The Average Brain Doesn't Exist. So Why Are We Still Following Average Wellness Advice?
You were taught that the way you are is wrong. The research says otherwise.
My stomach is where everything I feel and experience shows up first.
Not as a thought. Not even as a clear feeling. More like an angry roller coaster that won't stop. That dizzy nauseated moment right after you get off a ride when your body hasn't caught up yet and you're not sure if you're going to be sick or just have to stand very still until the world stops spinning.
That's my trauma response. That's what it feels like when my nervous system knows something is wrong before my brain has even caught up.
I Spent Decades Honestly Believing I Was the Problem. How about you?
When I was younger I had a relationship that was toxic in a lot of ways. But it was also the safest place I knew. When it ended my world broke. And my body broke with it. I couldn't eat. Couldn't keep food down. I was on autopilot.
But what was actually happening is that my body was responding to the loss of safety. For neurodivergent people losing a safe place hits in a way most people don't understand. Safety is hard to find. When it's gone the body knows before the mind does.
That connection between safety, loss and what happens in a neurodivergent body around food is something I'm exploring through Neurodivergent Yoga because I know it's real.
Masking taught me to override all of it. Push through. And every time I did I got a little more disconnected from what my body was trying to say.
Science Just Caught Up to What We Already Knew
A few days ago an article called The Myth of the Average Braincame across my feed and I stopped scrolling.
Stanford Medicine analyzed brain scan data from over 4,000 children and found that for many kids, especially those who struggled with focus and cognitive control, their individual brain patterns were moving in the complete opposite direction from the group average.
Not a little different. The opposite direction.
The average wasn't just missing them. It was giving wrong information about what was happening inside their brains.
Neurodivergent people, especially those of us over 30 who grew up without a diagnosis, have been living this truth our entire lives. Science is just only starting to pay attention.
What the research gives us is language. And in a world that requires proof before it will listen, that’s huge.
BUT the reason it stopped me wasn't the science. It was the recognition. If the average was giving wrong information about individual brains then every system built around that average was working from a false picture. Of us. Our whole lives.
The Average Person Doesn't Exist.
And We've Been Exhausting Ourselves Trying to Become Her.
Who is this person we've all been measuring ourselves against?
The one who wakes up refreshed, follows the routine, holds it all together, and does it again tomorrow.
Have we met her? Because I have a LOT of questions.🤔
So much wellness advice gets built around her. And when it doesn't work for us the story becomes personal. We think we're inconsistent. Resistant. Broken.
We never to question… maybe this was never built for our brain, our bodies, our needs.
It's Okay to Not Have the Answers.
I know what it cost you to keep going.
The years of pushing through when your body was saying stop. The relationships you held together with everything you had. The jobs, the routines, the masking of pretending to be fine. The exhaustion of being too much and not enough at the same time.
That's not a weakness. That's the work nobody taught us.
A lot of us were taught to override our own signals for so long that we stopped trusting them. We feel tension and call it attitude. Exhaustion and call it laziness. Resistance and call it failure.
Nobody told you it was okay to feel overwhelmed.
Nobody said slow down and get quiet and listen to what your body is actually asking for instead of what everyone else is telling you that you need.
Your body screaming NO before you can even name it, that's not drama. That's real information. And it was right more often than we gave it credit for.
Rebuilding trust with my body didn't start with fixing anything. It started with noticing. Catching that feeling in my stomach and letting it mean something. Just letting it exist without immediately talking myself out of it.
That was the beginning.
This Is Where Yoga Comes In.
And I Don't Mean Poses On A Mat.
There's a teaching in yoga called svadhyaya. Self-study.
It's about looking at ourselves honestly. Not judging. Not comparing. Just watching our own patterns so we can start making choices that actually work for us.
For those of us who spent years being studied, labeled and corrected from the outside, turning our attention inward without judgment is a radical thing.
What happens in me when I rush?
When I skip eating?
When I say yes before I've checked in with myself?
When I ignore the first signal and wait until my whole body is yelling?
This isn’t about building a case against ourselves. We're learning our own patterns so we stop abandoning ourselves in the middle of them.
You Already Knew.
You Just Weren't Allowed to Trust It.
Any type of average was never an accurate picture of us. The support we need is never going to come from a system that can’t see us clearly.
For those of us who grew up when being different meant being difficult, when being sensitive meant being dramatic, when being unable to focus meant being lazy, we’ve carried those labels and stories for too damn long.
This isn't about blame. It's about permission. Permission to trust what you already know. Permission to slow down instead of pushing through. Permission to stop measuring your life against a person who doesn't exist.
You're Not the Problem. You Never Were.
The average brain is not your measuring stick.
The average routine was not built for your nervous system.
And the fact that it never worked for you was never proof that something was wrong with you.
If you're just starting to figure this out, you're not late. You're right on time for yourself.
And if you've known this for years but never had anyone say it back to you clearly, I see you. You were right about yourself all along.
If this resonated I'd love to stay in touch. Sign up below for honest conversations about what it actually means to live and take care of yourself in a neurodivergent body.🌞