Regulated ≠ Comfortable

A Nervous System-Forward Approach to Facilitation (Part 2 of 3)

Written By Teddy McGlynn-Wright and Kirsten Harris-Talley of  In The Works, Edited by Sylvia G. Hadnot of Has Everything & Co.

In group facilitation, we often say that we “bring ease” to the process. Deriving from the Latin root facilis "easy to do, we shouldn’t be surprised when there’s an unspoken expectation that things should stay smooth and easy when we bring folks together; it’s right there in the name! We work to keep it calm. Unruffled. But here’s the reality: ease doesn't always mean comfortable, and regulation is not the same as stasis or sameness. And, authentic and intense emotions doesn’t automatically mean something is wrong or unregulated. 

The nervous system is built to detect and respond to threat, but it’s also built to stretch, to widen, to transform our response to the energy and circumstances we find ourselves in. Facilitators who equate regulation with stillness or being easy (instead of easeful) may miss the magic (and necessity) of emotional movement, especially in spaces where deep truth, healing, or liberation is on the table. 

When you roll with the group’s needs and growth - ease ain’t always easy!

This post builds on A Nervous System-Forward Approach-Part 1, where we explored how group dynamics are shaped by nervous system states, whether or not we name them. Now, we’re diving into a key nuance: how to recognize the difference between actual dysregulation and necessary discomfort—and how to support both.

What Dysregulation Actually Is

Let’s get specific. Dysregulation is not just “having big feelings.” It’s what happens when the body moves outside of its window of capacity (or window of tolerance). That is, when a person (or group) becomes so overwhelmed that connection and choice are no longer available.

Think:

• A group freezes and goes silent after a charged comment.

• Someone lashes out or interrupts repeatedly, unable to hear others.

• One participant has a “couldn’t care less” attitude, and a subtle wave of checked-out and confused energy spreads through the room.

These are cues that something might be flooding (overwhelming) the collective nervous system.

But contrast that with:

• A tearful reflection after a powerful prompt.

• Raised voices in a passionate, values-driven conversation.

• A generative silence as a group metabolizes something real and processes before deciding what do to next.

These aren’t necessarily signs of dysregulation,or dis-ease. They just might be signs of connectedness. As facilitators we need to understand that the motivation and potential of where a group can take action has be to considered in how we respond and guide the group through big ahas and oops moments. These times when the energy shifts are when the group and the collective nervous system needs us most.

Read the Room; Adjust Accordingly

As facilitators, we have to become fluent in what regulation looks and feels like—not just in ourselves, but across a group body. We have to assess how both are informing what is happening and what is possible as a next step. In the words of Amanda Litman, be the thermostat, not the thermometer.

This includes:

• Tracking nonverbal cues (breath, posture, tone, physical postures)

• Understanding and disrupting patterns that are not serving the group in acceptance and knowing how to move forward (e.g. does this group avoid conflict? Gently turn them toward it. Do they over-intellectualize emotion? Give them the language of sensation and emotional expression 

• Noticing our own reactivity and how it is helping / hindering us as facilitators bringing ease to a moment of growth (are we tensing up because of discomfort or a true signal of danger? how do we plan accordingly once we know which is happening?)

This is particularly important when facilitating multiracial and cross-cultural groups. Emotional expression has been disproportionately pathologized for Black, Brown, and Indigenous folks, especially when that expression challenges dominant norms around “politeness” or “professionalism.” Norms that have been defined by oppression and assimilation from othering. The resulting emotional repression robs a group of crucial energy, clarity, and ability to take actions to move through a challenge or toward a goal. As facilitators, our role is to make sure the group can move with care, even when the experience is uncomfortable and outcomes uncertain.

Let’s be clear: Intensity does not mean something is wrong. Facilitators that can hold the flow of the group from calm to intense and back again helps the group stay within the threshold of growth and maintain a baseline integration, not disintegration. Regulation includes a spectrum of emotions, feelings, and differences simultaneously.--it’s about being present and expressive without doing harm to the group members or collective process. Intensity can actually serve the group in those goals.

