How I Healed My Nervous System: Reclaiming Peace with Neuroplasticity

How did I accidentally begin to heal my nervous system? What did I stumble upon?

In this powerful episode, Dr. Keean and I explore how trauma reshapes our nervous system and how we can use prediction error, gentle sensory experiences, and intentional movement to rewire fear-based patterns. Learn how the brain constantly predicts based on the past—and how introducing new, safe, and empowering experiences helps us reclaim peace, presence, and possibility.

Whether you’re a trauma survivor, a healing professional, or simply someone seeking to feel safer and more grounded in your body and life, this episode offers insights into the science of neuroplasticity and practical ways to shift from survival mode to thriving.

RESOURCES

Dr. Keean Kirk

Website: Keean.org

Instagram & Threads: Holistic.therapist

Mandi Pratt, Resilience Speaker

Website: AwareAndPrepared.life (See How You Score on the Intuition Quiz)

LinkedIn: Mandi Pratt

Instagram: @WomenAwareAndPrepared

Transcript

 Hey, brave one. Welcome to the Aware and Prepared Podcast. I'm your host, Mandy Pratt, trauma-informed, resilient speaker, domestic violence victim advocate, and narcissistic abuse survivor. Here we keep it real with true crime stories and real world strategies to prevent emotional and physical harm. My guests and I share a mix of insight and survivor grit, all to help you feel safer.

Trust yourself more deeply and live with greater peace and power. Let's trade fear for freedom and step into the peace that you deserve.

Hey, welcome back to the Aware and Prepared Podcast. Today we're talking about how I accidentally stumbled upon healing my nervous system. So get ready to rethink what healing really looks like and walk away with small, powerful ways to feel safer in your own body. We have a very special guest returning with us, Dr.

Kian Kirk. He is a psychotherapist and holistic coach who utilizes attachment science, neurobiology, inner child work, and young in parts work, empowering others to reach their highest selves through unlearning harmful patterns and behaviors. He now has his doctorate and completed his master's degree in counseling Psychology with an emphasis in marriage and family therapy from Hope International University.

In 2017, he's appeared on the Dr. Phil Show, speaking on single parent family dynamics and the effects of divorce on children. Dr. Kean has extensive experience working with veterans, children, teens, and young adults in both individual and group settings. He is passionate about helping clients with anxiety, addiction, OCD, loss and bereavement, post combat trauma, autism, gender dysphoria, and Neurodivergence.

Kirk has worked as a therapist in detox facilities and recovery centers for addiction as well as with Veterans in Recovery as part of the Veterans in Progress Program at the US Veterans Initiative in Long Beach, California. Central to Kirk's philosophy is a powerful message about moving forward.

Quote, the past is a place of reflection, not a place of residence. End quote. His approach is rooted in the belief that true healing encompasses the mind, body, and soul. This holistic method seeks not just to treat symptoms, but to address the underlying causes of distress, unlocking doors to profound transformation.

Okay. Emotional intelligence building is a cornerstone of Kirk's therapy and life coaching. Dr. Kean specializes in liberating others from their unconscious trauma responses, often rooted in early childhood experiences. His goal is clear to enable individuals to reclaim their best and healthiest lives.

So let's dig into the conversation.

So Dr. Kean, thank you so much for being here with us. Absolutely. I'm so happy to be here and I love what you're doing, so I'm glad to be a part of it. Thank and I love what you're doing too.

So, um, Dr. Kian is also a good family friend, so, um, I have just watched as he is just, oh my gosh, like he, his following is crazy on Instagram. I'll tell you where to follow him later. And, um, he's just making such a difference. So I'm so excited and thank you for your time here with us. Yeah, thank you for the shout out.

I appreciate it. I love that. Uh. Community's growing and yeah, I just uh, encourage anyone who wants to be a part of that healing journey to join both of us on Instagram. 'cause we post about this stuff and it's important. And the healing journey. Yeah, exactly. So I wanted to talk about a million different things, but I think we've put it down, um, because you talk about so many good things and I was just sharing with you about, um.

Kind of how I accidentally, you know, found out about healing my nervous system. And that was because, um, I. I have a neuromuscular disorder and I, um, found a movement disorder doctor who has a membership program online helping us do different like eye movement exercises and breathing exercises. And I just found like, oh, oh my gosh, like it's kind of working and there is really nothing else that works so well for it.

So, mm-hmm. It just really helped me to see that and also to, um. Realize the importance of even just slowing down. So I talk a lot about intuition and being able to trust our intuition because when we see things like red flags, but we don't know how to trust our intuition, it's like then what? You know, so that doesn't really help.

