Do we fight, flight, freeze or fawn?

Reading time: 9 minutes

Do you often react in the same way when your buttons are being pushed? Do you mainly think afterwards that you’d rather have reacted differently? Then there is a good possibility your defense options are limited in threatening situations. No need, those can be expanded at any time!

Instinctively, humans have two basic defenses against danger: fight or flight (and, depending on who we ask, freeze). However, this is a physical danger to life; we end up in an acute life-threatening situation and in order to survive, the physiological stress response - in which a lot of energy goes to the muscle (groups) that need it very quickly - is highly welcome. Nevertheless, the times when we had to run daily from predators are far behind us and a growing part of humanity hardly has to deal with daily acute mortal danger. A relatively new threat that we face since the advent of the agricultural revolution is the so-called emotional danger.

We used to have to deal with predators and the elements, but now it's us who we most have to fear (see the news - or better not if you want to keep your stress level down). Societies are getting bigger and more complex, and the places where you hardly meet any people are becoming increasingly scarce on our planet. That causes stress because: so many people so many views. We therefore increasingly find ourselves in situations that do not pose an acute danger to our lives, but which we consider to be highly threatening and dangerous nonetheless. A cheating spouse can undermine the perceived safety of the marital arrangement; a lying politician can damage public confidence; an irate parent may threaten a child; a new supervisor may threaten my job.

Just as we used to utilize fight, flight and freeze to protect our physical body, we also use it to fend off emotional danger. In addition, we have expanded our repertoire with fawning (pleasing) as defense mechanism. This one (and freezing to a lesser degree) generally takes on a rather negative connotation, but can come in handy when a certain situation calls for it, as trauma therapist Pete Walker points out:

“People who experience ‘good enough parenting’ in childhood grow up with a healthy and flexible repertoire in response to danger. In the event of real danger, they can rely on all their defense mechanisms. If they have easy access to the fight response, they are familiar with their own boundaries and well able to state them, be assertive, and aggressively protect themselves if necessary. Also, they easily and appropriately access their flight instinct and disengage or retreat when confrontation would increase their danger. They freeze appropriately and give up or stop struggling when further activity or resistance is futile or counterproductive. Finally, they also please in a compliant, "playful" manner and are just as ready to listen, help and compromise as they defend and express themselves and their needs, rights and points of view.

This could be described as ‘defense mechanism training’. In a balanced household where parents are both physically and emotionally available, children are taught knowledge of the different defense mechanisms and in which situations or circumstances they can be best and most effectively used. Walker continues:

“However, those who experienced ‘not good enough parenting’ in childhood often learn to survive by relying too much on the use of one or two of the defense mechanisms. ('Not good enough parenting' can vary from neglect or overburdening to mental and/or physical abuse – and not just from parents, by the way - but also covers that very large group of sweet and benevolent parents who are however little or not physically and/or emotionally available. -ed.)

“Fixation on a particular defense mechanism not only limits the ability to access the other ones, but also severely hinders the individual's ability to relax. As a result, he is confined to a very narrow, impoverished life experience… An overdeveloped fight response can for instance progress to narcissistic disorders; an overdeveloped flight instinct can turn into obsessive, compulsive behavior and perfectionism. If freezing is the overdeveloped defense mechanism, dissociation is lurking, and with an overdeveloped please response, there is an increasing tendency to have our boundaries continually crossed, based on the conviction that we are completely helpless without the other (codependence).”

If indeed there is one overdeveloped defense mechanism, we can say that a) we’ve specialized in it as adults, and b) we automatically fall back on that defense mechanism as soon as our buttons are being pushed. The one-sidedness of our repertoire on potentially dangerous situations can be a problem when we find ourselves in a situation where our specialty only exacerbates the situation.

Compare this to a world in which only four languages are spoken: English, Dutch, Russian and Chinese. In order to go through life balanced and with confidence, knowledge of all languages is necessary because we never know in advance what kind of situations we will find ourselves in, and what language is required. Now consider we only speak English. Statistically that means in 25% of all situations are we able to deal with a situation effectively. Yet the remaining 75% of our time we feel lost and vulnerable because we can’t communicate in the language the situation requires. Just talking louder in English when Chinese needed usually doesn’t much help a situation. Gaining knowledge of Chinese all the more.

