Our Polyvagal World Quotes

“How safe we feel is crucial to our physical and mental health and happiness.”
― Stephen W. Porges, Our Polyvagal World: How Safety and Trauma Change Us

“There’s a brutal irony to the fact that many of the features of our built world that are billed as keeping us safe also make us feel unsafe. If one wanted to take a cynical point of view, one might posit that, at times, this is an intended outcome. And that certain individuals or institutions may want us to feel unsafe for their own selfish ends. But why would anybody actively want to make us feel unsafe? The Polyvagal Theory offers a simple explanation: When we feel unsafe, our bodies shut down our ability to critically think or learn in favor of a need for immediate survival.”
― Stephen W. Porges, Our Polyvagal World: How Safety and Trauma Change Us