How “move fast and break things” became my crash-course in Polyvagal Theory

By Chloé Andrus Bringmann

The ping that hijacked my body

My career has swung like a pendulum: first a psychotherapist, then Chief of Staff and Head of Operations to a tech unicorn, now a therapist once more. In the world of code merges and midnight PRs I discovered that speed is an intoxicant. Product cycles shrank from months to weeks; “final” roadmaps eroded overnight. Nothing galvanized a team faster than the promise of shipping the impossible.

But exhilaration charged a somatic fee. Four-hour nights became the norm, my heart responded to its Pavlovian Slack bell, and high cortisol was the norm. It felt personal, yet it was biological. Polyvagal Theory, Dr. Stephen Porges’ cartography of the vagus nerve, shows the body always negotiating three states:

Ventral vagal: safety, intimacy, creative flow.

Sympathetic: fight / flight, relentless drive, “outrun the deadline.”

Dorsal vagal: collapse, numbness, the quiet quit of burnout.

Tech’s velocity pinned me to the upper two. And yet, that same chaos bred my understanding of self regulation and how to teach others to do the same.

Three lessons from Silicon Valley

Iteration belongs in the body, not just the backlog.

One spacious exhale, a three-minute walk, a thirty-second hum; tiny repetitions re-wire baseline calm more reliably than a weekend getaway.

Velocity without recovery is disguised freeze.

Sprint, certainly. Yet celebrate the launch and silence notifications to allow the nervous system to remember what “enough” feels like.

Digital micro-affection sparks co-regulation.

Emojis, playful GIFs, warm check-ins are all means of pixels carrying prosody. Humanize the screen and ventral pathways light up, even across continents, time zones, and distributed teams.

Nervous-system hacks for the distributed workplace

Anchor before you open apps. With two feet on the floor, name one sensation, and lengthen the exhale.

Trade caffeine for pattern interrupts. Thirty seconds of humming or a bilateral shoulder roll down-shifts arousal better than another latte.

Schedule “data-less” meetings. Rather than decks or metrics, opt for relational check-ins. Eye contact, even camera-to-camera, is a safety cue.

Design collective recovery. Block a decompression window after shipping. Restored ventral tone today becomes tomorrow’s innovation.

Call all leaders: Safety is a performance metric

Psychological safety isn’t a perk; it’s operational hygiene. Regulated teams ship faster, with fewer errors and lower churn.

Predictability beats perfection. When possible, offer at least 24 hours’ notice before pivots.

Ritualize closure. Mark every sprint, feature, and failure. Ritual ends ambiguity.

Model regulation. “I feel a rush of adrenaline after that exchange; I’d like to invite you all to join me in breathing together before deciding.” Name it, tame it, move on.

From tech burnout back to the therapy chair

Returning to clinical practice, I spotted the same autonomic loops in my clients, whether they be founders, creatives, or managers living in perpetual refresh mode. A polyvagal lens gives anyone a map:

Notice → Name → Nurture. Track a bodily cue, label the state, apply a regulating act.

Co-regulate before you collaborate. Five human minutes can save hours of mis-fires.

Move fast and heal things. Innovation thrives when nervous systems feel supported, not interrupted.

The bigger picture

“Move fast and break things” revolutionized software; move wisely and mend things sustains humans. Notifications are still part of my day, yet each one is now a bell of awareness—pause, soften shoulders, unclench jaw. Speed thrills, but safety turns thrill into durable creativity for our products, partnerships, and bodies.

What Six Years in Tech Taught Me About the Nervous System