And so, um, I kind of developed a framework about trusting our intuition and the first part of that is pausing and really slowing down and, um. It's just so important. Not only, you know, just for the type of work we're doing, but also our bodies. Right. And so a lot of times when I go out and speak, especially to the students, they wanna know specifics.

Okay, Ms. Mandy, your story is freaking gnarly, right? We've heard that. Yeah, our jaws are dropped to the ground, but how are you? Okay? 'cause we would've never known that. So like they wanna know specifics and I always tell them that, um. You know, just honestly I'm an open book and like they can ask me anything.

And honestly sharing like, yes, I had years of talk therapy. Oh my gosh. And it was helpful, but I felt like I didn't really gain traction until I started like moving my body and like. Doing something else about it. And so getting out there, I always talk about people who follow me. You're probably tired of this, but I always talk about how much healing and nature helps me.

So I would go for walks, you know, at that time my son was little and I would actually like. Be present in nature. So I would stop and pet the caterpillar. I know it sounds stupid, or like touch the leaf, you know, and that would really, really help me. So I just found it interesting, that whole neuroplasticity, um, thing and kind of like starting to.

Crack open. Healing my nervous system with that. And I know that you're really the expert about talking about our nervous system and the brain and how all of that works. So just wanted to kind of touch on that and um, kind of dig into that. Yeah. Um, hmm. Where to start. So, let's see. So, okay. So as you're kind of talking about, um, the forest bathing part, it does make sense to me a lot because.

When we slow down enough to take in nature and take in the sensory present, we, we can often interrupt, uh, a process where our brain is constantly trying to predict what is going to happen next based off of past experiences. The present moment, right? So the sensory present moment, we're taking in sensory information.

And so as you talk about being in nature, that's really activating the part of our brain that is dialed into sensory. And there is something called prediction error. And what it is, is basically we take in prediction error when we're learning something new, when we're moving our body. Uh, and when we're dealing with something unpredictable, and, and so a lot of the time people don't realize that, you know, when you're in trauma, there's this immobilization that happens, right?

And we, we sometimes refer to this as dorsal vagal shutdown. When we look at polyvagal theory, it's, it's really just showing that our body is shutting down and disconnecting from a lot of different, you know, areas of the brain in order to reserve our battery power. Essentially, we've kind of been burnt out or from being in hyper arousal for a really long time.

A lot of people are in this space and don't know it, and so they kind of have adrenal fatigue and they get burnt out and tired. And so there's this, um. Uh, you know, this, this, this idea of, of prediction error that Dr. Lisa Bo Barrett talks about is really just a huge part of getting yourself out of fear or out of, you know, any of these, these predictions that your brain is making all the time, right?

And so. We can look at it with an example of like with, with dogs for example, right? If you have a history of fear of dogs, maybe you got bit when you were a child or a dog attacked you. There's a certain amount of your brain that is predicting what's going to happen next when you're around a dog. And so a way that we kind of engage with the prediction error is by.

Moving our body, learning something new and dealing with the unpredictable. And so an example of that would be maybe if you're afraid of a dog, instead of running away, you stand there and you just, you just observe, right? And maybe you're afraid that the dog is gonna bite you and so you allow yourself to pet it.

You know? Or maybe you, you know, you kind of put out some dog food. I don't know, a few feet away from you, and you allow the dog to come to you. And so when this happens, your brain is starting to make a different set of predictions. It's preparing multiple actions in the moment. And you need to prove to your brain that those predictions are wrong, right?

Your brain has action plans around dogs. So the same thing can happen with people, right? So when we talk about. You know, being aware and prepared, and we talk about being safe and also taking up space. Right. And, and mainly we're looking at, you know, um, the female population, right. And how they as, as, as women, they have been taught to be small and to be non-confrontational.

Mm-hmm. And to not be aggressive. And, and so when I think about kind of the. The population that you know, you are inspiring and bringing hope towards. You can look at how, how can you change the predictions that this population is navigating, right? Because you can't just kind of will yourself out of fear, as Dr.

Lisa talks about. You have to dose yourself with the prediction error. And so this is not in like overwhelming ways, but you might, you know, you might say like, I'm not gonna avoid people. Or keep quiet to stay safe. Maybe I'm gonna speak up. Mm-hmm. Maybe I'm gonna let myself be seen. Maybe I even let myself be rejected.

Mm-hmm. Um, and so your brain is making these, this set of predictions and it's preparing multiple actions for you to act on. Mm-hmm. And when you go into forest bathing and you go into something that engages your sensory, you're kind of stopping that process a little bit and you're bringing yourself into that present space.

