Embracing Your Power: The Nervous System's Role

summary

In this episode of the Catapult Effect podcast, host Katie Wrigley explores the relationship between our nervous system and our ability to embrace our true selves. She discusses how fear, often rooted in past experiences, can hinder self-expression and empowerment. 

Katie Wrigley emphasizes the importance of understanding and overcoming these fears to live authentically and joyfully. She also addresses the responsibility that comes with empowerment and the need to focus on supportive relationships while letting go of jealousy and negativity. The episode concludes with an invitation to a free webinar aimed at uncovering the patterns that drive anxiety and stress.

takeaways

• Many people desire to step into their power but fear holds them back.
• The nervous system can label experiences as unsafe, impacting self-expression.
• Personal responsibility is key to empowerment and change.
• Focusing on supportive relationships enhances personal growth.
• Pain is a part of life; mindset around it matters.
• Patterns of anxiety can be addressed through awareness and support.

Join the free webinar: The Pattern Behind the Panic

Register here

Resources

• Website
• Learn more about Cognomovement
• Try Cognomovement for yourself!
• Book a call with Katie

Credit: Tom Giovingo, Intro & Outro, Random Voice Guy, Professional ‘Cat‘ Herder

Mixed & Managed: JohnRavenscraft.com

Disclaimer: Katie is not a medical professional and she is not qualified to diagnose any conditions. The advice and information she gives is based on her own experience and research. It does not take the place of medical advice. Always consult a medical professional first before you try anything new.

Transcript

Katie Wrigley (00:00.62)
Welcome back to another episode of the Catapult Effect podcast. I am your host, Katie Wrigley. So I've been hearing a lot recently, a lot of desire from people to step into their power, to fully embrace their power. But what if your nervous system is telling you that that's not safe? How are you going to be able to allow yourself to be fully seen and heard as the amazing, unique, imperfectly perfect human that you are, if the nervous system doesn't think that, that is an option for you. Stay tuned. That is exactly what we're going to talk about today.

Katie Wrigley (00:41.144)
had a client session the other day and one of the things that she wants to do is really step into her power. And it gave me an idea for this episode because she's not the only client that's had those requests in one of our sessions. And so really got me thinking, we have so many people who want to really embrace who they are. But what if the nervous system is telling you it's not safe?

to be that person that is not safe, to feel seen and heard, to be seen, to be heard, to be yourself. And so many of us get that message growing up. We're told to be quiet. We are bullied. We are pushed down. We are met with anger, with jealousy, with all of these undesirable things that wind up hurting our feelings. And not only that,

The nervous system is labeling those events and deciding that when you start to become you, it's not safe. Bad things happen. This is something that I see over and over again. I also experienced it myself.

And over the last seven years, as I've been on this healing journey, things have shifted in ways I can't even describe. I do my best to talk about a lot of the things that have changed in my upcoming book on Fuck Your Nervous System coming out in early 2026. But it's been this last year when I really got deep into those layers, into the middle of the onion, to that pattern that was keeping me from fully being me.

pattern of I'm not good enough. Now that that pattern has shifted, now that I have gotten rid of that bullshit and I am in my truth that I have value as a human being that I am, I want this so much for everybody else that I work with to really and and not just work with I want this for everybody that I love and if you're a human being on this planet I love you and that means that I want this for you too.

Katie Wrigley (02:54.616)
What we get when we step into our power, it is freedom. And yes, there can be some scary things that happen. There can be pain that comes along the road. We want to be able to really attach to why we want to step in our power, what it gives us to embrace who we are. Because those things, in my experience, become so much more important.

than the reasons to stay small. The reasons not to be exactly who you are. So let's look at some of the things that come up. So the biggest one that keeps us from our power is fear. Fear that if we're seen or heard something bad may happen. And I have seen a lot of patterns in people's nervous systems. Some going into the woo.

where there have been other lives, where they may have been a healer in some regard, and it wasn't safe. There's a lot of people who feel back in the witch trials. A lot of witches were actually probably just practicing holistic medicine. They weren't actually doing witchcraft. We know that there was a lot of crap around that and it was a whole big fear-based thing with people being burned alive at the stake. I mean, that's a big reason to fear. I gotta say, if being burned at the stake was something that would happen today, I...

would not be suggesting you step into your power. Luckily, we're in a group and in a time where you don't have to be worried about burnout at stake. But your nervous system may still think that you do. And even if you're not someone who believes in other lives, and I'm not trying to get you to swallow my belief system, this is part of what I believe and this is what's come up in multiple client sessions as well, there is a lot of times, just as often, a lot of events that have happened in this life.

that have told you that it's not safe. Where you've stood up for someone and you've been punished somehow as a result. And remember the nervous system isn't tracking things with logic. The nervous system can something like someone just kind of shrugging at you and rolling their eyes at you and dismissing you. That can be a moment in time that may have had nothing to do with you.

