In this blog, I’m pleased to share one of my all-time favourite articles about the benefits and ways to stimulate the longest cranial nerve in the body — the vagus nerve — which carries signals between your brain, heart and digestive system.
The autonomic nervous system has two divisions: sympathetic (arousing) and parasympathetic (calming). While your sympathetic nervous system (SNS) controls your body’s fight/flight/freeze response, your parasympathetic nervous system (PNS) helps to manage your body’s response during times of rest.
Trauma, PTSD, anxiety, high stress response levels, etc. are related to a very active SNS. By stimulating the vagus nerve, we help to activate the PNS instead, which is the “rest and digest” nervous system.
Click HERE to read more on this topic by the article’s author Jordan Fallis. He notes: “..what you really need to pay special attention to is the tone of your vagus nerve. Vagal tone is an internal biological process that represents the activity of the vagus nerve. Increasing your vagal tone activates the parasympathetic nervous system, and having higher vagal tone means that your body can relax faster after stress.” His list of practical tips to increase one’s vagal tone include slow and deep breathing, meditation, singing, humming, yoga and tai chi, acupuncture, socializing and laughing.
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