And so. There's, there's kind of like these situations you can put yourself in and you can either do the forest bathing, which is a very healthy way of navigating it. And another way too is to kind of sprinkle in these moments of prediction error. So what that means is you're taking in the present moment, but you're also putting yourself in situations where the incoming signals disconfirm the fear.

If that makes sense. Right. That's how the learning happens. And so with you, what you've been doing is, you know, you're taking yourself out of the shutdown, out of the disconnect, out of the immobilization, and you're teaching your body that through little movements, it's allowed to take up space, it's allowed to move, it's allowed to exist, it's allowed to hold, you know, power.

Mm-hmm. And as as women in society, right. That is a very. That is the opposite narrative that women are told and they're also supposed to shoulder the world on top of that. Right. So dealing with all the fear, normalizing that them being celebrated on Mother's Day or you know, whatever, for being exceptional.

And sometimes we have to kind of shift that narrative and we're teaching the brain that we don't have to be exceptional all the time and we get to be acceptable. And that is enough. Wow. That's cool. So, yeah, I just, uh, I think that when it comes to, you know, the work you're doing, it's really about when those students ask you like, what can I do?

They can start with dosing themselves, right? Mm-hmm. With the prediction error and teaching their body and their nervous system that these, the sensory that they're taking in doesn't have to come with the signals of the fear. Right. It can be a new experience. Mm-hmm. Even like with public speaking, right?

Mm-hmm. Maybe as someone who's a trauma survivor, you go up in front of an audience of people and there's maybe that fear that like, I'm gonna say something wrong or I'm gonna mess it up. Or, you know, maybe someone might be like, you're not, you know, telling me my lived experience, or they might be triggered, but your prediction error is putting yourself in those situations.

Saying, okay. Even though I've been armed in the past and rejected and told my voice, doesn't matter. I'm taking up this space and I'm teaching my brain that I can do that. And there might be a different response, right? And there's no way that I could have done that like 10 years ago or something. 'cause I didn't feel safe.

So I always say like, healing happens. I feel like you need to get safe first and have like. A range of resonance, you know? Um, so like with the dog, you know, if I am petrified of dogs, like I'm not gonna go out there right away and be like, here, doggy, doggy. You know what I mean? Like, I might have my husband stand next to me with like a Right.

I don't know. Or like, I'll have the owner and the dog will be on a long lead or something so they can grab it if needed to, or something like that. Right. Exactly. Exactly. And you're, you're kind of like gently introducing new sensory experiences and you're in the present moment, so you're taking in that information and then your brain is able to consider that too, right?

In consideration with the past. 'cause it's always making predictions based off of the past. And the present moment. Mm-hmm. And a lot of people are kind of living in the past. Mm-hmm. Because they're not giving themselves these prediction error moments. They're not giving themselves moments where they have to really stretch and they have to grow and it's uncomfortable, right?

Mm-hmm. And they're also living from this lens of, you know, and this happens sometimes if we have, you know, caretakers or parents that. Didn't know how to regulate their emotions, so they go from zero to a hundred. There's only black and white thinking. Um, and that's not their fault. This is part of conditioning and it's part of the past.

There were not tools available, but the point is, is that. We're learning to also with prediction error, we're learning to pause, which I know you talked about last time we discussed it. And you're also using this dial. And so, uh, a good colleague of mine, uh, Dr. Harpe Maah talks about this and it's using this dial instead of saying like, I completely distrust this person, right, because they hurt me and now they're in a zero.

I'm gonna use a dial, and I'm gonna say, okay, out of zero to a hundred, how much do I distrust them or how much do I trust them? And therefore, I'm actually having less of a strong reaction and I'm slowly lowering, like maybe I'll take off five or 10 points because they lied to me. Right? But I'm not completely reinforcing that prediction in my brain that if someone does something wrong, they are therefore bad.

Like the black and white. The black and white. And so if we pause and we give ourselves time to actually consider how can we have a, you know, a different experience and change the prediction and I'm gonna use the dial and I'm gonna assign numbers to people in my life so I can have a appropriate reactions to when they might cause me fear.

Mm-hmm. Not go from zero, not go immediately to zero. Mm-hmm. Or not even put them in a hundred. Right. Even if they do something great, it doesn't mean I have to idealize them. Mm-hmm. And romanticize, or even, it's not a romantic relationship, but idealize. Mm-hmm. All the good things. And then all of a sudden they're in a hundred.

