breathing

The Vagus Nerve and 5 Ways to Tone It

Self-Regulation

Presented by Ashley Turner (source)

The Vagus Nerve

  • Also known as the “Wandering Nerve”
    • Connects to most vital organs
      • From the brain through the face and thorax to the abdomen
      • Carries information from the gut, liver, heart and lungs to the brain
    • Mediator of our parasympathetic (rest & digest) response 
    • Influences breathing, digestion and heart rate
      • Sends message to slow down heart rate
        • Releases: acetylcholine (a calming chemical) 
  • Listen to: Polyvagal Theory with Dr. Stephen Porges to learn more about the different branches of the vagus

5 Ways to Tone the Vagus Nerve

  1. Deep Belly Breathing: lengthen the inhale + exhale; calms, tones + soothes the vagus nerve
    • e.g., Meditation 🧘🏾‍♀️
photo of woman singing
Photo by White Gold Photography
  1. Chanting: singing or chanting are great ways to tone the vagus nerve
    • e.g., Singing songs from your favourite Spotify playlist 🎵
  2. Spinal Flexion: massages the vagus nerve
    • e.g., Yoga (cat/cow, seated spinal movements) 🌸
  3. Belly Laughing: increases circulation, blood flow, tones diagram + strengthens the vagus nerve
    • e.g., Watch comedies 😂
  4. Splash Face: tones your vagus nerve in the morning and resets/wakes up your nervous system
    • e.g., Splash face and eyes in the morning with cool water 💦

Why Tone the Vagus Nerve?

  • Decreases stress and anxiety (activates rest & digest system)
  • Deepens breathing
  • Lowers heart rate and increases circulation in the body
  • Opens emotional capacity (feeling grounded and lighter)

Ready to get started?

Vagus Nerve: Breathing for Relaxation
Spotify – Summer Hits Playlist
Cat-Cow Yoga Pose – Yoga With Adriene

WEBSITE DISCLAIMER

This website is provided only for informational purposes and not intended to be used to replace professional advice, treatment or professional care. Always speak to your physician, healthcare provider or pediatrician if you have concerns about your own health or the health of a child.

The Science of Yoga

Health & Lifestyle

Produced by Uplift TV (source)

Four Components of Yoga

  • Physical
    • Postures, stretches, exercises, movements, breathing and relaxation techniques
    • Affects our body’s overall functioning 
  • Self-Regulation
    • Ability to control internal stress and emotional responses 
    • Leads to resilience to stress, self-efficacy and equanimity in the face of emotions
  • Mind-Body Awareness
    • Feeling and experiencing what’s going on in the body and mind (being able to observe the flow of thought)
    • Leads to increased mindfulness that can change behaviours in a positive way
  • Experiencing Deeper States
    • Spiritual, transformative, leads to positive lifestyle and goals, improves and enhances life meaning and purpose 
Photo by Ketut Subiyanto

Benefits of Yoga

  • Research has shown measures of reduction in:
    • Depression
    • Anxiety
    • Psychological distress
    • Frequency of negative experiences 
  • Increase in resiliency and the frequency of positive experiences
  • Improvement in mental health
  • Creates much needed space in the body and mind 
  • Establishes connections by moving energy through the body
  • Yoga stretches the body; meditation empties the mind 
  • Enables management of the stress response system 

Breathing

  • Breath is the most powerful tool that everyone has to bring their stress response under their control 
  • It’s possible to reduce blood pressure by controlling breathing
  • Blood pressure is controlled by the sympathetic nervous system (the messenger of the stress response) 
  • Postures in yoga creates challenge that our mind is constantly dealing with; this can be controlled through breathing
  • Breathing + effort of regulating thought enhance parasympathetic nervous signal and brings sympathetic nervous signal down 
  • Breathing can be practiced within yoga and in daily life 