Plan for Rupture. Practice Repair. Revisit again and again.

Even with the best intentions, rupture happens.

Voices crack. Understanding fractures. Relationships falter.

That’s not failure—it’s the work, which is always in the works. Because we change in a back-and-forth, rupture and repair is to be expected. Somatic (felt) change—the real kind—requires moments of contraction and expansion. Pause and action. Push and pull.

Instead of fearing rupture, we expect it. We prepare recipes of reintegration and strategies for care into our facilitation plans from the start. The recipe includes understanding the sensations that rupture and repair tell our bodies, naming easy and hard things, coming together to create solutions that can help and hold all the folks in the group - not just those who want things to stay the same. Without rupture there is often not catalyst to change things. Without repair, a group doesn’t get practice at integrating differences and relationships into new and exciting ways of being. The role that rupture and repair have in helping individuals and groups practice change are immeasurable and essential. 

The core need of regulation is for connection - and the more disconnected the group is, the more intensity that will surface to bridge to connecting again.

This means:

• Naming ahead of time that moments of tension will arise, reminding folks that discomfort does not always mean danger.

• Building co-facilitation agreements for when one facilitator needs to step out or ground

• Building a mixture large group, small group, and solo activities when intensity shows us what needs extra time and intention to get to repair

• Deciding how we will come back into alignment after the group agreements are inevitably broken. 

Start Today / Build Over Time

Start Today:

• Practice noticing when there is too much, too little, and just the right amount of intensity. 

• When group tension arises, pause and reflect: is this discomfort productive?

• Normalize post-tension check-ins as part of your session rhythm

Build Over Time:

• Embed support for emotional expression (rituals, journaling, creative outlets)

• Train your team in trauma-informed principles

• Develop co-facilitation protocols for mid-session course corrections

Are You Nervous?

The Nervous System Is in the Room: Facilitation That Moves With the Body

Written By Kirsten Harris-Talley and Teddy McGlynn-Wright of In The Works, Edited by Sylvia G. Hadnot of Has Everything & Co.

As facilitators, we’re taught to track energy, emotions, and body language. But, what if we zoomed out and recognized that underneath it all, we are tracking nervous system states?

Our nervous systems are our body’s first responder. Their job is not to think critically or assess nuance—it’s to scan for threat and keep us alive. That means it’s constantly assessing the room, the tone of voice, the seating chart, the stories being told, the people who speak first and loudest. It’s taking notes. Whether we are consciously aware of it or not.

In facilitation, we cannot afford to ignore this. The nervous system is not just present—it is active, intelligent, and shaping the experience for every participant. As individuals and the group as a whole.

Nervous Systems Are Predictable, Yet (Un)Logical 

Our nervous systems don’t wait for cognitive clarity to give us needed information. Our bodies are finely attuned antennas - perceiving, processing, and responding in real-time. No thinking necessary, because it moves faster than thought.  We predict based on past experience and present cues. That’s why we can feel triggered in a space that seems “objectively” calm—because their body has detected a familiar pattern of harm. We don’t decide to feel unsafe. 

As facilitators, it is essential we have to understand the nervous system and intersections at three levels simultaneously - our own systems as facilitators, the experience of individuals in the group, and the experience of the group as a whole as the energy is shared. Our body tells us and we have a choice as to what is next from the experience our nervous system communicates. Our feelings and emotions are present and show up whether we’re ready for them or not. We can either ignore them and lose access to key data or group dynamics… or we can move with them and unlock deeper possibilities and connection.

Ease Is Not the Same As Comfort, Comfort is Not the same as Safety

To “facilitate” means to make easier—but not necessarily to make easy. Nervous system-forward  facilitation is about creating the conditions for people to stay present with discomfort, while staying safe in the process. Learning happens when we are introduced to new things that open up possibilities. And that newness can be uncomfortable. But safety can be present, even when we are uncomfortable. So the balance of that is necessary for a nervous system-forward space building. That might look like naming tension in the room, pausing a planned activity to check in, or shifting physical space to reduce unspoken threat (yes, even the artwork in a room can matter).

