If CPR Is the Skill for the Heart, What is the Skill for the Brain?

After the Red Rug Roundtable, a few people pulled me aside and said some version of the same thing:

“I’ve never heard it put that way before.”

That stayed with me.

Because what I shared wasn’t radical. It was obvious — once you see it.

We train everyday people to respond when a heart stops.

We teach CPR in schools, offices, airports, gyms.

But when a brain goes offline — from shock, overwhelm, fear, grief, or sudden stress — we mostly do one of three things:

• Tell people to calm down
• Tell them not to worry about it
• Wait until symptoms get bad enough to diagnose

None of those are first aid.

The Gap No One Talks About

When someone collapses from cardiac arrest, we don’t say:

“Just calm down — your heart will be fine.”
“Let’s explore why this happened.”
“Come back in six months if it’s still a problem.”

We respond immediately — because timing matters.

Yet when someone’s nervous system flips into survival mode — which happens far more often — we act as if time doesn’t matter at all.

But it does.

The brain doesn’t wait politely.

What Actually Happens When a Brain Goes Offline

In moments of shock or threat, the brain does something brilliant and primitive.

It prioritizes survival over reasoning.

Blood flow shifts.
Thinking narrows.
A snapshot of the moment gets locked in.

This isn’t pathology.
It’s protection.

The problem isn’t that this happens.

The problem is that the nervous system doesn’t always get the message that the danger has passed.

So it stays activated — looping, guarding, bracing — until the brain can find resolution and return the body to a true state of safety.

Without that resolution, the body keeps reacting as if the threat is still happening — sometimes for years.

We Built a System for Illness, Not Interruption

Our healthcare system is excellent at treating damage.

It’s far less skilled at interrupting stress in real time.

We wait for anxiety to become a diagnosis.
For stress to become illness.
For repeated survival states to turn into symptoms.

Then we intervene.

Imagine if CPR worked that way.

If CPR Is a Skill for the Heart — Is There a Skill for the Brain?

If CPR is a skill we teach everyday people to save a heart, then it’s fair to ask:

Is there a skill to save a brain when it shuts down?

Because brain shutdown isn’t rare.

It happens in moments of shock.
In sudden loss.
In fear, overwhelm, grief, or threat.

And when it happens, the brain isn’t broken.

It’s doing exactly what it was designed to do.

So what if, instead of asking people to explain their pain, we gave them a simple skill their brain could use in the exact moment it goes offline?

Not therapy.
Not analysis.
Not years of unraveling.

Just a way to help the nervous system resolve the threat it registered — so the brain can stand down and the body can return to safety.

That’s the question that changed everything for me.

This Isn’t About Replacing Medicine

CPR didn’t replace cardiology.

It reduced deaths before cardiology was needed.
Brain-first skills don’t replace therapy or medicine either.

They work earlier — when prevention is easier, faster, and far less costly than waiting for a system or body part to stop functioning.

That’s not radical.

That’s common sense.

The Question I Keep Coming Back To

If we agree the brain is central to health…

If we know stress drives so much suffering…

If we already teach lifesaving skills for the heart…

Then the real question becomes:

Why wouldn’t we do the same for the brain?

Because maybe the next health revolution isn’t a pill.

It’s a skill.

If you’re curious to learn more about the different ways people are learning the B.R.A.I.N.S. Technique™ — for personal use, families, or professional settings — you can explore the available programs below: