The vagus nerve is the longest nerve in the human body. It travels from our neck down to our abdomen. It is the main nerve in charge of our “fight or flight” reflex through the activation of the relaxation response that reduces the heart rate and drops our blood pressure. It has been shown that stimulation of the vagus nerve can turn on or off this natural stress response of the body. Almost like stepping on the brake in your car.
Technically, the vagus nerve is comprised of a pair, with each one directly activating the right or left side of the body. It is very lengthy and branches out to wander about connecting with every major organ from the brain down to the colon.
The vagus nerve should be regarded as the key mediator of the “body (thinking)-mind (feeling) connection”. This is evident in how it is utilized in our breathing. When we breath slow and deep we tend to relax and our heart rate slows. This quiets our mind and shuts off the sympathetic nervous system or our “fight or flight” response.
When we breath, the lungs send signals to the brain via the sensory nodes through the vagus nerve. The brain then uses the vagus nerve to send information to the heart to either slow down or speed up. Depending on the situation.
There is no two ways about it, the vagus nerve is involved in establishing a calmer state in the body which effects the mind and vice versa. It’s the body’s main wiring system that connects our active thinking center of the brain with the corresponding feelings of the body. I’m sure it’s a part of our innate survival network to alert the body to respond in an emergency or in times of stress.
We’ve all heard it said to “trust your gut” but more accurately, what they should be saying is to “trust your vagus nerve”.
But along with all the other systems of the body, the vagus nerve can sometimes not work as well as it should. In these cases, the body tends to stay on high alert. You can tell by when you are more irritable, emotional, experiencing a racing heart, feeling on edge, brain fog, worry, fearful, panic attacks, and trouble falling to sleep.
How to measure the health, strength and quality of the vagus nerve is referred to as your “vagal tone.”
One of the main ways of measuring the functionality of the vagus nerve is through heart rate variability (HRV). Heart rate variability is the rate in which the heart fluctuates in between when we inhale (which naturally speeds up the heart) and exhale (naturally slows down). The difference of the two rates measures a persons vagal tone.
Physical activity, obesity and overall health can effect the vagal tone. Athletes for example have been shown to have better quality vagal tone than most non-athletes. An example of those with lower quality vagal tone would be, elderly people and obese individuals who get less exercise, the bed-ridden, heavy drinkers, clinically depressed and astronauts (who are in non-gravity environments).
So movement, level of exercise and state of mind all play a part of conditioning the vegas nerve.
Other practices that are believed to improve our vagal tone include: deep, slow breathing, laughing, humming and singing, acupuncture, yoga and cold water showers. Another discipline that could be added to this list is LENS neurofeedback therapy.
Working with LENS on my clients has shown me that you don’t need to address issues of anxiety and parasympathetic imbalances only through the head. But, can just as effectively (and often more so), use different access points throughout the body to calm it down. My feeling is that stress and trauma are a full expression of the entire body. So it needs to be treated accordingly. Feelings that are old or new, seem to reside in different biological landscapes. Whether it’s your shoulder and neck region or lower back and hips.
The vagus nerve covers so much territory. This could be the reason that when emotional stress is ramped up it can be so debilitating. Brain-born signals travel to physiological destinations where they can reside for years. Holding on to their same maladaptive patterns, responsible for the old behaviors they support.
So in many ways, the condition of the vagus nerve or our vagal tone is a big factor in our overall wellbeing. It is the highway for thoughts and feelings to pass to and from the brain to the body.
-A Balanced Brain is a Better Brain for a Happier Life-