Nihilist Penguin, Healing Tarkan: A Nervous System Journey from Freeze to Expansion

Last week, two themes kept appearing on my social media feed: the Penguin documentary and the Tarkan concerts.

Both touched my heart and stirred many emotions within me.

A scene from the Penguin documentary began circulating again: a large penguin colony splits into two, yet one penguin turns away from both groups and walks alone toward the mountains. A movement that contradicts what we “know” about colony-bound penguins. Almost every video asks, “Why did the penguin do this?” and replays the solitary walk with dramatic music. The clip is reposted, reinterpreted, commented on again and again.

My question was the same: Why?

But what I found myself questioning was not the penguin’s choice. It was why this scene, from a documentary released in 2007, was suddenly circulating so widely now. What was it that led people to label a penguin “nihilist”? What created such deep identification? The comments repeated similar emotional tones: loneliness, despair, restlessness, exhaustion.

Nihilist Penguin

I observed what this stirred in my own body. Each time I watched it, my chest tightened. I felt the need to take a deep breath, to press my feet firmly into the ground and remind myself: “I am here. I am not going anywhere.” Because it appeared so many times, I had many opportunities to observe my internal response. There were moments when I remembered people who had left my life and felt the weight of grief in my eyes. There were moments when I felt the urge to withdraw, to disappear, to walk away myself.

Freeze. Perhaps even collapse.

The nervous system’s instinct to withdraw when emotions feel overwhelming. Many of the comments reflected a similar emotional state: restless, helpless, contracted.

Now, let’s turn to the Tarkan concerts.

I could not attend, but I am deeply grateful to those who shared their experiences. From the front rows, balconies, side screens—countless videos circulated. Women, men, mothers, young people attending their first Tarkan concert, artists, businesspeople, veterans of the scene… People from different backgrounds and experiences meeting in a shared emotional space. Some added sociological or psychological commentary; others turned it into humor with new headlines and voiceovers. The concerts ended, yet many venues continue hosting Tarkan nights.

There was unity there: dancing to the same song regardless of age, belief, ideology. Joy, excitement, hope—and a word repeated often in the comments: healing.

As I watched the concert videos, my body responded very differently. My lips curved upward, my eyes softened into a smile, my shoulders began to move. I relaxed. I felt joyful, grateful, hopeful. I felt the urge to share this energy, to spread it, to let it ripple outward.

This is the state in which the nervous system feels safe, calm, and connected—where joy even activates a gentle sympathetic energy. The ventral vagal state. The place where we feel centered, able to connect, able to communicate—not merely surviving in the face of threat, but experiencing life with aliveness.

Tarkan’s presence—his stance, energy, music, movement—if I speak in the language of my field, his aura—seems to ignite this field of unity and healing. Yet it also grows through the response of those who participate. It reminded me of a metaphor I used recently: the candle. Perhaps Tarkan is not a candle but a torch. And each person who lights their own flame from that torch carries and spreads the light further.

Taken from Tarkan’s official Instagram account. Photographer: Yiğit Eken.

In the same week, two nervous system states circulated widely across social media:

One of contraction and grief.

One of connection and expansion.

Energy works like this. We all carry within us both the penguin and the healing torch. The impulse to withdraw and the impulse to open coexist.

Life grows where the heart is open. When we are open, our dreams expand. Our motivation rises. We feel more connected to ourselves, to our consciousness, to our intentions. Our contact with the world—people, objects, other beings—deepens.

When we close, however, experiences tend to loop us back to the same threshold. We become stuck in certain painful patterns, shrink under anxiety’s control, focus only on staying safe. Minimal contact. Less creation. Less self-expression.

Sometimes this state is numb. Sometimes it is highly functional. To-do lists are completed perfectly. Roles are performed successfully. Life continues efficiently.

But there is more than merely surviving.

So perhaps the question becomes:

How do I awaken my heart?

How do I rekindle my willingness to live fully?

How do I recognize when I am aligned with myself?

From a nervous system perspective, many things can help shift us into ventral vagal tone: uplifting content, meaningful social interaction, movement, touch.

Yet I want to speak about imagination.

As some quantum-based therapists say, we attract what we declare. In Sufi tradition, “every thought is a ‘be’.” When we observe our body language, we notice that a relaxed nervous system increases our daily energy, our capacity for movement and completion. We create more.

Just as external stimuli shape our nervous system, so does our inner imagery.

When we imagine how we want to live our day, the coming weeks, the coming years, we are already initiating the bodily response required to realize that vision. We are inviting possibility.

The essential task is to discern the source and impact of that dream. To recognize the dream aligned with our soul.

And this is not so difficult.

The subtle movement in your body when you sing along to a song...

The warmth that appears when you embrace someone you love...

The freshness after a deep night’s sleep...

If the dream you are holding creates a similar sense of expansion, nurture it. Let it grow. Let it have concrete plans, yes—but focus less on what you want to possess and more on how you want to feel. In that dream, can you see yourself as a torch lighting other torches?

If your dream consists of familiar, socially repeated images that create a rational “yes, this is correct,” yet do not evoke a smile in your body or warmth in your heart, perhaps it is time to reconsider.

Because life does not become vivid when we join the penguin in frozen places. It becomes alive when, like Tarkan moving from his authentic self, we act from the core of who we are.