In This Episode:
Sometimes the medicine we teach is the medicine we need most. Seryna records this episode on the road (with imperfect audio and a whole lot of F-bombs) to share a raw, real-time story about what happened when a stranger moved her bag on an airplane and she completely lost it. This isn't a polished lesson about boundaries—it's the messy truth about what happens when old conditioning takes over, when survival self strategies kick in, and when you realize you've self-abandoned in a moment you t...
In This Episode:
Sometimes the medicine we teach is the medicine we need most. Seryna records this episode on the road (with imperfect audio and a whole lot of F-bombs) to share a raw, real-time story about what happened when a stranger moved her bag on an airplane and she completely lost it. This isn't a polished lesson about boundaries—it's the messy truth about what happens when old conditioning takes over, when survival self strategies kick in, and when you realize you've self-abandoned in a moment you thought you were past that pattern. This episode is about fawning responses, righteous anger, the patterns we inherit about deferring to men, and why it's okay that you're not going to get it right 100% of the time—even when this is literally the work you do.
What You'll Discover:
- The fawn response: What it looks like when you prioritize someone else's comfort over your own needs and why it feels automatic
- How perfectionism is a survival self strategy (and why Seryna recorded this episode on AirPods anyway)
- The deeper truth beneath anger: How rage often masks feelings of vulnerability, shame, and self-abandonment
- Why safety is at the core of people-pleasing patterns (and what happens when you lose control to old conditioning)
- How reduced capacity changes your ability to respond from your unshakeable self
- The importance of having strategies in place for environments that typically shake you
- Why the work you do to heal yourself is never wasted—even when you "mess up"
- How to give yourself grace when you revert to old patterns under stress
Episode Highlights:
00:00 - Recording on the road: Pushing through perfectionism to get the message out
01:15 - The airport incident: A stranger moves her bag and everything spirals
03:42 - The freeze and fawn response: Deferring to someone with zero authority
05:20 - Righteous rage kicks in: When the flight attendant validates she was right all along
07:35 - The spiral continues: Hangry, delayed, and ready to fight in the airport
10:18 - Recognizing the pattern: This isn't really about the purse
12:40 - The deeper wound: Self-abandonment and conditioning around deferring to men
15:25 - Safety as a core value: How people-pleasing protects but also costs you
18:10 - What happens when survival self takes control (and why it's so maddening)
20:45 - The cost of self-abandonment: When it becomes your default setting again
23:00 - Strategies for staying grounded when capacity is reduced
25:15 - Anger as a mask: Revisiting the medicine from Sacred Anger
27:30 - The medicine is for you too: Why this work makes a difference in her own life
29:00 - You don't have to get it right 100% of the time—just a little better than yesterday
About Self-Abandonment and the Fawn Response:
We talk a lot about fight or flight, but we don't talk enough about fawn and freeze—the nervous system responses that prioritize safety through appeasement and people-pleasing. The fawn response is what happens when your body decides that going along, deferring, accommodating, or self-abandoning is the safest strategy in a moment of stress or threat. It's the "yes, of course" when you mean "absolutely not." It's the automatic prioritization of someone else's comfort over your own needs. And it's often rooted in deep conditioning about whose needs matter more.
For many people raised as women, this conditioning runs especially deep. We're taught to be accommodating, to not take up too much space, to defer to male authority (even when that "authority" is just some random guy on an airplane who has no actual power). This isn't about blaming anyone—it's about recognizing how these patterns get wired into our nervous systems and continue to run the show long after we've done years of healing work.
What makes it so deeply maddening is when you know better. When you've done the work, when you teach this work, when you have a podcast literally called The Unshakeable Self—and then some stranger moves your bag and you freeze. You fawn. You self-abandon. The survival self takes the wheel, and suddenly you're not in control anymore.
But here's the real medicine in this episode: You don't have to get it right 100% of the time. Your capacity fluctuates. Stress, hunger, existing anxiety—all of these reduce your ability to respond from your most grounded, regulated self. And when capacity is reduced, of course you're going to revert to old patterns sometimes. That's not failure. That's being human.
The key is what you do after. Do you beat yourself up? Or do you get curious? Do you recognize the pattern, understand what happened, and put strategies in place for next time? Do you give yourself grace while also recommitting to your boundaries and your truth?
This episode is Seryna doing exactly that—getting curious, recognizing the pattern, understanding that her rage was actually masking deeper feelings of shame and vulnerability, and ultimately realizing that the medicine she teaches is the medicine she needs too. This work isn't about perfection. It's about awareness, compassion, and doing a little better than yesterday when you can—and being gentle with yourself when you can't.
Resources Mentioned:
- Sacred Anger (Seryna's book on anger as a sacred emotion and how to navigate it constructively)
- Brené Brown's Core Values Exercise: Assess your core values and discover what really matters most to you
- The survival self pattern of fawning: One of the four nervous system responses (fight, flight, freeze, fawn)
- The Unshakeable Self (book in progress): The focus of Seryna's current work
Continue Your Journey:
Deep Dive: Ready for transformational coaching? Apply to work with Seryna
Explore In-Person: Energy healing, angel readings, and spiritual guidance at Golden Soul Sanctuary in Nanaimo, BC
Join Community: Monthly gatherings and events for local seekers
Connect: Follow Seryna on Instagram @serynamyers for inspiration, behind-the-scenes moments, and daily tools for stepping into your power
TAGS:
unshakeable self, survival self, fawn response, self-abandonment, boundaries, people-pleasing, anger management, sacred anger, nervous system, conditioning, trauma response, shadow work, personal growth, spiritual podcast, core values, self-compassion, grace, healing journey, women's conditioning, feminist podcast
