The Evolved Nest is a breakthrough concept that integrates findings across fields that bear on child development, child raising and adult behavior.  The Evolved Nest promotes optimal health and wellbeing, cooperation, and receptive and sociomoral intelligences. Societal moves away from providing the Evolved Nest have contributed to the ill being and dysregulation we see in one another and society. Learn how to nest your children and re-nest yourself.

Evolved Nest with Darcia Narvaez

Kelly Wendorf shares her two decades of indigenous worldview allyship captured in her latest book, Flying Lead Change, and shared on her teaching ranch in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Kelly has lived and worked around the world, studying with many spiritual and indigenous leaders in India, Africa, Indonesia, and Australia. Her early work inspired her to found Kindred to answer the question: how do we live a sustainable and peaceful life? A question we still aspire to answer here at Kindred.

Read the transcript and find resources here: https://www.kindredmedia.org/2021/03/finding-a-bridge-to-indigenous-wisdom-and-worldview-an-interview-with-kelly-wendorf/

Finding A Bridge To Indigenous Wisdom And Worldview: An Interview With Kelly Wendorf

Read the transcript here: http://www.kindredmedia.org/2013/10/bruce-lipton-on-the-honeymoon-effect-an-audio-download-and-print/

In this LIVE Q&A, Bruce Lipton covers his initial discoveries of the connections of biology to beliefs as a stem cell biologist, to the epic era of evolution we find ourselves in as the human race to his latest book, The Honeymoon Effect, which shows us how to override our unconscious programming to create heaven on earth. 

About Bruce's New Book, The Honeymoon Effect:
With authority, eloquence, and an easy-to-read style, Lipton asserts that if we use the 50 trillion cells that live harmoniously in every healthy human body as a model, we can create not just honeymoon relationships for couples but also a "super organism" called humanity that can heal our planet.

About Bruce:
Bruce H. Lipton, PhD is an internationally recognized leader in bridging science and spirit. He is a stem cell biologist, bestselling author of The Biology of Belief and Spontaneous Evolution, as well as the recipient of the 2009 Goi Peace Award.  Visit Bruce at www.brucelipton.com.

Bruce Lipton on the Biology of Belief, Spontaneous Evolution and The Honeymoon Effect

Darcia Narvaez and Mary Tarsha discuss their studies recent findings in this podcast.

KEY POINTS
- Adversity in childhood is associated with poor physiologic regulation, seen in measures of vagal tone.
- A system of socially supportive childraising known as the evolved nest is associated with healthy vagal tone.

Read about the study here: https://www.kindredmedia.org/2021/11/evolved-nest-experience-in-childhood-buffers-the-negative-effects-of-aces/

Evolved Nest experience in childhood buffers the negative effects of ACEs

Darcia Narvaez and Mary Tarsha review Dan Siegel's book, Brainstorm.

In this New York Times-bestselling book, Dr. Daniel Siegel shows parents how to turn one of the most challenging developmental periods in their children's lives into one of the most rewarding.
Between the ages of twelve and twenty-four, the brain changes in important and, at times, challenging ways. In Brainstorm, Dr. Daniel Siegel busts a number of commonly held myths about adolescence--for example, that it is merely a stage of "immaturity" filled with often "crazy" behavior. According to Siegel, during adolescence we learn vital skills, such as how to leave home and enter the larger world, connect deeply with others, and safely experiment and take risks.
Drawing on important new research in the field of interpersonal neurobiology, Siegel explores exciting ways in which understanding how the brain functions can improve the lives of adolescents, making their relationships more fulfilling and less lonely and distressing on both sides of the generational divide.

Brainstorm by Dan Siegel - An EvolvedNest Book Review

Tyson Yunkaporta talks with Lisa Reagan, Kindred's editor, about his book, Sand Talk, released in 2019, and his ongoing studies of Indigenous knowledge, wisdom, and worldview. Sand Talk explores the connected methodologies of Indigenous thinking and how its application could help us develop new approaches to some of the world’s biggest challenges. 