When it comes to deploying defense mechanisms no two situations are identical, so each one needs a fresh point of view and its own unique approach. If a situation turns out to be a dead horse, but the only available defense mechanism is pleasing, then there is a good chance one will continue to pull that dead horse for way too long a time. Having access to all defense mechanisms therefore gives real freedom of choice and can provide complete relaxation. Due to the defense mechanism training, there is confidence in the spontaneous ability to use the most appropriate mechanism in any threatening situation, without having to think about it in advance (just like intensive training eliminates the need for an athlete to think about the execution during the world championships).

In my particular case, I am a specialized, over qualified, licensed, distinguished and award winning pleaser. That was reflected for example in some of the bands I played with because I wanted to be a rich and famous drummer. I would first gather musicians with the unchecked expectation that they wanted the same thing as me. Then we usually worked it out musically and after about six months there was a great repertoire, so from that moment on I wanted to accelerate: perform a lot and develop a show/image/brand, preferably based on my musical heroes of Iron Maiden, Kiss and Van Halen.

Since none of the other band members came up with a vision which was essential to me, I created one and then presented it to the band. My expectation here was that any vision was better than no vision and that my fellow band members saw matters identically, again without checking (concepts like tuning in and feedback – except from guitars – were as yet unbeknownst to me). So I’d start making a website, posters, arranging performances, etc., only to find out after another six months that I was the only one who developed 'extra-musical activities'. That pushed my buttons because: big threat ahead - my intended desired situation was endangered! That's where the pleaser comes into action.

Now, in addition to the musical and extra-musical activities, I also started putting time into enthusing the individual band members. I visited them, discussed the vision, encouraged and wanted to support, anything to get them in the 'on' position. Again with the expectation that… well, you know by now. After about another half a year it turned out: nothing had changed. So instead of enthusing I then began to threaten to quit, but still I thought to be doing this it with the aim of making this band the new U2. The fact that I was pushing the rest away hard remained safely out of sight.

That childish thought fit very well with my childish behavior which resulted from my childish pain, or child pain. In my young youth I started to develop pleasing as a defense mechanism to keep myself afloat. When my fellow band members didn’t act the way I had hoped for, my child pain buttons were pushed hard with the result that I sought refuge in the only defense mechanism available to me: pleasing. While a freeze reaction for instance would probably have been much more effective at that moment. If I only had asked if the other band members enjoyed the vision and were willing to comply, that could have saved everyone time, headaches and energy leaks.

Finally after about two years I left the band with an accusing finger pointing at the rest; After all, it wasn't my fault that the band didn't work out. This pattern repeated itself in about six bands before it became apparent to me. And even then I got into it once again! It's like the great Dutch Zen master Johan Cruijff once said: "You don't see it until you get it."

It becomes apparent here that a) I was little aware of my own boundaries and needs, and b) that I had an unrealistic wish (namely to become a rich and famous drummer as opposed to a professional musician) which, when achieved, would satisfy my needs and solve my problems forever. The lack of self-knowledge made my unrealistic wish incredibly important and the moment the path to the desired situation was jeopardized, I was automatically triggered into the only defense mechanism I knew; pleasing until way past the expiration date only to leave highly frustrated in the end.

The flight instinct and the freezing reaction have developed over the past eleven years. Sooner and sooner it’s being recognized when a situation turns out to be a dead horse, and it is becoming easier and easier to count to ten as opposed to a primary reaction when my buttons are pushed or my bucket overflows. But that wouldn’t have been possible without my family, friends and not least my classmates from physiotherapy training. I am still very grateful to all of them for the feedback and mirrors that they, with a lot of compassion, have continuously presented to me – and still do.

Still lacking though was a developed fighting reaction. Knowing my limits and needs and having the ability and courage to stand up for them was until recently an underdeveloped and unknown area. The only known fighting manifested itself in outbursts of anger when my bucket was again full and was therefore by definition not very healing and effective; not for the situation and neither as a stress release. Hence the decision to leave the Netherlands for a while to learn Tai Chi in China, because by now two things had become clear: 1) having access to all four defense mechanisms under stressful conditions gives choice in behavior (and thus a clear increase in self-confidence and overall relaxation); 2) regardless of age, every defense mechanism can be learned.

As Pete Walker has said before, there is a great power in an overdeveloped defense mechanism, which is especially manifested when our defense repertoire is expanded with the hitherto less developed mechanisms. To find out in which defense mechanism we often shoot automatically, many ways of self-assessment are available. In this blogpost I share one method that you can use freely if it suits you. Because having knowledge of one's own overdeveloped defense mechanism opens the door for the others to practice and develop.

Good luck and jolly greetings,
Erik Stout