of us can sense what’s going on through our autonomic nervous system…meaning that neurception just happens and we have very little control over that sensation of felt-safety or lack thereof.
Additionally, when someone has come from hard places, this neuroception is STRONG in them because they’ve been caught unawares before and suffered consequences. So our brains & bodies get wired tightly together to sense danger quickly. Quicker than before. Quicker than most folks who’ve not grown up in dangerous environments.
Now let’s think to your school and the hallways. What is the presence of others in any given classroom? Do some shrink? Do some push in and take over? Do some bounce around? Do some of these presences make others uneasy, even if no one has moved a muscle? Why? Even if no one has actually moved, the presence in the room has a felt sense, a neuroception. And in our classrooms and hallways, we want this sense to be felt-safety.
Some educators come from very safe lives and have low trauma in their past. That’s AWESOME! We who’ve been in hard places need you in our lives to normalize with us a better path. And so that also means low-trauma adults want to be particularly aware of their presence in a space. A tone, a stance, a movement, a breath to you may scream DANGER! DANGER! to others.
And so to be self-aware we want to become introspective. How am I feeling right now? How is that affecting how I’m showing up? What’s my presence in this room with these people? We call that developing your own personal Interoception skills.
Our mantra should become “Check-in, not Check-out” when we’re noticing something is off. What are we feeling? Mad? Sad? Glad? Afraid? What’s that feeling mostly about? Just check in and name it. Acknowledging that something is going on will do a LOT to create felt-safety.
According to Kelly Mahler, Interoception allows us to answer the question, “How do I feel?” And then take action to show up as a choice, not a reaction.
While Neuroception, according to Dr. Stephen Porges, is how neural circuits distinguish whether situations or people are safe, dangerous, or life threatening. So when we consciously practice interoception, asking, how do I feel? How am I showing up for this person? we can impact the felt-safety in the room. Does the room FEEL SAFE to me right now? Does it feel safe to others? How am I contributing to -- or detracting from -- the felt-safety here?
And when we do that, we can help to ensure the neuroception of the others around us isn’t firing off danger alarms for them. People are at least neutral, but better yet, put at ease by our presence. And so then our work as educators gets exponentially easier when people are put at ease and they’re not flipping desks, or pulling their hoodies down around their faces.
To simplify, our key takeaway from all of this is to check in with ourselves and how our presence is impacting the room. Once we know that every brain in the room is sending out neuroception signals, we can develop our interoception skills and be mindful of our presence in order to create more felt-safety in every space. When kids feel safe, they can learn.
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When we’re working toward a trauma-responsive culture, there are many givens that are quite different from how we have traditionally been taught to be and taught to show up in terms of classroom management and student behavior. The work of the ESSDACK Resilience Team for many years now has been focused squarely on helping educators who are working inside the system to learn the science of trauma and resilience.
We want to help educators utilize different strategies to begin unlearning outdated beliefs, habits, and teaching in order to embrace the emerging brain science of the past couple decades to create schools and communities that are safe and are full of learning and achievement.