Today, as a senior research fellow at Deakin University, Dr Yunkaporta is exploring how to create a space where Indigenous practitioners – not just academics – can come together and apply their thinking and their systems to different contexts around the world. 

In this interview, Tyson shares that, "Poetry, done right, is not about naming 'the thing' but about pointing to the thing without naming it. This is where Indigenous Worldview lives, in not naming or studying the thing, but the relationships and connections between the things. I don't want people to study Indigenous culture by looking at it - buying your rattle or whatever. I want people to see the world from inside Indigenous culture, to look out from this space, not into it."

Tyson Yunkaporta: How Poetry (Done Right) Reveals The Indigenous Worldview

Lisa Reagan, Kindred's editor, talks with the authors of the book, Attached at the Heart. Lysa Parker and Barbara Nicholson share their insights from the third editor of their beloved and classic parenting book.

Read more about the interview and watch the video version here: https://kindredmedia.org/2024/01/normalizing-nurturing-a-discussion-with-the-authors-of-attached-at-the-heart/

Read the foreword to the book, by Darcia Narvaez, here: https://kindredmedia.org/2024/01/attached-at-the-heart-the-foreword-by-darcia-narvaez/

Learn more about the book here: https://kindredmedia.org/2024/01/35730/

“Our book encourages the nurturing care and emotional connections necessary to build strong, resilient brains for optimal mental and emotional health. It’s revolutionary because the information in this book isn’t found in most parenting books. It counters popular parenting advice in order to empower parents to listen to their babies and young children. These early years are critical to the development of trust and empathy, the necessary ingredients for developing a secure attachment,” said co-author Barbara Nicholson, MEd, CEIM.

Attached at the Heart is endorsed by parenting experts, pediatricians and luminary moms such as Alanis Morissette and Mayim Bialik, PhD.

“When we co-founded Attachment Parenting International, now known as Nurturings, nearly 30 years ago, we knew that new parents needed evidence-informed education and practical information about how best to nurture their babies. That’s how Attached at the Heart came about – as a guidebook for new parents to help them lean into their caregiving instincts and set their children up for success,” said co-author Lysa Parker, MS, CFLE, CEIM.

Attached at the Heart has been a key resource for the attachment parenting movement, encouraging parents to trust their instincts and provide responsive care for their children.

“Research has proven that early nurturing experiences transform lives. The Eight Principles of Parenting that are detailed in our book are supported by research and rooted in attachment theory. Attached at the Heart provides science and evidence-backed recommendations to guide new parents in their loving journey,” said Nicholson.

The 3rd edition provides new recommendations regarding infant sleep, how to help children and their parents maintain a secure attachment, and how parents can learn to be more emotionally self-aware in order to teach their children emotional regulation strategies.

Normalizing Nurturing: An Interview with the Authors of Attached at the Heart

Join the Earth Day Celebration Launch for The Great Physician on April 22 at 3 p.m. ET. Read the press release and register for the event here: https://kindredmedia.org/2024/03/the-great-physician-medicinal-poetry-for-the-anthropocene-earth-day-book-launch-announced/

Poetry Reading:
Who Are You? Timemark 15:30
American Waiting Room, Timemark 21:30
The Texture of Oppression, Timemark 34:40

Kindred World Publishing House is proud to announce the release of The Great Physician: Medicinal Poetry for the Anthropocene, the first major collection of poetry by the renowned neuroscientist, healer, and climate activist, Stephanie Mines, PhD. In The Great Physician, Dr. Mines unflinchingly and soulfully moves us beyond transgenerational trauma, war, oppression, planetary collapse, toward the truth of our birthright: our “Original Brilliance.”


