Turn off Anxiety in Your Nervous System: 4 Ways to Turn on the Parasympathetic Response

you know that feeling you get when you're  anxious or scared or angry and you can feel your   body start to spiral out of control almost like  you're falling out of a plane without a parachute   well stick around because I want  to tell you about the built-in   emotional parachute that your body has and how  you can deploy it whenever you feel the need this video is sponsored by better help where you  can get professional affordable online counseling   for around 65 a week so check out the link in  the description for 10 off your first month i'm   Emma mcadam i'm a licensed marriage and family  therapist and in today's episode I want to talk   to you about your body's natural and trainable  counteracting response to the fight flight or   freeze response now hopefully you've seen my video  on the fight flight or freeze response it was   actually the first video I ever made for this  channel and in that video I explained that those   fight flight freeze reactions are the body's  natural stress response and how anxiety isn't just   in our mind but it's also very much manifested  in our body now there are a lot of things you can   do to help pull yourself out of the fight flight  freeze response but in this video i'm just going   to cover four simple ways that I feel work best to  calm you down and to soothe that anxiety response   so in this video we're going to cover deep  breathing and vagal tone peripheral vision and   softening the eyes the valsalva maneuver and the  yawn but first let's talk about a little biology   for context so our bodies have what's called the  autonomic nervous system this part of our nervous   system automatically regulates breathing heart  rate blood pressure and a whole bunch of other   stuff when we experience a stressful situation  the autonomic nervous system kicks on that fight   flight freeze response which is also known as the  sympathetic response this response is automatic   and it controls how much cortisol and adrenaline  are released into our system it increases our   blood pressure and our breathing rate your hands  may start to sweat your stomach may clench up   or your voice may start to shake just a little bit  these are the physical manifestations of anxiety   however our brilliant wise beautiful body has a  counterbalancing force called the parasympathetic   response and that's para as in parachute and  this is the body's natural way of slowing down   and creating a sense of calm and safety so  it works like this if your brain thinks that   you're in a dangerous situation whether that's a  tiger attacking you or just public speaking your   body may trigger the fight flight freeze response  but when the dangerous situation is resolved and   your brain knows that you're safe your body then  triggers this parasympathetic response which is   also sometimes called rest and digest it's called  this because as your body starts to relax and   transition from that fight flight freeze response  other systems in your body which had temporarily   been switched off like digestion these come back  online and they start functioning normally again   so your breathing automatically slows  down your immune system turns back on   and you're able to relax calm down and your  body has time to heal now this is how your   body naturally transitions between these two  states and as i've said it's all automatic so it   may feel like this is all out of your control but  with some training you can actually teach yourself   to kick on that parasympathetic response and to  do that you first need to know about your vagus   nerve the vagus nerve is the longest nerve in  the autonomic nervous system and this nerve   does two really important things so first it can  trigger that parasympathetic response that we want   and second it transmits signals in both directions  so that means it can send information from your   brain to your body about whether to be stressed or  calm and then it sends information from your body   to your brain about whether to be stressed or  calm so when we practice these bodily calming   techniques we actually send a message along the  vagus nerve from our body to our brain saying   that things are okay that we're safe and that  in turn calms our stress and our anxiety so now   let's go over these four body calming techniques  that will help you send these calming signals   from your body to your brain and better help you  regulate your emotions in stressful situations   so first let's talk about vagal tone bagel tone  is a measure of how strong your parasympathetic   response is it indicates how good your  autonomic nervous system is at calming down   and just like muscle tone in your arm would  indicate how much you exercise your arm   bagel tone is a measure of how much you  use your parasympathetic nervous system   and how strong it is so to start first i'm going  to just show you how to feel your bagel tone and   you'll be doing this by noticing your heart rate  variability so first find your pulse on your wrist   or if you hold really still you should  be able to feel your heart beating   now close your eyes so you can focus and  breathe in and breathe out very slowly   and pay attention to what happens to your heart  rate when you breathe in and when you breathe out okay did you notice that when you breathe  in your heart rate increases and when you   breathe out slowly your heart slows  down that is heart rate variability   for people who have a stronger vagal tone their  heart rate slows down even more on the out breath   than people who have a weaker vagal tone and just  like exercising your arm muscles you can exercise   with deep breathing to strengthen your vehicle  tongue higher vagal tone is associated with better   general health it leads to better blood sugar  regulation better heart health improved digestion   and a reduction in migraines most importantly  it improves emotional stability and resilience   lower vagal tone is associated with mood  instability depression ptsd diabetes chronic   fatigue syndrome cognitive impairment and  inflammation so you've probably heard that   deep breathing helps with stress and anxiety  and this is why deep slow breathing helps   to increase your vagal tone and trigger that  parasympathetic response through the vagus nerve   you may feel yourself relax when you do it you  may notice that you start to salivate or that your   eyes may soften and that's all thanks to how deep  breathing and vagal tone affect that vagus nerve   so practicing deep breathing and especially those  long slow out breaths can help you soothe that   stress response and it can train your body to be  better at kicking on that calming parasympathetic   response