Episode 185 - Growing Your Capacity Over Time
(Part 4 in the Nervous System Regulation Series)
Practical, faith-centered, and encouraging, this episode invites you to make small, consistent choices that expand your tolerance, help you recover faster, and transform your relationships in the year ahead.
The long-game approach to handling life's challenges without falling apart
Over the past few weeks, we've explored how your nervous system works, how to build a safety foundation, and what techniques you can use in those hard moments when you're activated. These quick regulation tools are essential—they help you put out fires when emotions run high.
But today, we're talking about something different. Something that will transform not just your hard moments, but your entire baseline experience of life.
Today, we're zooming out to look at the big picture: how to build stress resilience over time. This isn't about managing crisis moments—it's about expanding your window of tolerance so you can handle more without falling apart. It's about becoming more fireproof, not just better at putting out fires.
If you're in it for the long game, this is your roadmap.
Understanding Stress Resilience vs. Stress Reduction
Before we dive into practical strategies, let's clarify an important distinction that will shape how you approach this work.
Stress reduction is about making the waves smaller. It's eliminating stressors where you can—setting boundaries, saying no, removing yourself from toxic situations. This is important work. If you're chronically overwhelmed, something needs to change.
But here's the truth: you cannot control whether your adult child makes choices you agree with. You can't control whether your spouse has a bad day. You really can't control much of what life throws at you.
Stress resilience is about becoming a better swimmer. It's about building your capacity so you can handle bigger waves when they come—because they will come.
You can control how you prepare yourself. You can build your capacity. And that's exactly what we're exploring today.
Where Are You Starting From? Understanding Your Baseline
Think about your nervous system on a scale from 1 to 10:
• 1 = Complete shutdown (dorsal vagal collapse—you can't get out of bed, everything feels impossible)
• 5 = Regulated state (ventral vagal—you're grounded, present, able to think clearly and connect with others)
• 10 = Full panic mode (extreme activation, heart racing, can't breathe, completely overwhelmed)
Where is your baseline? Where do you spend most of your time?
Maybe you're living most of your life at about a 7 or 8—not full panic, but constantly activated. Always a little anxious. Always on edge. Always ready for the next shoe to drop.
Or perhaps you're hovering around a 3—kind of shut down, just going through the motions, feeling numb or disconnected.
You might think this is just who you are. That you're "just an anxious person" or "naturally withdrawn."
But it's not your personality. It's nervous system regulation. The goal is to move your baseline closer to that regulated state at 5—to spend more of your time grounded, present, and capable. And you do that through consistent practice over time.
The Goldilocks Principle: Finding Your Growth Zone
If we're going to grow your capacity and build your resilience, we need the right amount of challenge. Not too little. Not too much. Just right.
Too little stress: You don't get to practice anything. There's no challenge, no growth. You stay comfortable but stagnant.
Too much stress: You're overwhelmed. Your body goes into protection mode. There's no growth—you're just surviving.
Just the right amount of stress: You're challenged enough to grow, but not so overwhelmed that you shut down. This is where real transformation happens. This is your growth zone.
The sweet spot is different for everyone. What's just right for me might be too much or too little for you. You have to pay attention to your own system and find your own edge—that place where you feel stretched but not broken.
Hill Training: A Powerful Metaphor for Building Capacity
Every day, we're going to meet resistance. We're going to encounter hard things. It's inevitable. But when we come to that hill, we have three choices:
Choice 1: Turn around and do nothing. Avoid the challenge. Stay in your comfort zone. Don't climb the hill.
Choice 2: Stand at the base and complain. Acknowledge the challenge—you know it's there—but you don't actually do anything about it. You just talk about how hard it is, how unfair it is, how you wish it wasn't there.
Choice 3: Strategize and climb. Make a plan, then actively move forward. You can take breaks. You can rest. But you're facing the challenge. And every time you choose to climb, you're building your resilience and expanding your window of tolerance.
Applying Hill Training to Relationships
Maybe you have a relationship with one of your adult children that's challenging right now. Different worldviews. Hard conversations. Deep disagreements.
You could turn around and avoid them—just stop having the hard conversations. It's okay to recognize when you're not ready to climb that particular hill.
You could stand at the base and complain—talk about how hard it is, how much it hurts—but never actually engage.
Or you could strategize and climb. You can prepare yourself before conversations. You can practice your regulation tools. You can stay in relationship even when it's uncomfortable, taking breaks when you need to, but continuing to show up.
Every time you choose to stay in relationship while also staying regulated, you're building capacity. That's hill training. That's how you grow.
10 Daily Practices That Build Long-Term Resilience
Quick regulation tools help you in hard moments. But the following daily practices change your nervous system over time. They build your capacity to handle whatever life throws at you.
1. Meditation
Research shows that 13 minutes of meditation is optimal. The type that works best depends on your tendency:
• If you're always in your head overthinking, try meditation that directs your attention outward (like focusing on sounds)
• If you're always focused externally, try meditation that directs inward (like a body scan)
Start with just a few minutes if 13 feels like too much. Meet yourself where you are.
2. Meditative Activities
These are different from formal meditation—anything that helps you feel fully present. Listening to music (really listening), puzzles, art, knitting, journaling, yoga. Anything where you're focused on one thing and not multitasking.