Purchase your copy of The Great Physician from the publisher for a discounted price. These sales support the nonprofit work of Kindred Magazine and Kindred World.
The public is invited to join the live launch party on April 22, 2024 at 3 p.m. ET. The Great Physician will be launched on Earth Day 2024, with virtual poetry readings and a salon discussion with Stephanie Mines and Lisa Reagan, founder of Kindred World and publisher of Kindred World Publishing House. (Register for the live event here.)

In The Great Physician’s autobiographical poetry and prose, Dr. Mines shares how her personal and professional background shaped her insights into a fusion of trauma recovery and climate activism. In her global activism through her Climate Change & Consciousness nonprofit, Dr. Mines focuses on humanity’s forward moving direction where inner and outer climates meet. In that place of mystery is our connection with the natural world and the living systems waiting to communicate with us, to give us what data cannot record.

Poetry, Dr. Mines says, helps make possible “the spaciousness needed to match our inner experience to the outer catastrophe that is accelerating before our eyes.  It helps us to understand.” These poems are inner experiences through which she, and indirectly the reader, find a way to understand planetary experience, personal and generational cause and effect, and hopefully, the courage and energy to change organically—from war, intolerance, fear, ennui.

“The invitation I received from Lisa Reagan of Kindred World to assemble a collection of my poems as a chronicle of these times stopped me in my tracks. It led me to an internal retrospective of my life in which I saw that I was born to be a poet as well as a healing artist” writes Dr. Mines in the introduction to The Great Physician. “My life has been marked by irrevocable losses. This is underscored by the crushing impact of the Anthropocene. The loss that is the most brutal, the most devastating, is the loss of our children’s future. I am speaking of the children of the world, born and unborn, as well as my own children and grandchildren.”

In more than a dozen books that reflect her three decades of research as a neuroscientist and embryologist, Mines has investigated shock and trauma as a survivor, a professional, a clinical researcher, and a healthcare provider. Her work has resulted in her nonprofit, The TARA Approach, which provides practical means for the systemic change she promotes as a Regenerative Health paradigm. Her training and healing modality is used by individuals internationally and by professional counselors and organizations such as addiction clinics, abuse centers, and refugee charities.

The Great Physician Interview and Poetry Reading with Stephanie Mines, Phd

In this interview with Darcia Narvaez, PhD, listeners discover the connections between the neurobiology of brain development in babies and the current ecological, social and cultural crises created by disconnected, brain damaged adults, a product of modern parenting practices and beliefs.  Narvaez is one of Kindred's most popular contributors and a new member of our international advisory board.  She is a Professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of Notre Dame. Her recent book, Neurobiology and the Development of Human Morality: Evolution, Culture and Wisdom won the 2015 William James Book Award from the American Psychological Association. In 2016, she is organizing a conference on Sustainable Wisdom: Integrating Indigenous KnowHow for Global Flourishing. 

You can read her work on Kindred here: http://www.kindredmedia.org/author/darcia-narvaez-phd/

A transcript of this interview is available here: http://www.kindredmedia.org/creating-sustainable-humans-with-conscious-parenting-an-interview-with-darcia-narvaez-phd/

Creating Sustainable Humans With Conscious Parenting: An Interview With Darcia Narvaez, PhD

Darcia Narvaez, PhD, explains why the United States is the worst place on Earth to raise children and how, without the Evolved Nest to provide nurturing, we become fearful reptiles instead of human.

Read the podcast transcript here: http://kindredmedia.org/2017/01/raising-children-love-dynamite/

Visit the nonprofit initiative at www.EvolvedNest.org.

About Darcia Narvaez, PhD

Darcia Narvaez is a Professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of Notre Dame. Her prior careers include professional musician, classroom music teacher, business owner, seminarian and middle school Spanish teacher. Dr. Narvaez’s current research explores how early life experience influences societal culture, wellbeing and sociomoral character in children and adults. She integrates neurobiological, clinical, developmental and education sciences in her theories and research about human nature and human development.