Katie Wrigley (05:18.261)
But your nervous system decides in that moment you're not lovable. And if you're not lovable, no point in stepping into your power because no one's gonna like you, no one's gonna love you. These patterns that start a lot of times in early life, not even going into the past lives, but these patterns a lot of times start in early life and tell us that it's not safe to be seen and heard. Maybe horrifically, and I hear this one a lot too,

someone has been abused as a child and when they've tried to tell a parent or another adult what has happened to them that parent or adult isn't able to receive it and believe it most likely because they too have been abused and if they face your abuse they have to face their abuse it doesn't make it acceptable that they're not believing you but it makes it understandable that they aren't able to because it means they're going to have to face what's happened to them as well and that

can be really terrifying if you've been running from that for most of your life. But when someone doesn't believe us, we get small, we lock it inside, and we decide, okay, no one's gonna believe me. No one's gonna like me. No one's gonna love me. And these things are keeping us from stepping into our power.

One of the things that can really help shift that is understanding there's always going to be people who aren't going to believe you. There's always going to be people who are going to be against you. Those aren't your tribe. The things that you give up when you don't want to step into your power, you're giving up joy, you're giving up peace, you're giving up freedom.

Few things have felt as good as being yourself, being myself, and not worrying how someone is perceiving me. Just being me in the moment and being accepted for me. And as I've been able to do that more more, shockingly, more and more people are accepting who I am because I'm so at ease with who I am that they feel that.

Katie Wrigley (07:33.868)
We're all bouncing off of each other energetically in ways that are pretty hard to comprehend actually. But a lot of times we're picking up some of these internal patterns. We give up so much of what makes life worth living. Deep connection, real joy, real bliss when we stay small, when we don't allow people to see us.

Yes, we're opening ourselves up to more pain. Yes, we're being vulnerable, which can be terrifying. And the reward is for the people who are your tribe, they're gonna love you. They're gonna accept you. They're gonna let you be exactly who you are. And they're gonna become part of your support group, your secure foundation in this life. To get out there.

and do the things that are going to be of service to other people. That is one of the biggest things that you get. Not only just joy for yourself, but you are going to have so much more to put out to the world in your own unique way when you can fully harness the power of who you are and allow that power to shine. You are going to be of so much more service in the ways that are unique to you.

And that my friend, feels fucking amazing. If you haven't tried it yet, just go volunteer somewhere for a weekend and see how good it feels to be of service to someone else. Just give it a shot, see what happens. So being able to start to attach over to the things that matter more, why you want to step into your power, what it's going to give you, what it's going to allow for other people, what you're going to be able to put out there into the world as a result of you claiming your power.

those things become bigger and more important than the things that are going to hurt you along the way. You may be able to try to avoid pain in life, but you are losing out on so much more pleasure when you try to make your life a pain-free existence. Pain is going to come with life. Your mindset around that pain, that's the difference between suffering and accepting it. When you can accept pain, yes, it hurts, but you aren't

Katie Wrigley (09:52.02)
agonizing with it. You're able to let it go. Another thing that comes up is that people may feel like it's too much responsibility. It's too much. I have too much power. It's scary how much I'm capable of. If I really let myself out there, let my freak flag fly, whatever that may look like, that alone can strike up more fear.

The thing that I want to leave you with when we talk about empowerment and responsibility, you are only ever responsible for your actions, your thoughts, your emotions, your responses. Everybody else is responsible for theirs. You can never make someone feel a certain way. You may have the power to inspire them. You may have the power to hurt them, but how they receive you, you have no control over that.

They have control over how they receive you. All you can do is be clear in your intent and empower yourself and realize that you aren't giving yourself extra responsibility. You're giving yourself the right amount of personal responsibility. And the thing is, when you are ready to take that level of responsibility, the other piece you get with that is that now

You are empowering yourself to be able to handle all the challenges that come your way. You are not putting the solution on someone else to figure out for you. You're putting it on yourself. And you're starting to trust yourself that I'm going to figure this out. Now, it doesn't mean that you're not going to need support, that you're not going to need many who's along the way as you figure out the how. And that's OK. Again, that's why we want to be connected to people. Takes a village.