Mind & Brain

  • Yoga strengthens the power of the mind and how we connect with the world
  • The mind controls our health and biology 
  • 1% of illness is related to genes; 90% of illness is related to stress 
  • Yoga brings the mind into focus and can change brain activity and structure (such as plasticity, resulting in the brain becoming conducive to the benefits that come with yoga and meditation)
  • Can change and enhance gene activity that’s good for you (improved immune response); down-regulates negative gene activity when under chronic stress (inflammation) 
Photo by Polina Tankilevitch

Barriers to Moving Yoga Forward 

  • Perception and misconceptions about yoga, often created by the media:
    • Yoga viewed as complex exercise forms and postures; requires you to be flexible, thin, young to practice; is difficult, specific and not adaptable to individual circumstances
      • Yoga practices can be adapted to any population, and still train the same properties (mind-body coordination, mindfulness, awareness) 
  • Chair yoga for elders
  • Can be done with young children

Global Benefits 

  • Survival requires the foundation of human behaviours and the way we respond to life and to change
  • Using our individual power for harmony, connection, union
    • First done by the individual through healing themselves, taking back power over their behaviour, becoming in harmony and good health  
    • Establishing awareness, self-regulation, immunity to stress, compassion, high-mindedness, clarity 
    • Our collective nature as individuals becomes stronger and harmonious, leading to a greater influence on the planet 
  • Engaging in yoga is a practice of evolution and transformation on society as a whole 

Ready to get started?

Yoga with Adriene

Arianna Elizabeth

Black Yogi Nico Marie

Breathe and Flow

The Bare Female

Mady Morrison

Yoga With Bird

Alo Yoga

Lululemon

Yoga for Kids

Yoga for Elders

WEBSITE DISCLAIMER

This website is provided only for informational purposes and not intended to be used to replace professional advice, treatment or professional care. Always speak to your physician, healthcare provider or pediatrician if you have concerns about your own health or the health of a child.

How to Breathe! To Activate the Calm Response in Your Body

Self-Regulation

“No matter what you eat, how much you exercise, how skinny or young or wise you are, none of it matters if you’re not breathing properly. There is nothing more essential to our health and well-being than breathing: take air in, let it out, repeat 25,000 times a day. Yet, as a species, humans have lost the ability to breathe correctly, with grave consequences.”

– James Nestor, Breath: The New Science of a Lost Art

How to Breathe! To Activate the Calm Response in Your Body is a video presentation by Melissa Holland Mansika. Melissa is a stay-at-home mom, homeschool teacher and career and life transition specialist from Boulder, Colorado. She has a background in teaching graduate psychology students career counselling, life transitions and positive psychology. It is a pleasure to learn from and alongside her as one of my peers in the Self-Reg Facilitator’s Program course!

As a result of her curiosity on the breath and breathing, she created and shared this video presentation about a way of breathing that can activate the calm response in the body. Upon request, after watching her presentation, Melissa kindly gave me permission to share it. In this video, she shares traps and tips of breathing, the anatomy of the breath, and the difference between nasal and mouth breathing. Thank you, Melissa, for expanding my understanding on the breath and breathing, and for allowing your knowledge on this topic to be shared with others!

“Taking some time to learn about the complexity of the breath in the human body, can result in greatly reduced hidden stressors.”

– Melissa Holland Mansika

For Career and Life Transition Coaching, connect with Melissa Holland Mansika by visiting her WayFinders website.

How to Breathe! To Activate the Calm Response in Your Body by Melissa Holland Mansika

Additional Resources on Breathing

Breath: The New Science of a Lost Art, by James Nestor

How to Maximize the Power of Your Breath (The Goop Podcast with James Nestor)

Conscious Breathing: Discover the Power of your Breath, by Anders Olsson

Calming Down a Stressed Brain Through Conscious Breathing with Anders Olsson

The Oxygen Advantage, by Patrick McKeown

Shut Your Mouth to Change Your Life with Patrick McKeown

WEBSITE DISCLAIMER

This website is provided only for informational purposes and not intended to be used to replace professional advice, treatment or professional care. Always speak to your physician, healthcare provider or pediatrician if you have concerns about your own health or the health of a child.