Enter If You Dare: Horror as Healing
Horror movies as a tool for emotional regulation? Read on to find out more.
Our Two Nervous Systems: The Gas and The Brake
When you think of emotional regulation and the nervous system, what comes to mind? For many people, they think of the fight-or-flight response, an aspect of the sympathetic nervous system, which is part of the autonomic nervous system (ANS). The ANS also includes the parasympathetic nervous system (rest-and-digest), which is what allows us to rest, relax, and experience a calm or grounded state. The way I like to remember the difference between the two is that the sympathetic nervous system is responsible for our fight-or-flight response, for activation, for adrenaline, a preparation to do something; it’s like if you’ve got a friend that you’re feeling sympathetic towards, oftentimes we want to do something for them. On the other hand, the parasympathetic system is responsible for relaxing, resting, and returning to a calmer equilibrium; it is a system for deactivating or deflating, much like a parachute coming down (parachute, parasympathetic). Because it’s October, I’ve been watching a lot of horror movies lately and, phew, my sympathetic nervous system has been up.
Which got me thinking about what makes the experience different between the activation ( anxiety, fear, distress, discomfort) experienced when watching a movie versus activation out in the world. Watching a movie, I know I’m safe - the fear is contained within the boundaries of my couch or the theater. Out in life, that sense of safety is often missing. The nervous system is not actually that skillful at parsing out whether something is truly dangerous or simply has the hallmarks of danger - was that an actual tiger in the corner or just a shadow that flickered funny? Emergency, alert, alert, deploy all torpedoes - it does this so fast that there’s very little time for our rational thought-centers to come online (bye bye prefrontal cortex, you’re getting a timeout until we solve this danger!)
Living with the Alarm Always On
In our world today, our nervous systems have been hijacked by the sheer amount of stimulus that we experience on a daily basis. They weren’t set up to handle the constant alerts and pings that hit them these days. This type of overstimulation and oversaturation of the nervous system can create an intense (and constant) anxiety that never dissipates and never allows the parasympathetic system to fully engage, like an itch that constantly aches. The result is a body and mind stuck in fight-or-flight mode, a body and mind that always feel prepared for something without any rest: increased heartrate, rapid breathing, light numbness, the works. The limbic system - the emotional center of the brain - drives this response long before our rational mind catches up, unless we’ve had some training in maintaining emotional stability during activation; something that allows us to manage anxiety for long enough that the rest of our brain catches up to the limbic system’s response.
Remaining in a state of increased anxiety, constant stress, and ongoing activation has a cumulative and harmful effect on the body and mind and impacts everything from the immune system to interpersonal relationships and, yes, emotional regulation. How can you increase your ability to respond under duress? How can you increase your distress tolerance in general? What do horror movies have to do with this?
Practicing Fear: From Meditation to Monsters
One way is through something like meditation, where the goal is to sit in whatever feelings come up, which sometimes involves anxiety and discomfort, and continue to come back to the present. However, meditation is not the only way to do this! There have been studies that folks who regularly consume horror or other types of frightening fictional experiences have increased distress tolerance - and based on the above, why wouldn’t that be true? Watching a horror movie is similar to meditation in many ways; the primary activity is a sitting in (and continually coming back to) the present, which may be uncomfortable, distressing, anxiety-inducing. The fight-or-flight response might be activated, yet there’s also an additional sense of safety, an understanding that you’re sitting on your couch or in a movie theater and not in any actual danger. In many ways, a horror movie can be like meditation on steroids, providing a large amount of opportunities over an extended period of time to return to feelings of discomfort, anxiety, or distress while also simultaneously experiencing a sense of safety. Over time, this sort of experience is what allows for an increase in distress tolerance.
So the next time you’re watching a horror movie, I invite you to pay attention to what’s happening. Does your pulse suddenly start racing? Do your palms get sweaty? Do you feel a shortness of breath? Do you recognize these feelings as something that happen to you at other times? That’s your nervous system doing exactly what it was designed to do. Pay attention to what you do next! Do you take a long, restorative breath? Do you focus on the couch or chair underneath you? Do you bring your attention to something else in your surroundings before coming back to the movie? All of these are ways of being mindful and, yes, strengthening emotional regulation and distress tolerance. So get out there and enjoy your horror movies and haunted houses with increased gusto! Not only are you having a good time, but you’re working on your mental fitness too.
Hi, I’m Derek. I’m a psychotherapist practicing in Seattle, Washington. I’m passionate about mental health and frequently enjoy pondering the intersection of mental health and pop culture, which is a lot of what you’ll find on my blog. Throughout my blog, you’ll find musings on movies, games, anime, and general culture through a therapeutic, mindfulness, and existential lens.