Framework 07 · The collective body
A culture has a state. It can dysregulate, and it can co-regulate.
What we call society is not abstract. It is a network of nervous systems regulating one another, mostly without noticing — through tone, pace, eye contact, what is and isn't said, who is allowed to be tired, who is allowed to be soft.
A dysregulated culture is not a failure of individuals. It is the cumulative shape of unprocessed pressure being passed forward, faster than any single body can metabolise it. The room becomes the problem, and then the room produces more rooms like it.
Co-regulation is the same logic in reverse. One steadier nervous system in the room changes what the room can do. This is small, and it is not small at all.
A room is regulated by the steadiest body in it.
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Other ways of seeing that softly touch this one.