← Dr. Trish Leigh Podcast
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Let me ask you a question. When you're with other people, are you really with them? Or do you find that you're managing yourself the whole time? Maybe you're smiling, maybe you're feigning listening. Maybe you're holding it together, or maybe you're not. Connection might look fine, but on the inside you feel restless. This is one of the most common experiences of modern life and almost nobody knows how to name it. We assume it's personality. We've talked lately about it being introverts or introversion, social anxiety, burnout, or just living in the times that we live in. But what's actually happening is much deeper than people realize. Yes, this is a cultural phenomena, but it's also a neurological one. It's quietly reshaping people's sense of self. It's quietly reshaping your sense of self. This episode is brought to you by my Harper Collins published book, Mind Over Explicit Matter. Learn how artificial stimulation miswires your brain and what you can do to rewire it back to purpose, intimacy and connection. Go to drtrishleigh.com book there's a system in the brain called the relational self network, or rsn. It's the network that constructs your identity in relation to other people. It's how your brain knows who you are through connection, through being seen by others in the real world, through shared meaning, meaning making through emotional attunement. The RSN is literally how the nervous system builds the feeling of me. And here's the problem in today's day and age, culturally modern life gives us proximity to other people without resonance. We're surrounded by people, faces, messages, content, opinions, but very little attunement, very little mirroring, very little emotional safety. So you can guess what happens. The RSN activates constantly, but rarely becomes satisfied. I'm Dr. Trish Leigh. Welcome back to another episode of the podcast with me, your hostess, the Mostess, where today we are going to break down how your relational brain is being impacted by going back to the screen, especially to high dopamine producing content and what it's doing to your real life relationships. Let's dive in, get a cup of coffee because this is a good one. Okay, so your relational brain is online all the time, but in a simulated way. It's never completing its true authentic function. Instead of connection in the real world reinforcing your true identity, connection begins to erode it. And the relational self network. It isn't just about your relationships. It's about your identity formation. It's how your brain answers Questions like this, who am I? Where do I belong in this world? Am I safe to exist as myself? In older cultures, identity was shaped through tribe, family, community, religious, physical presence. I talk about it here all the time. As one of six children growing up in a small home, my identity was formulated to become intellectual, to shape the way I was seen in my family. That's how I became known, it was reflected to me. That's how I got seen. And whether it's healthy or not, we had more experience with other people to help us create our true identity, help us create more self awareness so we can continue to grow. This is how we're known. It's reflected back to us through our family and our community. Your nervous system back in the day had constant feedback from others. In real life you exist, you matter, you're seen. Now identity is being constructed not externally, in the world through relationships, internally through screens, imagination, fantasy comparison, FOMO content, metrics through likes and views and symbolic connection instead of true real world embodied connection with friends, with family. So the RSN shifts from authentic relational identity to to check this out to internal identity simulation. Hear that again. Simulation. People still feel like they need connection, but their nervous system no longer expects it to be safe or satisfying in the real world. So the brain adapts. It starts sourcing meaning internally instead of relationally. This is where you as an individual might feel the rise of emotional numbness, of social exhaustion, of digital attachment, of fantasy based stimulation. You probably feel it as motivation collapse and intimacy shutdown. You might even feel it as sad sexual arousal dysfunction, namely ed. This doesn't happen because people don't want connection. And it happens because the RSN has learned that connection in the real world is effortful, unpredictable and rarely nourishing. So it down regulates loneliness, stops being a state and it becomes an identity. I am alone, even with people. This is the identity fragment. Now we know this is happening culturally, not just to individuals. Napoleon Hill wrote so long ago in Think and Grow Rich, the mind attracts the things it dwells upon. But what happens when the mind dwells primarily on internal stimulation instead of shared reality? What happens when the brain is trained to source meaning from fantasy scrolling imagination simulation. Instead of being mirrored by other nervous systems, and instead of having to show up, the culture becomes psychologically introverted, not shy, not quiet, internally absorbed. Mel Robbins says it like this. You are one decision away from a completely different life. I love that. But what if your nervous system can't tolerate the emotional friction of real life anymore? What if the issue isn't decision what if it is in fact regulation or inability to regulate? Modern culture trains people to live inside their heads, inside imagined futures, inside digital selves, inside idealized identities, not true ones. The RSN