so deep breathing is a really helpful  skill for people with anxiety disorders and ptsd   so I just mentioned that your eyes  soften when you do deep breaths   I don't mean that they become squishy or  something like that but rather that they lose   focus on any one particular thing they relax and  your focus shifts from a specific visual point   to more of your peripheral vision and  everything around you so you've likely   experienced eye softening when you've been lost  in thought or daydreaming so your eyes are open   but they're not really looking at anything and  this is what I mean when I say your eyes soften   now these nerves here three and seven from the  parasympathetic system these control our eyes   uh you've maybe heard of the term tunnel vision  right that's where your vision seems to get really   narrow when you're stressed and again your brain  is sending signals along that vagus nerve to get   into that fight flight freeze response i've only  really noticed tunnel vision happened to me once   i was rock climbing up a scary route and there  was a high risk of a fall and I came to this one   spot on the route and I was you know gripping  the holds of the rock as tightly as I could   and I was looking for the next hole to keep moving  and I was really nervous my arms were just like   shaking you know I was running out of strength  and I was just looking like so hard as hard as   I could but I just couldn't see any holds um and  i'm about to fall and just then my belayer yells   up to me that there's this huge hold you know  just right basically right in front of my eyes   and and yep there it was it was like right  there but because I was feeling nervous   and my body was getting all stressed out it's  like it shut down my ability to see around me   well it turns out that tunnel vision is  a sympathetic response and again that's   part of the fight flight freeze and when we soften  our eyes we can trigger a parasympathetic response   meaning we can use our body to send signals  up the vagus nerve to the brain and tell it to   calm down now buddhists and yogis have known and  practiced this for centuries so here's the second   way to trigger that parasympathetic response so  start by softening the muscles around your eyes   so if you don't know how to consciously do that  you can start by by squeezing them shut and   then consciously like relaxing them to gain  more awareness or you can just gently touch   the side of your eyes right here you can gently  close your eyes and then open them really softly try to expand your awareness out to the sides of  your vision while keeping your eyeballs straight   ahead so you can keep looking at the screen but  then just start to notice what's out to the side   here and using that peripheral vision is a way  to trigger that calming parasympathetic response   okay a third way to calm anxiety is to  increase the pressure in your chest cavity   this is called the valsalva maneuver my  five-year-old would love this because she   loves potty talk but basically you're  gonna bear down as if you're pooping   or you can plug your nose and close your  mouth and push out as if you're gonna exhale   or like you're going to you know stifle  a sneeze so it's just kind of like this the vagus nerve actually comes  into contact with your pelvic floor   and you maybe you've seen this  when someone's mad they're like   like that when someone breathes like that and  what they're doing is they're subconsciously   increasing that pressure in their chest and then  letting it out but you can also practice this by   you know bearing down when paramedics are working  with someone who has tachycardia so that's like   a fast heartbeat they'll often tell them to bear  down because this triggers the heart to slow down   so bearing down is another way to stimulate  that nerve and to send signals to your brain   to calm down to trigger that parasympathetic  response so try breathing in for five seconds then hold it and bear down for five seconds  now you don't need to push hard you just   need to create a little pressure in your chest  and then finally breathe out for five seconds and do this once or twice in a row breathing  regularly in between so you don't get light headed   and this can help trigger that vagus nerve now finally the fourth action to trigger that  vagus nerve is to yawn so my favorite way to do   this is to make the r sound open your mouth  really big and try to lift your soft palate   in the back of the roof of your mouth  there's a decent chance that this is   going to make you yawn or you can even  try a fake yawn to trigger that response this action makes me sleepy  and relaxed almost every time   um you may have seen this reaction in  your fur babies have you ever noticed how   if a dog gets like super hyper they'll start  doing these huge dog yawns as they calm down   my dog geneva used to do this all the time  in the car she loved car trips so she would   get super excited about the car and then she'd  be in the car and she would start to do these   big yawns like that um and you know how yawns are  contagious well that's because yawning is actually   a herd behavior these contagious yawns keep the  pack from going wild with excitement these yawns   send a message between dogs to each of these  animals vagus nerves to say you know chill out   calm down you're okay so those are the four quick  ways to trigger the parasympathetic response   but there are a bunch of other techniques you  can try so watch for part two of this video   if you've tried these techniques before or  if you have others that have worked for you   leave them down below in a comment i'd love  to know about them I hope you found this video   helpful learning to turn on that parasympathetic  response could be a great skill to have when   dealing with anxiety disorders ptsd depression and  stress also if you know someone who could benefit   from these skills please share this video and give  it a like so that others can find this content   thank you so much for watching if you'd like to  learn more about how to ground your mind and body   check out my online courses in my free  grounding skills course i teach about   25 skills to ground the nervous system and to  develop a stronger nervous system regulation   and in my coping skills and self-care course I  teach dozens of ways to cope with intense emotions   the links are in the description  thank you for watching and take care

Channel: Therapy in a Nutshell

Views: 766,753

Rating: 4.9583921 out of 5

Keywords: therapy in a nutshell, parasympathetic response, parasympathetic response, parasympathetic response vs sympathetic response, parasympathetic nervous system

Id: FPH5CFSmYEU

Length: 14min 43sec (883 seconds)

Published: Thu Nov 19 2020