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If triggers are the cues that send our body into stress and survival mode, glimmers are the antidote. Glimmers are our invitations back home into a state of calm, safe social belonging. Glimmers are moments that remind us to return to pleasure, rest, calm and connection – no matter how big the storm around us. Glimmers are cues of safety, and thus as different for each of us as trauma triggers are to survivors.
To explore your Glimmers, think about where you have felt most safe, held and connected in your life. What does it feel like to feel safe? What are the sensations, emotions and embodied experiences you associate with safe social connection?
In this episode, we explore Glimmers – a term coined by Passionate Polyvagalist Deb Dana – and invite you to explore your own Glimmers as opportunities to shift back into the realm of pleasure, relaxation and joy.
We also push the idea of Glimmers into new territory by proposing Sparks – bigger embers of erotic wanting that, when captured and savored, can pivot our embodied experience in a quicker blaze! Sparks are erotic ideas, thoughts, memories, sensations and yearnings that when given space to burn move your entire being into the sensations of not only safety but wanting. Not only belonging but also craving.
Glimmers are the twinkles on the horizon that remind us who we are, where we belong and what our bodies love – it is up to us to move towards them and actively practice returning to the state of calm, relaxed awareness. This is the physical state where more pleasure, joy and connection are possible, and where our erotic beings can thrive.
More Speaking Of Sex Podcast Episodes To Explore
- Managing Trauma Triggers : Interview with Jamila Dawson and August McLaughlin
- Before Pleasure Comes Safety
- Feeling Myself – Discovering Erotic Interoception
- Savoring: A Foundational Pleasure Practice
- Burnout: The Stress and Sex Connection – An Interview With Emily Nagoski
- Too Stressed Out For Sex? Here’s How To Complete The Stress Cycle
More Resources On Polyvagal Theory, Glimmers, Triggers and More!
- A Quick Guide to Ventral Vagal Anchors An excerpt from Polyvagal Exercises for Safety and Connection, by Deb Dana
- Deb Dana’s work and resources
- Glimmers And How They Work article from Greatist.com