becomes active without being grounded in real world co regulation. So people start experiencing desire without direction, ambition without the energy to accomplish it, intimacy without arousal, function, connection without presence, identity without coherence. We've built a world where the nervous system is constantly stimulated, but rarely settled. So the true capital S self that you could or should be becomes fragmented. Not broken, but fragmented, not whole, not fully developed. This shows up very clearly in men, especially around motivation, desire and intimacy. Men describe it like this. I don't feel excited anymore. I care, I really do, but I'm not emotionally there. I want connection, but my body doesn't respond. I feel numb, detached, unmotivated. This isn't about character and it's not about discipline. It's not even about relationships. It is about the relational self network in the brain being active in a nervous system that has been trained for internal reward instead of relational safety and enjoyment. When stimulation becomes internal fantasy, digital novelty, imagination, the relational brain learns that real people require more regulation, more effort than simulated experiences. So real connection starts to feel like a lot of work. Not because people aren't lovable, but because the nervous system isn't settled enough to receive them. And this shows up just as powerfully in women, especially after relational rupture, after betrayal. Women often describe feeling confused. They feel disoriented and hyper vigilant, always on red alert. They feel disconnected, not only from their partners, but from themselves. They don't just feel emotionally hurt, but they feel like their sense of reality has completely collapsed. That's RSN disruption. The relational brain loses coherence. So the nervous system starts scanning for stability, for truth, for. For grounding, for what is possibly real. You may have felt this relationship dynamic play out. When one nervous system is scanning and the other one is withdrawing. You get the classic modern relationship pattern. One partner pursuing reality, the other escaping it. Two nervous systems, two different survival strategies. One shared collapse of coherence. And the RSN is at the core. Okay, but I want to reframe this for you, of course. Because this, my friend, changes everything. You don't need more insight. You don't need better communication, even though it will come when your brain is regulated. You don't need more discipline, but you get that too. What you need is nervous system regulation. You need more brain control. The rewire happens when the nervous system learns to experience connection as safe again. Not super duper exciting, not dramatic, but safe. When the RSN stops downregulating and the posterior cingulate cortex shifts from rumination to coherence, that's when the magic starts to happen. When your frontal brain networks stabilize, when the brain updates its core model, you know what happens then? People equal safety and joy again. And presence equals returns. You get to experience your life again, not just watch it unfold. Then of course, your desire for worldly experiences returns. Your motivation returns. Intimacy can return. Healthy sexuality and arousal function. Now, for me, this is the best part. Your identity stabilizes. It's not up and down, back and forth. It doesn't go between fear and fabulousness. Instead, you become formidable not through effort, but through regulation. Let me give you a simple brain hack for this. This is what I call remove, reduce, retrain. It's imperative to remove constant internal stimulation. So just become aware of it at first, then start removing some of it. Reduce digital reward. Retrain your nervous system through real world CO regulation. So it looks like this. Step out of the screen, go into the real world embodiment. Get in your body. Don't just get into imagination. Be present. Don't worry about performance. And if you want to see what your nervous system is actually doing, spend time with me. That's where brain mapping becomes so powerful. You can literally see your rsn dysregulation. You can see the hypervigilance and the withdrawal. You can see if your brain is operating from a state of coherence or not. They're not a diagnosis, these brain patterns, but they are in fact patterns that can be retrained. So if it resonates, please go over to Dr. Trishleigh.com and book a brain mapping session with me. Because that brain hack can work for many people. But if it doesn't work for you, you might be stuck. And this isn't about fixing anything. It's about understanding how your nervous system learned to survive. And in this modern culture of complete overstimulation. And then of course, it's about retraining it back into healthy connection. Living in today's day and age didn't make you broken. So many people feel broken. It made you internally stimulated in a world that requires relational safety for real world joy, happiness and connection. And the future of your brain and mental health isn't more insight. It's building up your nervous system from the inside out so it has more capacity for presence. Identity isn't something you think your way into. It's something that comes as your nervous system and brain heal, Then you can feel your way into it in the presence and the mirroring and the connection of real people in the real world. That's the real rewire that I want to happen for you. That's what I call the supernormal shift. From supernormal stimuli to supernormal living doesn't mean being superhuman, but it means being fully alive. All right. Until next time, control your brain, or it'll control you. I'll see you then.