She publishes extensively on moral development, parenting and education. Recently she has been studying the Evolved Nest and how it influences wellbeing, sociality and morality.

She hosts interdisciplinary conferences at the University of Notre Dame regarding early experience and human development (the talks and/or powerpoints are available online). In 2016, she organized a conference on Sustainable Wisdom: Integrating Indigenous KnowHow for Global Flourishing (talks available online).

She is the author or editor of numerous books and articles. Read her bio and blogs here: kindredmedia.org/author/darcia-narvaez-phd/

About the Evolved Nest

Every animal has a nest for its young that matches up with the maturational schedule of the offspring (Gottlieb, 1997). Humans too! The Evolved Nest (or Evolved Developmental Niche; EDN) refers to the nest for young children that humans inherit from their ancestors. It's one of our adaptations, meaning that it helped our ancestors survive. Most characteristics of the evolved nest emerged with social mammals more than 30 million years ago.

Humans are distinctive in that babies are born highly immature (only 25% of adult-sized brain at full-term birth) and should be in the womb another 18 months to even resemble newborns of other species! As a result, the brain/body of a child is highly influenced by early life experience.

Multiple epigenetic effects occur in the first months and years based on the timing and type of early experience. Humanity's evolved nest was first identified by Melvin Konner (2005) as the "hunter-gatherer childhood model" and includes breastfeeding 2-5 years, nearly constant touch, responsiveness to baby's needs, multiple responsive adult caregivers, free play with multiple-aged playmates, positive social support for mom and baby.

Calling these components the Evolved Nest or Evolved Developmental Niche, Narvaez and colleagues add to the list soothing perinatal experience (before, during, after birth) and a positive, welcoming social climate. All these are characteristic of the type of environment in which the human genus lived for 99% of its existence. Below are publications and a powerpoint about the evolved nest.

Why does the evolved nest matter? Early years are when virtually all neurobiological systems are completing their development. They form the foundation for the rest of life, including getting along with others, sociality and morality.

Evolved Nest

Evolved Nest: With It We Become Human, Without It We Are Fearful Reptiles

Darcia Narvaez assumes the persona of a modern, medical model born baby to help us understand from a baby's perspective what this experience is like.  Here is the transcript to this podcast:

Read more of Narvaez's work here: http://kindredmedia.org/author/darcia-narvaez-phd/

Darcia Narvaez is a Professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of Notre Dame. Her prior careers include professional musician, classroom music teacher, business owner, seminarian and middle school Spanish teacher. Dr. Narvaez’s current research explores how early life experience influences societal culture and moral character in children and adults. She integrates neurobiological, clinical, developmental and education sciences in her theories and research about moral development. She publishes extensively on moral development, parenting and education. Recently she has been studying the Evolved Developmental Niche (nest) and how it influences moral development, moral capacities and preferences. She hosts interdisciplinary conferences at the University of Notre Dame regarding early experience, flourishing and evolution. In 2016, she organizes a conference on Sustainable Wisdom: Integrating Indigenous KnowHow for Global Flourishing. She is the author or editor of numerous books and articles. Her recent book, Neurobiology and the Development of Human Morality: Evolution, Culture and Wisdom (2014), won the 2015 William James Book Award from the American Psychological Association. She is executive editor of the Journal of Moral Education.

Heartseeds Sisters Babyheart

What Adults Did To Me At Birth: A Baby's Point Of View

Listen to award-winning neuroscience researcher, Darcia Narvaez, PhD, share foundational insights into the Evolved Nest.

DESCRIPTION: How can we maximize human flourishing? The answer—the Evolved Nest!  Learn what the Nest is and how it fosters human potential.

Visit the nonprofit initiative at www.EvolvedNest.org.

About Darcia Narvaez, PhD

Darcia Narvaez is a Professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of Notre Dame. Her prior careers include professional musician, classroom music teacher, business owner, seminarian and middle school Spanish teacher. Dr. Narvaez’s current research explores how early life experience influences societal culture, wellbeing and sociomoral character in children and adults. She integrates neurobiological, clinical, developmental and education sciences in her theories and research about human nature and human development. 