But being able to be fully responsible, that gives you the power to change the things that you want to change in your life. And you aren't waiting for someone else. You aren't giving someone else your power to keep you small. You're taking that for yourself and allowing yourself to step into it. And then two other things that I want to cover. Sometimes when we have a higher level of success,

Katie Wrigley (12:16.001)
because we are stepping into our powers and we have some unique ability that maybe a lot of other people haven't harnessed yet. And as a side note there, I fully, fully, fully believe that what one human can do, another human can do. Period, end of story. What one can do, another can do. You see someone doing something, you're gonna be able to do that too. You just need to figure out how and who you need to make it happen.

But when you've had high levels of success and you've been around people who aren't very secure in themselves, who have been grasping at that success, who haven't been able to achieve the levels that you have, jealousy can rear its ugly head. They can bully you. They can try to sabotage you. And we can see this at career level too. Let's say for instance, you're really good at sales.

and you have outsold people who have been there for years and you did it in a fraction of the amount of time. This is a true story from one of my clients. You would think that that would be a celebratory moment. But what if that came with a whole lot of people ganging up on you and isolating you? Now that success doesn't feel as safe. That jealousy thing, all of this is gonna go back to fear, by the way.

giving you a hint there, that jealousy thing, well what if I succeed too much then someone isn't going to be happy for me? Someone's going to want to take the wind out of my sails because I'm happy. And so you don't celebrate it and you don't go for as many successes and you start to create a subconscious pattern where you're going to be getting in your own way. Again, I want you to reconnect to your why.

What makes you want to be so good at sales? What makes you want to get that level of success? And if you're trying to compensate for something inside of you, be honest with yourself. There's nothing wrong with it. It's just data, figuring out what drives you. And these are important things to discover for yourself to fully embrace and empower yourself to be exactly the person you are right now, today. These are very important keys to being able to do that. So letting go of, yeah.

Katie Wrigley (14:28.179)
Some people are going to be jealous. Let's look at Taylor Swift. She has a massive, massive following. And she has a massive amount of haters too. Do you think she's spending time on the haters? No. She's fully focused on her fan base and the people who love her and giving them more of what she can give them in the unique way that only Taylor Swift can. And

I have a lot of respect for her. I'm not actually a huge fan of her music. Some of her songs I really like, but I love the messaging she puts out there and I love her as a human for all the empowerment and all that she stands for and all that she shows is possible to the world. And I really admire her business sense, big time. There's a lot that I admire about her. And that makes me a fan even if I don't like all of her music, but she's not focusing.

on all those nasty things that come with it. She's focusing on her why and on all the people who love what she's doing. You focusing on your why and all of the people who love what you're doing. You keeping your focus there. You're not even going to start to notice the haters after a while. They're going to fade into the background because they're not important. You know, like Brene Brown says,

And there was a quote from Roosevelt, I believe, that unless you're in the arena and you're getting your ass kicked, I really don't care about your opinion. I that's, I'm being very, very succinct in that quote. I don't remember the exact quote, but Google Brene Brown and the arena and you can see the quote for yourself.

But think about that. Does it really matter if someone's a spectator on the side and they have no idea what you have done and created for yourself and the work that you've put in, the blood, sweat and tears that have put into whatever it is that you're doing? Unless they understand that, their opinion really doesn't matter. It really doesn't.

Katie Wrigley (16:35.765)
And so allow yourself, if you have someone who's hating on you, does their opinion really matter? It may hurt in the moment. But are they someone that you're really going to care about? Are they someone who is adding to your life? Or are they draining you and making you guess yourself? If that's what you find, refocus on the people who inspire you, who empower you, who support you, who cheer you on.

who want to watch you succeed, who love you for exactly the person you are and are going to be applauding as you embrace that person more and more and let more and more people see who you are. Letting go of that fear of rejection, letting go of that fear of being too much, letting go of that fear that you're not enough. Those are all things that you can do to step into your power.

Finding ways to be able to give yourself that is huge. And now I want to end this episode with an invitation to you. On Tuesday, November 4th at 4 p.m. Eastern Time, I am going to be running a free webinar called The Pattern Behind the Panic. Now it's not necessarily about stepping into your power.

But it's helping to understand what some of these patterns are that are driving the stress, are driving the anxiety, that are driving the fear that's keeping you from being the person that you know that you can be. The person you are dying to let the world see.

So I'm going to put a link to that in the show notes. And I hope you're going to come join me. It's totally free. We're just going to be online for about an hour. My goal is to actually give you back 15 minutes of that hour. And we're going to talk about some of these deep drivers that are creating these stress patterns that are leaking the energy out of you instead of allowing you to embrace that energy and fully utilize it for what you need and want to do the most in the world. Thank you so much for joining me again. And until next time, please be well.