In this approach, ease means creating enough nervous-system-regulation in the space that people can feel, think, and relate to each other—even when the material is activating, as change so often is.  Remember, nervous systems prefer predictability to novelty, so change itself is an activating nervous system experience. New strategies create new sensations (feelings), emotions, and neural pathways, and change is rarely, if ever linear.::

“We change in a back and forth—doing the new thing, then the old thing again, then the new thing more—until a new habit forms.”

— Kirsten, In The Works

Our nervous systems interpret change through sensation before we ever assign a story to it. The conditions and contexts that we grow up within shape our experiences, which shape what our nervous systems come to expect. The sensations that come with change — rising heartbeat, butterflies in the stomach, hollowness, — need space, validation, and interpretation not pressure to resolve quickly. When we allow groups to move at “the speed of trust,” we’re not just haphazardly slowing things down—we’re building sustainable, accessible, and lasting change together.

Foundations of Nervous System-Forward Space Design

1. Safety – This space is not a threat to folks’ being or identity.

2. Agency – Participants have choice and voice.

3. Dignity – Those in attendance will be respected in their full humanity.

4. Belonging – We are not alone here. We are recognized.

When all of these are present together, it creates a space that allows people to take risks, make mistakes, and share ideas without fear of rejection or punishment. It’s not just an emotional state—it’s a nervous system cue that says: you can show up fully and belong here. Check out our previous post titled Wholeness & Wellness for a refresh on safety, agency, dignity and belonging. 

Designing for these doesn’t require fancy tools, handouts, or materials. It requires attention and intention. As well as a willingness to change our facilitation approach is the group needs something new to come back to safety. Consider how names are used, how conflict is handled, how decision-making is built into the room. These are all cues to the nervous system. And when the nervous system feels held, the people in the room can show up more fully.

Co-Regulation is Essential for Co-Leadership

Co-leadership shows up in co-facilitation and requires connection and reflection between the facilitators. That vulnerability helps us build the give and take we will need to respond to the nervous system of the groups when one or more facilitators find ourselves dysregulated.  Facilitation isn’t just about task-sharing, it is also about supporting our whole selves and the emotions we feel as we hold the group. Our nervous systems support us as we support the group - and we have to tend to ourselves as well.  It’s about shared regulation, shared presence, and the ability to respond to what’s unfolding in the room—together.

When facilitators are attuned to nervous system dynamics, they can adapt with more wisdom, more ease, and more care. And in turn, they create spaces where groups can adapt, too. And they as facilitators can meet the group whole, centered, and clear.

In a world that often demands speed, performance, and certainty, this kind of practice is radical. It says: We are human. Our bodies are here. And they know something important about what’s needed. 

Inspiration for Implementation: Nervous System Awareness in Your Facilitation Practice

✅ Start Today

• Scan the Room with the Nervous System in Mind
  Before your next session or meeting, take a few quiet minutes to notice the environment. What might feel safe or unsafe to someone walking in for the first time? What visual, auditory, or spatial cues could you shift? How can you create a space / place for rest when folks need to recenter?

• Ask Yourself: “What are the conditions for ease?”
  Before introducing content or pushing for productivity, check: does this group have enough safety, agency, dignity, and belonging to show up fully right now? What do they need to get there?

• Normalize Pause
  Pauses invite presence: Even building in a 10 second pause between speakers can give nervous systems time to digest what’s been offered. 

🌀 Build Over Time

• Integrate Embodied Language into Your Group Agreements
  Invite participants to co-create how they’d like to feel and act while together. Then they can create practices for how to handle dysregulation when it arrives.

• Track Your Group’s Somatic Patterns
  Begin noticing group-level cues: body posture, voice tone, collective energy shifts, engagement /non-engagement. These are clues to how the group’s nervous system is responding.

Practice What You Preach
Develop your own daily or weekly rituals. What helps you recognize when you are dysregulated and return to center? Remember: you can’t co-regulate a room if you’re disconnected from yourself.