She publishes extensively on moral development, parenting and education. Recently she has been studying the Evolved Nest and how it influences wellbeing, sociality and morality. 

She hosts interdisciplinary conferences at the University of Notre Dame regarding early experience and human development (the talks and/or powerpoints are available online).  In 2016, she organized a conference on Sustainable Wisdom: Integrating Indigenous KnowHow for Global Flourishing (talks available online). 

She is the author or editor of numerous books and articles. Read her bio and blogs here:  https://kindredmedia.org/author/darcia-narvaez-phd/ 


About the Evolved Nest

Every animal has a nest for its young that matches up with the maturational schedule of the offspring (Gottlieb, 1997). Humans too! The Evolved Nest (or Evolved Developmental Niche; EDN) refers to the nest for young children that humans inherit from their ancestors. It's one of our adaptations, meaning that it helped our ancestors survive. Most characteristics of the evolved nest emerged with social mammals more than 30 million years ago.

Humans are distinctive in that babies are born highly immature (only 25% of adult-sized brain at full-term birth) and should be in the womb another 18 months to even resemble newborns of other species! As a result, the brain/body of a child is highly influenced by early life experience.

Multiple epigenetic effects occur in the first months and years based on the timing and type of early experience. Humanity's evolved nest was first identified by Melvin Konner (2005) as the "hunter-gatherer childhood model" and includes breastfeeding 2-5 years, nearly constant touch, responsiveness to baby's needs, multiple responsive adult caregivers, free play with multiple-aged playmates, positive social support for mom and baby.

Calling these components the Evolved Nest or Evolved Developmental Niche, Narvaez and colleagues add to the list soothing perinatal experience (before, during, after birth) and a positive, welcoming social climate. All these are characteristic of the type of environment in which the human genus lived for 99% of its existence. Below are publications and a powerpoint about the evolved nest.

Why does the evolved nest matter? Early years are when virtually all neurobiological systems are completing their development. They form the foundation for the rest of life, including getting along with others, sociality and morality.

1. The Evolved Nest: An Introduction with Darcia Narvaez, PhD

Listen to award-winning neuroscience researcher, Darcia Narvaez, PhD, share foundational insights into the Evolved Nest.

DESCRIPTION: What we experience in early life and childhood eventually affects the whole society.  Find out how we can make big changes to our world, starting with the little ones.

Visit the nonprofit initiative at www.EvolvedNest.org.

About Darcia Narvaez, PhD

Darcia Narvaez is a Professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of Notre Dame. Her prior careers include professional musician, classroom music teacher, business owner, seminarian and middle school Spanish teacher. Dr. Narvaez’s current research explores how early life experience influences societal culture, wellbeing and sociomoral character in children and adults. She integrates neurobiological, clinical, developmental and education sciences in her theories and research about human nature and human development. 

She publishes extensively on moral development, parenting and education. Recently she has been studying the Evolved Nest and how it influences wellbeing, sociality and morality. 

She hosts interdisciplinary conferences at the University of Notre Dame regarding early experience and human development (the talks and/or powerpoints are available online).  In 2016, she organized a conference on Sustainable Wisdom: Integrating Indigenous KnowHow for Global Flourishing (talks available online). 

She is the author or editor of numerous books and articles. Read her bio and blogs here:  https://kindredmedia.org/author/darcia-narvaez-phd/ 


About the Evolved Nest

Every animal has a nest for its young that matches up with the maturational schedule of the offspring (Gottlieb, 1997). Humans too! The Evolved Nest (or Evolved Developmental Niche; EDN) refers to the nest for young children that humans inherit from their ancestors. It's one of our adaptations, meaning that it helped our ancestors survive. Most characteristics of the evolved nest emerged with social mammals more than 30 million years ago.