Mm-hmm. Because going through zero to a hundred, zero to a hundred is exhausting and fatiguing on your nervous system. True. So if we pause and we use the dial and we combine that with changing predictions that our brain is taking in, we're really gonna be in a much better grounded space. And we're gonna notice that our body is shifting out of survival.

Mm-hmm. And into thrive mode, into taking in data mode, into observation mode. Right. And so it's not in that. That fear based response, if that makes sense. Right? Yeah. So we're kind of disrupting that prediction that our brain, and so it's, isn't it kind of like our brain has these like neural pathways? Yes.

These ruts that it gets into, like I'm always afraid of dogs and now you're trying to kind of reroute that. Yes, exactly. And you're strengthening the neuro pathway, like when you tie your shoe every day. It strengthens the neuro pathway that tells you how to tie your shoe, right? So you have a neuro pathway in your brain that shows you, okay, when I get up in the morning and I put my shoes on, then I tie them, this is how I do it.

Now. I start doing it automatically because I'm not even thinking about it, right? Mm-hmm. I'm just like, oh, I'm putting my shoe on. Same thing with prediction error, right? And people do this with novelty. They choose novelty experiences to get them way out of like their. Way, way of thinking. 'cause you can't predict what's gonna happen if you start riding a bull and you and you, you've never ridden a bull before.

You don't know what's gonna happen. Right. And that's a really funny example for trauma survivors. But you get the point, right? Yeah. You can't predict, right? And so if you put yourself in situations where your brain is not able to predict what's gonna happen, and you pause and you use the dial. You're gonna start to experience that neuroplasticity, and you're gonna build new neural pathways around experiences.

And the old ones are gonna latch away. They're gonna pull apart, right? Because you're not tying your shoe the same way. And maybe if tying your shoe is like a trauma response, let's say maybe it's overthinking. Mm-hmm. Your brain is coming up with a thousand predictions on how this could go wrong. Right.

If you are reinforcing that every time you interact with somebody and you're not getting new experiences with new people and different experiences mm-hmm. You're gonna have a thousand predictions every time you go to do X, y, Z. Mm-hmm. So we wanna lower that down 'cause that's extreme thinking. Mm-hmm.

And we wanna introduce new predictions with the sensory present and the remembered past. Interesting. That's so, yeah. That makes sense. Good. Yeah. I'm glad it lands. I, I, I love our conversations because we kind of like process stuff in real time together. Yeah. And sometimes you'll say something to me and I'll be like, oh yeah, I didn't think about that.

But that, you know, it's like we all have our lived experience to pull from. Mm-hmm. And you have your lived experience of being in these traumatic situations. And then you took yourself out of that despite everything. Mm-hmm. And you put your brain and your body and your nervous system in a new environment mm-hmm.

And like went through the discomfort and now you're, now you're experiencing the reward of that, right. You're changing your brain. Right, exactly. Yeah. And question. Yeah. So if, is that why? They like with kids. Like, I remember for my son, you know, he was so little when we were going through the, the worst of it, but mm-hmm.

I remember, you know, he of course didn't wanna go to counseling. What little kid wants to go to counseling, but finding a therapist that like, played with him while they talked mm-hmm. Or would walk around, like one of the places we lived was kind of nearer to the beach and so he and the counselor would, uh, walk down to the beach and back.

Yes. So they're talking and walking. Somebody that I, you know, my counselor and then her husband was the one who saw him. Uh, very trustworthy people that I really appreciated and they helped me, helped us so much. But is that just thinking of that, or like somebody, a trauma survivor and, uh. They start doing something like, like I have another guest that I'm gonna have on it.

She's a, um, therapist and she started doing like, I don't even know what it's called. It's like trapeze work and stuff. Mm-hmm. And like, yeah. So that is something totally new. I guess that would be kind of like the bull writing idea. Yeah, the novelty. The novelty, yeah. Yeah. So like you have no idea. What to expect, but it could be something more tame like pottery or something.

Right? Yes. Pottery, arts, singing, music, whatever. Your, your brain is not used to being in Uhhuh. You're giving it opportunity to make new predictions. Mm-hmm. And it also gonna be forced to kinda learn, right? 'cause it has no predictions to go off of Right. In that particular environment. And you're right.

When you think about your, your son and. The movement element that is taking up space that is expansion. Yeah. And when we bring in somatic attunement to the body, somatic awareness, we're moving the body out of immobilization and we're telling our body it's safe. Right. Right. Like we do this with food too.