3. Grounding Techniques
Simple practices like the 5-4-3-2-1 technique (notice 5 things you see, 4 you hear, 3 you feel, 2 you smell, 1 you taste) or barefoot walking on grass. These anchor you to the present moment.
4. Creative expression
Painting, writing, music, photography, anything that lets you express what's inside in a non-verbal way. Your nervous system doesn't just process through talking. Sometimes it needs other outlets.
5. Connection
Real connection with safe people. Not just surface conversation—actual connection where you feel seen and heard. Your nervous system co-regulates with other regulated nervous systems.
6. Affection
Hugging someone you love. Physical touch. Petting an animal. This releases oxytocin which helps you feel safe and connected.
7. Laughter
Real laughter. Not polite chuckling. Deep belly laughs. It's incredibly regulating.
8. Crying
Don't hold back tears. Crying releases stress hormones. It's your body's way of completing the stress cycle.
9. Nature
This is one of the most powerful and immediate ways to regulate. Get outside every day if you can. Even just a few minutes. There's something about being around trees and the open sky that settles your nervous system.
10. Fascia work
Your fascia is connective tissue throughout your body. When you're chronically stressed, it gets tight. Foam rolling, massage, stretching—anything that works with your fascia can release stored tension.
Amplifiers: Advanced Resilience Building
If you're ready to really accelerate your capacity building—and you feel safe doing so—there are some amplifier practices you can explore. These give you short bursts of acute stress followed by rest and recovery.
Think of it like strength training: you stress the muscle, then let it recover, and it gets stronger. The same principle applies to your nervous system.
NSDR (Non-Sleep Deep Rest)
Similar to meditation but more guided. Scripts and apps walk you through a deep reset process for your nervous system.
HIIT (High-Intensity Interval Training)
Short bursts of intense exercise followed by rest. This trains your system to go from activation to recovery efficiently.
Breathwork
Intentionally stressing your system through specific breathing patterns, then allowing for recovery. There are many approaches—find one that resonates with you.
Cold Exposure
Brief cold exposure (like cold showers or ice baths) followed by warming up trains your system's ability to handle stress and recover quickly.
Important: You don't need to do all of these. Choose what feels safe and appropriate for you. The key is the pattern: challenge followed by recovery.
How Do You Know When You've Completed the Stress Cycle?
Your body will tell you. Signs that you've moved through activation and returned to regulation include:
• Your breathing has deepened and slowed down
• Your jaw has unclenched
• Your shoulders have dropped
• Your stomach has relaxed
• You can think more clearly
• You might yawn or sigh deeply
• You might feel emotional (like you need to cry)
For me, I know I've completed the cycle when I can take a full deep breath without that tight feeling in my chest. When I can think about the stressful situation without immediately feeling activated again. It's not that the problem is solved—it's that my nervous system has moved through the stress response and returned to baseline.
This Is a Journey, Not a Destination
You're not going to arrive at perfect nervous system regulation. You're not going to reach some point where you never get activated again.
Life is going to keep happening. Your nervous system is going to keep responding. That's what it's designed to do.
But here's what can change:
• How quickly you notice you're activated
• How many tools you have in your pocket
• How fast you can return to baseline
• How wide your window of tolerance becomes
• How much capacity you're building over time
I've been practicing this work for a while now, and I still get activated. I still have moments where I say things I regret or shut down when I don't want to. But it happens less often. And when it does happen, I recover faster. My baseline is higher. My window of tolerance is wider.
That's what this work does. It doesn't make you perfect. It makes you more resilient.
Your Action Plan: Getting Started
You've learned how your nervous system works. You've built your safety foundation. You have tools for hard moments. And now you understand how to build long-term resilience.
This is powerful information that can transform your relationships, your health, your life, and your faith—but only if you practice it. You can't just know this intellectually. You have to live it daily, consistently.
Here's your invitation for this week:
• Review the basics. Notice which nervous system state you're in throughout your day.
• Practice your safety anchor every single day. Make it a non-negotiable part of your routine.
• Use your regulation tools when you need them. Pick your favorites and practice them.
• Choose one or two daily practices from the list above. Start small. Be consistent.
• Check in with yourself regularly. What's working? What's not? What do you want to try differently?
Some days you'll remember to use your tools. Some days you'll forget completely. That's totally normal.
Some practices will resonate with you; others won't. That's okay. You're building your own toolbox.
Some days you'll feel regulated and capable. Other days you'll feel like you're starting from scratch. That's the journey.
Be patient with yourself. Be compassionate with yourself. This is hard work, and you are doing it.
You're not too late. You're not too broken. Transformation is always possible.
Here's to building greater capacity in 2026.
Related Resources:
• Episode 182: Understanding Your Nervous System
• Episode 183: Building Your Safety Foundation
• Episode 184: Quick Regulation Tools for Hard Moments
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About the Host: Jill Pack is a certified faith-based life + relationship conflict coach and member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. She helps women of faith navigate their seasons of life with greater purpose and joy including how to transform conflict into connection. For more resources or to work with Jill, visit www.seasons-coaching.com.
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