Belonging: The Foundation for Meaningful Change

It is an understatement to say that there’s a lot going on in the world right now. It seems that not a day goes by without a parade of “ordinary horribles” coming into our awareness. Many of us are experiencing direct threats to our dignity or safety, while others are having their agency indirectly compromised/assaulted. All of these experiences, whether firsthand or witnessed, are dysregulating for our nervous systems. The times we’re living in call for connection, creativity, and collaboration—all of which are built by belonging.

On January 21st, we celebrated Martin Luther King Jr., a leader who presciently posed the question, "where do we go from here, Chaos or Community?" Laying out a clear choice for us as a country and a species. There are a few loud folks who are pushing hard for chaos, increasing the need for the majority of us to choose community. This work, our work is possible because of a shared sense of belonging—a knowing that each person has a place, a role, and a voice in the movement.

What Does Belonging Really Mean?

Belonging means more than fitting in. It’s knowing that your place is reserved for you, that your unique voice matters in decision-making, and that your contributions are both valued and impactful. Cultures and Politics of Belonging are the antidote to disposability politics. Like in an orchestra, any individual floutist, oboist, violinist, etc who doesn’t contribute impacts the whole. Belonging fuels connection, which is the foundation of our movements, organizations, and relationships. Belonging is necessary to foster trust, collaboration, and accountability. All of which we need now as we all move through this moment of change.

At In The Works, we’ve built our approach to facilitation around this principle. That’s why we call our contribution Belonging-Based Facilitation ™ —a methodology grounded in our principles of being Black-Liberative, anti-racist, and trauma-informed. This concept of belonging has been beautifully articulated by the brilliant john a. powell of the Othering and Belonging Institute and contains three core elements:

1. An individual’s felt sense of belonging—ensuring people feel seen, heard, and valued.

2. A relational imperative—inviting individuals and groups to move toward one another and others’ experiences, especially when it’s uncomfortable.

3. An institutional commitment — organizations responding meaningfully to the claims, needs, and challenges of their members/employees..

The urgent and complex challenges we face today demand bold, creative solutions. These solutions cannot be designed in isolation. They require the collective creativity and capacity that can only emerge within groups. And groups require belonging to work well.

Belonging in Practice

Every organization has the potential for transformative change. Often, what’s needed is a facilitator to help uncover hidden strengths and new ways of working. Through interaction, connection, and embodiment, we help “stuck” teams rediscover flow and collaboration. We focus on skills like improving communication, clarifying processes, and cultivating resilience for leaders and teams.

Here are some steps you can take to build belonging in your organization:

• Create intentional spaces for honest dialogue and active listening.

• Develop shared rituals that reinforce connection and purpose.

• Invest in conflict resolution practices that prioritize repair and trust.

• Center accountability in your processes and decision-making.

• Celebrate contributions, milestones, and shared successes.

Ready to Build Belonging?

Co-leadership, co-regulation, co-growing, co-building are more important than ever to sustain ourselves through what promises to be an incredibly challenging season in the USA and across the globe. This moment requires us to be present, resilient, and sustainable. We’re at a point in time in which  we need ourselves and each other more than ever AND many people are burning out. We want people to be able to lead sustainably, so that they will still be here in 4(0) years. The time we are in is built to overwhelm us wholly - our individual bodies, our communities, and our work for justice and social change. But we know, when we build belonging and connection, these moments are time for reflection and building resilience for new ways of being. 

For leaders ready to dive deeper into belonging-based practices, we invite you to consider Co-LED Camp, a week-long residential retreat at Westerbeke Ranch in Sonoma, CA. This retreat is designed for co-leaders and catalysts for social change across sectors, including non-profits, government, arts collectives, education, and philanthropy. We chose to do this retreat in person, specifically, because there is something special that happens when we physically take up space together - we are able to embody leadership in new ways when we experience this kind of growth together somatically.   

At Co-LED Camp ™ , we center our core principles of being Black-liberative, trauma-informed, and anti-racist. The facilitation team will guide participants through embodied practices, reflective exercises, dialogue, and play. You’ll leave with strengthened skills, deeper self-awareness, and actionable tools for leadership.