Humans are distinctive in that babies are born highly immature (only 25% of adult-sized brain at full-term birth) and should be in the womb another 18 months to even resemble newborns of other species! As a result, the brain/body of a child is highly influenced by early life experience.

Multiple epigenetic effects occur in the first months and years based on the timing and type of early experience. Humanity's evolved nest was first identified by Melvin Konner (2005) as the "hunter-gatherer childhood model" and includes breastfeeding 2-5 years, nearly constant touch, responsiveness to baby's needs, multiple responsive adult caregivers, free play with multiple-aged playmates, positive social support for mom and baby.

Calling these components the Evolved Nest or Evolved Developmental Niche, Narvaez and colleagues add to the list soothing perinatal experience (before, during, after birth) and a positive, welcoming social climate. All these are characteristic of the type of environment in which the human genus lived for 99% of its existence. Below are publications and a powerpoint about the evolved nest.

Why does the evolved nest matter? Early years are when virtually all neurobiological systems are completing their development. They form the foundation for the rest of life, including getting along with others, sociality and morality.

2. The Evolved Nest: Cycles Of Development, with Darcia Narvaez, PhD

DESCRIPTION: What is it and why is it important?  Self-directed, social, whole-body play grows the body and brain in remarkable ways.  Even if missed in your childhood, it is never too late to begin to play!

Listen to award-winning neuroscience researcher, Darcia Narvaez, PhD, share foundational insights into the Evolved Nest.

Visit the nonprofit initiative at www.EvolvedNest.org.

About Darcia Narvaez, PhD

Darcia Narvaez is a Professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of Notre Dame. Her prior careers include professional musician, classroom music teacher, business owner, seminarian and middle school Spanish teacher. Dr. Narvaez’s current research explores how early life experience influences societal culture, wellbeing and sociomoral character in children and adults. She integrates neurobiological, clinical, developmental and education sciences in her theories and research about human nature and human development.

She publishes extensively on moral development, parenting and education. Recently she has been studying the Evolved Nest and how it influences wellbeing, sociality and morality.

She hosts interdisciplinary conferences at the University of Notre Dame regarding early experience and human development (the talks and/or powerpoints are available online). In 2016, she organized a conference on Sustainable Wisdom: Integrating Indigenous KnowHow for Global Flourishing (talks available online).

She is the author or editor of numerous books and articles. Read her bio and blogs here: kindredmedia.org/author/darcia-narvaez-phd/

About the Evolved Nest

Every animal has a nest for its young that matches up with the maturational schedule of the offspring (Gottlieb, 1997). Humans too! The Evolved Nest (or Evolved Developmental Niche; EDN) refers to the nest for young children that humans inherit from their ancestors. It's one of our adaptations, meaning that it helped our ancestors survive. Most characteristics of the evolved nest emerged with social mammals more than 30 million years ago.

Humans are distinctive in that babies are born highly immature (only 25% of adult-sized brain at full-term birth) and should be in the womb another 18 months to even resemble newborns of other species! As a result, the brain/body of a child is highly influenced by early life experience.

Multiple epigenetic effects occur in the first months and years based on the timing and type of early experience. Humanity's evolved nest was first identified by Melvin Konner (2005) as the "hunter-gatherer childhood model" and includes breastfeeding 2-5 years, nearly constant touch, responsiveness to baby's needs, multiple responsive adult caregivers, free play with multiple-aged playmates, positive social support for mom and baby.

Calling these components the Evolved Nest or Evolved Developmental Niche, Narvaez and colleagues add to the list soothing perinatal experience (before, during, after birth) and a positive, welcoming social climate. All these are characteristic of the type of environment in which the human genus lived for 99% of its existence. Below are publications and a powerpoint about the evolved nest.

Why does the evolved nest matter? Early years are when virtually all neurobiological systems are completing their development. They form the foundation for the rest of life, including getting along with others, sociality and morality.

