Free somatic tool
My Polyvagal Ladder
Your nervous system moves between three basic states: ventral vagal (safe, social, connected — the top of the ladder), sympathetic (fight-or-flight — the middle), and dorsal vagal (shutdown, collapse — the bottom). The ladder, a metaphor developed by Deb Dana, is a map: when you can recognize which rung you're on and what moves you between rungs, you stop being at the mercy of your own alarm system.
This exercise builds your personal ladder — how each state feels in your body, what pulls you down, and what lifts you back up. Your ladder starts empty and fills in as you answer — watch it take shape as you type. One deliberate design note: we'll visit the states in a specific order and end in ventral vagal, so you finish the exercise resourced rather than stuck in shutdown — the same order the workbook prescribes.
Completely private: everything happens on this page, in your browser. Nothing you type is sent anywhere — your in-progress answers are kept only on this device, only until you close the tab, so an accidental refresh won't erase them.
Your ladder is ready
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Fix one part without redoing the rest: · ·
Use your ladder every day. The map matters because you consult it: Which Rung Am I On? is the three-tap daily check-in built for exactly that, and The Long Exhale is the fastest climbing skill there is.
Keep your ladder somewhere you'll see it — many people save it to their phone. In a hard moment, the question "which rung am I on?" is itself a step up the ladder. Your glimmers and skills list is your climbing route.
If mapping shutdown stirred up more than you can settle, pause — and if you need someone now, 988 (call or text) is there, around the clock.
About the ladder
Polyvagal theory (Stephen Porges) describes how the autonomic nervous system shifts between connection, mobilization, and shutdown. Deb Dana translated it into the ladder metaphor and the idea of triggers and glimmers — the cues that pull us down and the small signals of safety that lift us up. This worksheet appears as Practice 45 in The Healing Trauma Workbook (Wong, 2023). Knowing your own ladder is the foundation for nearly every other nervous-system skill.
This exercise is for reflection and psychoeducation; it is not a diagnosis or a substitute for professional care. If completing it stirs up more than you can settle, that is important information — bring it to a therapist rather than pushing through alone.
Common questions
What is the polyvagal ladder?
It’s a map of your nervous system, developed by Deb Dana from Stephen Porges’s polyvagal theory. The top rung is ventral vagal (safe, social, connected), the middle is sympathetic (fight-or-flight), and the bottom is dorsal vagal (shutdown, collapse). Everyone moves between rungs all day — the ladder isn’t about staying at the top, it’s about knowing where you are and how you climb.
How do I use my ladder once I’ve built it?
Keep it somewhere you’ll actually see it — many people save the image to their phone. In a hard moment, asking “which rung am I on?” is itself a step up the ladder, because naming a state engages the part of you that can observe it. Then look at your glimmers and skills list: that’s your climbing route back to ventral vagal.
Is what I enter private?
Yes. Everything runs on this page, in your browser. Nothing you type is sent to a server. Your in-progress answers are kept only on this device, and only until you close the tab — so an accidental refresh won’t erase your work, but once the tab closes, it’s gone unless you’ve downloaded your ladder first.
Can this exercise tell me if something is wrong with me?
No — and that’s not what it’s for. This is reflection and psychoeducation, not an assessment or diagnosis. Spending time in sympathetic or dorsal states is a normal nervous-system response, not a defect. What the ladder can do is make your patterns visible. If mapping them stirs up more than you can settle, that’s important information — bring it to a therapist rather than pushing through alone.
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