We’ll explore topics like:

• Your Personal “Why” for Co-Leadership

• Groups, Choice & Deciding Together

• Connection & Conflict Resolution

• Change, Transitions & Good Goodbyes

• So What, Now What? From Learning to Action

This immersive experience is designed to transform how you lead and collaborate, equipping you to address the challenges and opportunities unique to your context.

How Will You Build Belonging?

Whether you’re leading a team, building community, or navigating change, the work of belonging is foundational to meaningful lasting change. Let’s explore how we can create spaces where everyone feels seen, valued, and empowered to contribute. Part of building and holding belonging is having wholeness. Our Wholeness Model ™ centers wellness and includes our need for safety. 

We define safety as “The sense of being physically, psychologically and emotionally secure. What makes us able to take risks.” 

Take some time for reflection and an embodied safety practice (estimate 10 - 15MIN):

• Sit somewhere you feel safe and secure - it may be your bedroom, outside by a tree, in your kitchen with a mug of your favorite tea

• Sit and feel your body and the sensations you note - where is there ease? Where is there tightness? Is your heart beating quickly? Slowly? Is your breath deep? Shallow? Be present in the messages your body is giving you

• Slowly breathe in and out, taking particular time to bring ease and relaxation to the parts of your body that need attention

• Sit with the following question as you continue to breathe “Where are the places and who are the people with whom I feel safe right now?” “What risks can we take together, where we know that risk will bring us reward and clarity?

• Be present with the thoughts, emotions, and feelings in your body as the answers come to you

We’ll see you online and, hopefully, in person at Co-LED Camp. Together, we can build the belonging-based future we all need.

Warm Welcomes Build Belonging

This is the time of year where many of us gather with family and friends. We find ourselves in groups in different forms and in diverse stages. Many of us are moving through the stages of groups at speeds that can feel jarring and overwhelming. When groups change rapidly, we even sometimes go through the stages concurrently - and yet each stage still deserves some intention. To review the stages of groups, check out our posts from October and November!

This month, we’re honing in on the anatomy of a warm welcome: invitation, recognition, and preparation. 

Invitation

Any of us who have seen a movie about secret societies (or a wizarding school that shall not be named) have seen what it looks like when someone receives an invitation. The gold filigree, the careful scripting, scented paper, even the delivery-how it arrives and who delivers it-is part of the invitation. In reality, not every invitation will - or needs to be - hand penned and elaborate, yet all good invitations are intentionally crafted. 

Who are you inviting specifically? Why are you inviting them? What qualities do they possess that you are recognizing? How will you make sure they know they are important and welcome?

Recognition 

How do you recognize the quality in those who are being invited? In professional settings it can be easy to lose this; in the formality of a job offer, for example. But this is precisely the time to offer a warm welcome. Teddy was once hired onto a job in a different part of the country that he had no prior relationship with, he asked those who made the final decision what set him apart. Their answer was instructive: you were the one who most talked about community. The clarity of that invitation both affirmed a quality that he had and communicated a hope of what he would bring to the team. We also had a tequila toast and indoor second line at the end of our first training institute - New Orleans really does know how to welcome a body!

J. Ruth Gendler’s The Book of Qualities offers playful wisdom for recognizing qualities in. I recommend it to all my facilitation trainees, as it was recommended to me by a trainer. Part of the loveliness of the book is that it personifies a variety of characteristics as characters: ”Beauty doesn’t anger easily, but she was annoyed with the journalist who kept asking her about her favorites–as if she could have one favorite color or one favorite flower.” (Gendler, page #) It is my favorite combination of  whimsy and rigor.  Expanding our vocabulary of qualities, enables us to craft that intentional moment of recognition that so characterizes a a warm welcome. 

Preparation

So we’ve invited, we’ve recognized, and now we prepare the space for our folks. Preparing the space is how we do our best to make sure what is built will meet their needs and encourage their growth. It’s when we ask ourselves, “Based on what we know about 1) the possibilities and limitations of the space we are creating and 2) the folks we are inviting into it, what do we need to do to make it as welcoming as possible?” 

