Accessing the Healing Power of the Vagus Nerve: Self-Help Exercises for Anxiety, Depression, Trauma, and Autism

If we are trying to restore the regulation of our nervous system with social interaction, we must be sure that the people with whom we choose to interact are themselves well functioning. A simple way of evaluating this is to ask ourselves, “When I am with them, do I feel better afterward?” We have all had experiences of being with people and feelin

People with a diagnosis of depression, or people in a depressed state, typically lose interest in activities that once were pleasurable. They over-eat, experience loss of appetite, or have digestive problems. They have reduced energy, and they become inactive, introverted, apathetic, help-less, and asocial. They can feel sad, anxious, empty, hopele

fighting in order to overcome the threat or fleeing to avoid a threatening situation.

By getting the autonomic nervous system to function better, I have been able to help people with a wide variety of chronic problems that have not been helped by other modalities of treatment, whether allopathic or alternative. Although I have worked with many different kinds of health issues, I was especially pleased by my successes in helping COPD

Activation of the spinal sympathetic chain in the “fight or flight” response is one of the three possible states of the autonomic nervous system,

The enteric nervous system is a network of nerves interconnecting the visceral organs. We know next to nothing about these nerves;

our nervous system may be stuck in the past, poised to fight or flee at the slightest trigger from the environment. A wonderful example of this is an Abbott and Costello sketch called “Slowly I Turned” (searchable on YouTube).

In 1994, in his presidential lecture for the Society for Psychophysi-ological Research, Stephen Porges introduced his Polyvagal Theory,

hands-on healing technique

improve their breathing capacity and thereby increase oxygen uptake into their blood.