19. The Evolved Nest: Free Play

Part III in Kindred’s Black Men, Breastfeeding and Social Justice Series
An Interview with Reaching Our Brother's Everywhere, ROBE's Wisdom Council Members, Calvin Williams and Kevin Sherman.

TRANSCRIPT HERE: www.kindredmedia.org/2020/06/black-…uncil-members/

About Kindred’s Black Men, Breastfeeding and Social Justice Series: In this series, Lisa Reagan talks with the Wisdom Council members of Reaching Our Brothers Everywhere, ROBE, Calvin Williams and Kevin Sherman, who share their extraordinary stories of forging a new “generative” path to fatherhood, one that prepares black fathers to become crucial advocates and supporters “to increase breastfeeding rates and decrease infant mortality rates within African-American communities.”

The maternal morbidity, infant death and low breastfeeding rates (a path to lifelong wellness) in African-American communities are the results of institutional and structural racism, gender inequality, and living in the one developed country on Earth that does not provide social support for families, such as paid family leave, healthcare, and worklife laws for fathers.

While ROBE’s wisdom council members seek to “educate, equip and empower” new fathers, they, and the fathers they serve face the persistent cultural myth of black fathers as absent fathers. A damaging mythology contradicted by CDC data that shows:

Most black fathers live with their children. There are about 2.5 million who live with their children, and 1.7 million who don’t, according to the CDC.
Black dads who live with their children are actually the most involved fathers of all, on average, a CDC study found.
For more academic insights into breaking stereotypes of black fathers, see Understanding the Positive Impacts of African American Fathers, or any work by Waldo E. Johnson, Jr., who has been deeply immersed in the study of black fathers and families for over two decades.

About Kindred’s Editor: Oral history has its roots in the sharing of stories throughout the centuries. It is a primary source of historical data, gathering information from living individuals via recorded interviews. Lisa Reagan’s interviews of thought-leaders, researchers, activists, parents and professionals serves as an oral history of the organic conscious parenting/family wellness movement in the United States and globally since 1999. Follow her podcasts, and this series, on Apple Music/iTunes, SoundCloud and here on Kindred.

Black Fathers: Cultural Myth and Reality

In this discussion with Rhea Komarek, DC, we ask what happens when we bring ourselves out of our heads and into our bodies to our worldview? Is this a which comes first, the chicken or the egg question? Dr. Rhea shares insights from Polyvagal Theory and Somatic Movement and how, befriending and tending our bodies, allows us to create the safe space that becomes the fertile, “tonified” soil for perceiving our world around us.

“When our physiology changes, our worldview changes. We can also use worldview to help us change physiology. There is so much we can do to tonify and nurture our physiology – to get ourselves into a healthier worldview. They can work together, the intellect and the intelligence. It is not a battle, but people need to be safe enough to shift their neuroceptions.”

In this Kindred interview, Dr. Rhea shares:

- Her personal story of moving from a wellness to wholeness approach, and discovering the roots of dominator culture thinking in our quest for an intellectual understanding of “wellness” instead of a relational experience of wholeness within the living energy of our bodies. “One is befriending and accepting, and one is shaming,” Rhea says.
- Her personal story of moving through injury and “panic states” when trying to approach her body, and discovering the neurobiological roots of her body’s responses.
- How she uses practical self-awareness and self-regulation exercises that both model for her son that these states are possible, and enrich his own capacity to co-regulate.
- How a community of adults who understand and practice co-regulation is a part of our cellular memory and expectations as human beings.
- How the Polyvagal science helps to explain our lack of “listening” in our culture and how its practical skills can be used for conscious activism.

Dr. Komarek is a chiropractor in Napa, California specializing in helping people move from states of stuckness and stress into more embodied states of health and wholeness using hands on care, applied polyvagal theory, and somatic movement. You can visit her site here: www.blossomlife.com

19. The Evolved Nest: Free Play

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