When we get protein first thing in the morning, we're telling our body that it's safe and okay. Right. You don't have to run off of cortisol. Yeah. You, you get to run off of the hormones that tell you when it's safe to eat or when it, when you are ready to eat. Mm-hmm. And when your stomach is full, a lot of trauma survivors don't have, you know, the, the hunger cues, uh, that tell them right when they wake up, it's time to eat.

It's just cortisol, it's just blow blood sugar. Um, one of my friends, uh, on Instagram, my nourished belly, Ashley talked about this. Oh yeah. Um, yeah, she's amazing at this. And, uh, that's just scratching the surface. But the point is, is that, you know, there's, there's just like ways we tell our body it's safe through prediction error when we change things around, when we put ourselves in discomfort, uncomfortable situations, and when we give our, our body experiences where it can't predict everything.

Mm-hmm. And then we're also making sure that, you know, we're. In combination with mental health healing, we're changing our, the way our body is nourished and that it is getting food because food equates to safety, right? Mm-hmm. When we give our body food, it knows it can relax, it can rest and digest the food.

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. And protein is a huge part of that. Mm-hmm. Um, and when we, when we give ourselves that first thing in the morning, we're, we're giving our body the ability to use the hormones it has. Right. Um, instead of just cortisol mm-hmm. We're running on cortisol as trauma survivors and it does not help.

Right, right. And there's a lot of people, you know, drinking coffee and, um, being on stimulants, right. Like taking stimulants from prescriptions and stuff like that. So it's just important as a trauma survivor to have a well-rounded and again, holistic right approach. To healing and part of your son's movement integrated with the talk therapy is a huge part of like its success.

Mm-hmm. His success. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, exactly. That makes sense. And my cat just jumped up here to join us, and I know his mouth was right by the microphone. You got a second guest right there. Ready? Go. We have an extra guest. Too bad this isn't a visual as well as audio. Yeah. Anyway, um, well, thank you. All of that makes sense.

Um, and like we were talking about in the beginning, um, you have grown such a huge Instagram and threads following, talking about all of this. Um, do you wanna share with people how they can find you there? Oh, uh, sure. Yeah. And thank you for the shout out. Mm-hmm. Um, you can find me on Instagram at Holistic Therapist.

You can find me on threads at the same name, holistic therapist. Um, I, if, if anyone has any questions, you know, you could comment on the posts, ask questions, um, you know, we can even maybe in the future talk about it, uh, if there are questions people have, um mm-hmm. On your podcasts that mm-hmm. That write in.

Um, but I just love having, continuing the discourse, so mm-hmm. If there's anything that comes up or there's a post that's made. Either, uh, me or Mandy and, and, and, you know, there's a question that comes up with that. I, I'd love to discuss it further. Cool. Thank you. Thanks for being here with us. Um, you are so busy.

You just got your doctorate, you know, not like you're doing anything there in the background, so. Yes, yes. And I'm so excited, like, uh, to have that behind me and. It's just, yeah, looking forward to what comes next. And I love these opportunities to come in and have discourse around healing from trauma and, and uh, and just like the ways that we all.

Go about this and mm-hmm. I think there's more empowerment when we're in community talking about it. Yeah. And we're sharing our individual experiences because that's where the power comes from, right? Mm-hmm. And that's where the healing comes from. So I'm all about this, all about this. I know you are quite the expert on it.

And your website is, uh, is it kean.org? kian.org. Okay. And, um, I do have, uh, uh, several, uh, practitioners that are working with me and are, are working. They're using the same approach that I take with clients, uh mm-hmm. And so if there's anyone interested in, um, you know, starting, uh, coaching with us. Um, I have wonderful practitioners mm-hmm.

Uh, with different skill sets mm-hmm. That we all are trained in the same way I've, I've trained them in this approach. Mm-hmm. Uh, that does have, uh, a lot of, um, what we've talked about. Mm-hmm. And, um, they are open for clients. So, uh, we, we do have openings, um, for the practitioners and you can go on my website@kian.org and I believe there's a contact us and you can mm-hmm.

Can reach out to us there. That's KEEA n.org. Yeah. Yes. Yes. Cool. Awesome. Well, thank you so much for being here with us. We appreciate your time and your expertise. Thank you so much for having me.

 Thanks for being here on the Aware and Prepared Podcast. Don't forget to hit, follow that little plus sign in your app in the top right, ensures you never miss an episode. Curious how tuned in your intuition really is. Take the free quiz at aware and prepared. Life and get your score. See how sharp your inner guide is.

Remember, you are worthy of a safe and peaceful life. Talk to you next week.