We treat “relaxing” like a task on a to-do list. We think if we just sit on the couch and turn on Netflix, we are relaxing. But for many of us, the body refuses to cooperate. Your heart races, your jaw clenches, and you feel a buzzing anxiety under your skin. You are physically still, but internally, you are running a marathon.
This inability to rest isn’t a personality quirk; it is a biological state known as “survival mode.” When you live with chronic stress—financial worry, a toxic job, or relationship instability—your nervous system gets stuck in the “on” position. It forgets how to switch off. Living in this state for too long is dangerous for your mind and your body. Here is why you can’t relax and what it is doing to you.
The Cortisol Feedback Loop
In survival mode, your body is flooded with cortisol and adrenaline. These hormones are designed to help you outrun a tiger, not navigate modern life. When the threat never goes away, your baseline stress level shifts upward. You become chemically addicted to the rush.
When you try to relax, your cortisol levels drop, and your body goes into withdrawal. This feels uncomfortable, boring, or even unsafe. Your brain interprets the quiet as a threat (“It’s too quiet, something is about to happen”). Consequently, you subconsciously create chaos or busy work just to get your hormone levels back up to where they feel “normal.”
Hypervigilance: The Scanner is Always On
Survival mode creates hypervigilance. You are constantly scanning your environment for threats. This might look like being unable to sit with your back to a door, jumping at loud noises, or constantly checking your bank account. Your brain is dedicating a massive amount of energy to threat detection.
Relaxation requires a feeling of safety. If your brain doesn’t feel safe, it will not allow you to let your guard down. You can’t “Om” your way out of this; you have to signal safety to your nervous system. This is why you feel exhausted but can’t sleep—your brain is on sentry duty.
The Digestive Shutdown
Your nervous system has two main modes: “fight or flight” and “rest and digest.” They cannot operate simultaneously. When you are in survival mode, your body shuts down non-essential functions like digestion to divert energy to your muscles.
This leads to chronic issues like bloating, IBS, and nutrient malabsorption. You might be eating healthy food, but your body is too stressed to process it effectively. If you have stomach issues that doctors can’t explain, it is often a symptom of a nervous system that has been stuck in overdrive for years.
Emotional Numbness and Anhedonia
To survive chronic pain or stress, the brain eventually starts to numb out. This is a protective mechanism. However, you cannot selectively numb emotions. When you numb the fear and the pain, you also numb the joy and the excitement.
This leads to anhedonia—the inability to feel pleasure. You might look at a beautiful sunset or your playing children and feel… nothing. You are operating behind a glass wall. This isn’t just depression; it is exhaustion. Your emotional receptors have burned out from the high voltage of survival mode.
The Crash is Inevitable
You can run on adrenaline for months or even years, but not forever. Eventually, the adrenal glands fatigue, and the crash comes. This usually manifests as a major autoimmune flare-up, a mental breakdown, or severe burnout where you physically cannot get out of bed.
Your body will force you to rest if you do not choose to do so. The goal is to catch it before the crash. You have to teach your body that safety is possible again.
Signaling Safety
Healing from survival mode doesn’t happen overnight. It happens in “glimmers”—tiny moments of safety. It might be wrapping yourself in a weighted blanket, taking a slow walk in nature, or humming a low tune. These somatic actions tell the vagus nerve that the tiger is gone.
You have to manually switch your system from “survive” to “thrive.” It takes practice, but reclaiming your ability to rest is the most important work you will ever do for your health.
Do you feel guilty or anxious the moment you sit down? Let us know how you handle the urge to keep moving in the comments.
What to Read Next…
- 6 Behaviors That Make You Look Guilty—Even If You’re Innocent
- What Parents Say That Accidentally Makes Their Kids Feel Guilty
- 6 Nervous System Resets That Stop Anxiety in Less Than 3 Minutes
- Are You Underestimating The Cost Of Staying In A Stressful Relationship?
- How Did We Survive? 7 Dangerous Things Everyone Did in the 80s & 90s
The post Why You Can’t Relax: The Danger of Being in “Survival Mode” for Too Long appeared first on Budget and the Bees.