For example, at a recent retreat for a transformative justice collective, we made preparation with intention:

• Crafted an upbeat playlist with some crowd favorites to play for the first 30 minutes of the gathering (when people would arrive).

• Always had someone at or near the door to welcome folks in with as much or as little contact as they would like. (We considered a soul-train danceline, but not all the introverts want that kind of fanfare when they arrive).

• We kept scents to a minimum in the main room. 

• Once everyone was seated (in Circle) we thanked everyone for coming, shared a bit about our purpose in coming together for the day and offered a grounding meditation that brought us all into the room and into relationship with each other. 

Warm Welcomes Build Belonging

One of the stories I often share about what it is to feel belonging is also a story about a warm welcome. I was running late for a Buddhist retreat with my Sangha and as I stood at the door contemplating whether to attend at all because I didn’t want to be “that guy” I walked into the meditation hall and as I moved up the stairs, folks were singing, snacks were out, I was unobtrusively directed where to put my coat and without breaking song/stride I was shown to my cushion with the song sheet in front of it. Settling into my seat I joined the song. Not every warm welcome is about changing up everything, it isn’t about a record scratch and turning of attention, sometimes it is the subtle invitation of your seat having been prepared and the recognition that you deserve attention and care. 

How will you build belonging with warm welcomes this season?

Anatomy of a Welcome

Belonging Based Facilitation leads with its values, one of which is anti-racism. As such, one of our core commitments is to not be ahistorical. This value shows up in our practice when we are warming up a group - we help usher them into and ultimately through the Warm Welcome Stage by letting them know what preceded their iteration of a group. As Priya Parker discusses in her book on The Art of Gathering when we come together in the warming stage, we can quickly share who we are and what brings us all together. 

As facilitators, we often introduce ourselves to a new group by describing how we came to be part of that group or how long we have worked with a subset of the group to prepare for our time together. When doing circle-work (e.g. transformative justice, community accountability, or other sacred circle work) we often begin with a grounding and/or check-in. Grounding or checking in allows the group to arrive, to become present with the moment. This act of becoming present is important for all groups embarking on a particular project or task together, and it can be easy for groups that have been together a long time to  overlook the warming stage,  It’s important to remember that every time someone joins or leaves a group or whenever a group comes together to engage in something new, it’s time to warmly welcome folks into the group, answering the questions: who are we now? and why are we now together?

You’re The New Sheila vs. Individuated Invitation

As Belonging-Based facilitators, we want to let people know that they belong from the moment that they arrive. So often our warm welcomes are about how we set the space ahead of time: materials are shared a week before, anything we need that day is printed out, name tags are available with a variety of colors, nourishment is on hand, there is relatively comfortable seating for everyone and when we finally get around to doing introductions, we invite folks to share their names, pronouns, access needs, and something that they need from the group to feel belonging [we actually tend to ask this ahead of time]. 

When folks are new to groups, they often practice in this way. But as we are with organizations longer, we can begin to skip over this step. How many of us have been on a job where someone leaves and when the new hire for that position comes on, we say “oh, you’re the new Sheila!” and proceed to introduce Kenya as “the new Sheila.”? This can be even more complicated when race, gender, and other identities are involved, but it is also a lie. This person is not the new Sheila, they are their own person with unique talents, gifts, and experience. They may be coming in to join the team and perform a specific function, but they will do it a different way and if we hold them to the same expectations of Sheila, we will miss their new and unique contribution. We are signaling that they don’t belong, but that SHeila does. Or that they can belong conditionally to the extent that they are a carbon copy of Sheila. “Sheila always used to bring the donuts to our meetings,” Sheila was never late with her reports, Sheila always knew how to reset the servers, the list goes on. We say “any time a group changes composition it’s a new group,” so that the group can adjust to and incorporate this new being into belonging to the organization. At the Othering and Belonging institute, there is this lovely image that describes it in the context of exclusion and inclusion.

From the Othering and Belonging Institute at UC Berkely.

So how do you do it?

Invitation, recognition, and connection.