Day 11 - The Yellow Zone

Arriving on this planet is a weird thing. We are all born into an ocean of expectations and projections about who we must be before we have even taken our first breath. It’s no one person’s fault that this is the territory that we’re all wadding our way through, it’s just the world that has come to be over the course of the presence of humanity on this flying rock we called home.

There is no manual for how to be human, and so we grow up giving it our best shot while often believing that everyone else seems to have it figured out and that we must be lacking or broken in some way. As children, we look to our caregivers for adequate attention and guidance, and if/when that falls short the rest is up to us to discover and make meaning. Sometimes what makes the most sense is to internalize that there’s something very weird and inadequate about our way of orienting to the world, and so begins a continuation of wondering what on Earth is or isn’t acceptable when it comes to connecting with other beings. Social norms become the implicit bumpers that keep us “in the lane” we think we should be going down in conversation, norms that may have been established by generations long ago who also seemed to lack the ability to foster meaningful conversation and emotional depth. Some may rely on what they think they ought to be doing or saying and instead bottle up what is really going on.

Having heard the internal dialogue of hundreds of people, it would seem that most seem to be walking around in their own worlds thinking that they must be the only one that sees the world in the ways they do…until they realize or find otherwise. While in many ways, no one will ever think, do or be quite like you, and yet the isolation of our seemingly unique struggles has the ability to detrimentally consume us. How humans can become accustomed to this type of secret turmoil is excruciating to me. Often it is the blanket of shame that blocks us from reaching out and sharing the honesty of what grips us. I’ve said this in previous blogs, but we never know the world someone carries until it is revealed to be seen and held.

The other night I reflected on my own journey of learning how to relate and creating the types of connections I somehow imagined could exist. I’d always been a curious soul but found many relationships to leave a trail of disappointment or longing that I didn’t know how to fill. When I found Circling in 2016, it would seem that I unearthed a cavernous hunger that I didn’t know could be satiated. I spent much of my young adulthood wondering how everyone else had seemingly figured out this human thing, only to realize after much discussion that I couldn’t have been further from the truth. The more conversations I had, the more present I became to the intricate worlds of how people relate to themselves, others, and groups such as family, community, and organization. Along the way, I’ve found many seem to experience a paradoxical tug between deeply wanting to be seen and feeling wildly afraid of the repercussions of this type of connection. Please see me, actually no fuck that don’t. An internal battle of protection and surrender. It moves me deeply to see people bravely approach the kind of connection they long for, facing the fears that so often rob them of even imagining the steps they could take if they were uninhibited. In these courageous moments, I find hope in knowing there is a way to step beyond our comfort zones to allow the magnificence that lives inside to be witnessed, celebrated, and connected with. I like to call this ‘living in the Yellow Zone’.

What is the Yellow Zone one might ask?

Think of a stoplight. Green is your comfort zone. It’s where you feel easeful in yourself, it’s a space of familiarity. This might be an environment where you are in solitude or it may be with certain people that feel like home to you. Experiencing the Green Zone doesn’t necessarily mean that it was always a Green Zone or that it just came naturally. Green Zone may also be just what feels safest to you, but may not necessarily be what you deeply desire in connection with yourself or others.

Before we go into the Yellow Zone, let’s talk about the Red Zone. The Red Zone is where you’re triggered or where coexisting feels too overwhelming or counterproductive to the health of your nervous system. It’s where you may have overextended yourself or leaped further than you had the bandwidth for. It’s like going into the deep end without knowing how to swim. If you’ve ever should yourself into doing something to fit in, belong, or prove something without checking in with yourself first, you may have found yourself in a Red Zone space. This is a space where self-abandonment tends to live. I believe that continually operating from the Red Zone lacks integrity with yourself. If and when you find yourself in the Red Zone (because you likely will at some point because you are human) it is important to support yourself with integration and process what happened in some way. In some circumstances, operating from the Red Zone can perpetuate the very thing you don’t want and affirm any beliefs about how challenging relationships are.

And that leaves us with the Yellow Zone…this is where you stretch beyond your comfort zone. You may notice you have a physiological response. You may notice that there are parts of you attempting to persuade you away from what you ultimately desire. The discomfort in your systems will likely be present and you may experience something new and unfamiliar. The Yellow Zone invites you into vulnerability and the unknown. Most importantly, it is NOT an abandonment of yourself. The Yellow Zone invites you deeper into connection with yourself as you move into new territory. It is a way of honoring yourself while leaning into what feels confronting, challenging, uncomfortable, and potentially exposing in relationship to another.

Some of you may be asking…but what if I’m not sure how to connect to myself?

If this is you, this is where your journey starts. To cultivate enriching relationships with others, you must begin with yourself. The depth to which you know yourself is the degree to which you can allow others to know you and connect with you. If you lack the understanding of yourself, it may make it challenging for others to actually connect with you versus any number of topics that you may have the ability to talk about. There’s a specific type of nourishment received when someone connects with the authenticity of who you are instead of the persona you think you need to be. I’ve found journaling or recordings of myself talking out loud to be two of the most powerful ways to build a relationship with myself. To cultivate a relationship with your body, I highly recommend practices like Focusing and listening to your somatic sensations. There’s a lot more detail I could go into here, but I’ll leave it here for now.

Another way you can think about the Yellow Zone is to think of the Goldilocks Rule. Not too hot (Red Zone), not too cold (Green Zone), but just right (Yellow Zone). The intention behind the Goldilocks Rule however is not that “just right” means comfortable and delicious as it is in the case of Goldie eating the bowl of porridge, but that you’re staying in a zone that continues to be challenging but manageable. The reminder here is that you are not abandoning yourself in the face of connection, but that you’re allowing relationships to support your growth and development as a human being.

Practice moving between the Green and Yellow Zone and see what emerges in this oscillation. Just like you lift weights to get stronger at a gym, we practice being in connection to create the relationships we desire. To be clear, I’m not suggesting you move into and out of trauma-inducing states without professional support.

I hope this framework provides a supportive pathway to your growth and relational development.