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The Story Behind The Nervous System Economy (NSE)
The Nervous System Economy (NSE) was born from lived experience and a deep frustration: why is this fundamental information so hard to find, and why aren’t solutions easily accessible? Many highly functioning professionals are not okay, struggling silently under the weight of unresolved stress from high-pressure childhoods and demanding careers pursuing solutions that at best are ineffective when a nervous system is locked into dysregulation, and at worst, compounds the problem further.
For over 20 years, corporate success masked a deeper struggle for Shannon Eastman. In 2019, after investing in excess of £100k and more than a decade trying to “fix” her inner state, she resigned herself to the belief that she was too broken to be fixed. Frustrated and exhausted, she stopped all personal development efforts, focusing instead on simply managing symptoms.
A single image changed everything. During a webinar with Dr. Gabor Maté, she saw two brain scans of five-year-old children—one from a neglected home, the other from a home full of love. The difference was profound. That moment ignited a year of intense research that led Shannon to leave corporate life in 2020 and spend 4.5 years immersed in neurobiology.
Twelve weeks of applying Nervous System Intelligence (NSQ) tools transformed her life more than the previous decade of self-work.
The realization? This information, so critical to human quality of life, was hard to find, difficult to navigate, and nearly impossible to integrate effectively.
Determined to bring this knowledge to the corporate world, she first wrote C-PTSD at Work: Highly Functioning, Secretly in Despair, before investing nearly two years interviewing 400 practitioners, doctors, and experts—yet found no clear path forward. In January 2024, she launched the podcast Who Turned the Lights On? to explore and articulate these ideas. The podcast hit 100k downloads that year.
In December 2024, Shannon realized she would be the one to bridge this gap.
That has meant translating the science into layman’s terms, contextualizing nervous system solutions, mapping insights to business outcomes that feel easy for anyone to recognise and apply.
Thus, the Nervous System Economy (NSE) was born: a vehicle to translate science, contextualize solutions, and empower 40+ professionals to self-direct their way out of the dark.
The NSE also brings cohesion to the fragmented landscape of nervous system solutions, making it easier for providers to collaborate, innovate, and evolve this space.
2025 Focus:
A foundational psychoeducation initiative (NSQ101), for 40+ professionals, supported by 27 self-directed micro-products mapped to the Nervous System Continuum™.
A Nervous System Economy™ Landscape & Directory – Organizing and contextualizing existing nervous system solutions for individuals and businesses.
2026 Focus:
The NSQ Shared Industry Framework – Establishing a structured corporate well-being standard, launching at #NSQSummit26 in London.
A Nervous System Economy™ fully enabled with Gen AI technology making the b2c and b2b solutions easy to see, understand and engage.
Where Are We Now?
Today, the NSE is powered by a team of 20+ experts—half rooted in science, the other half in business strategy, media, and communications—working together to bring NSQ to 1 million professionals in 2025. By helping professionals self-identify where they are on the Nervous System Continuum™, we provide education, tools, and tailored solutions to support their journey from dysregulation to self-regulation to co-regulation.