Six Activities To Balance Your Nervous System
Safe to say, we have all been under stress lately. Change is hard, and there has been a lot going around in every aspect of life. Stress can take a toll on our nervous system, leaving us unbalanced and ungrounded.
As you maneuver the changes in your life, here are 6 activities to balance your nervous system and rein in the associated stress impacting your well-being and possibly your adrenal balance.
Be Present
Seeing thoughts and not reacting gives you space to step out of panic mode and stop activating your adrenals and the fight or flight response. Ninety-nine percent of what we worry and even panic about isn’t real or going to happen.
One of my first yoga teachers explained it this way.
Imagine you are on the beach watching the tide come in. The waves are strong, and your initial response is to panic and feel like the waves will wash you out to sea.
Alternatively, you can watch your thoughts, catch them, and choose to think of them differently. Then, you can tell yourself, here come the waves. Still, I will not be swept up by them as you calmly watch them coming in and then going out, realizing you were never really at risk of drowning at that moment.
Being present takes practice, but it is worth the reward.
Breathe
One of the most basic breathing practices in yoga is called Victory Breath. A slight constriction in the back of the throat when breathing out, causing a sound akin to an ocean wave or a very light Darth Vadar breath, helps slow and lengthen the exhalation.
Increasing the exhalation is beneficial as it strengthens the parasympathetic branch of the nervous system (the rest and digest branch) and helps ease the other branch where we spend too much time – the sympathetic (fight or flight).
Try this technique several times daily to help calm your body and mind.
Body Scan
You can practice a body scan standing, sitting, or lying down.
Simply bringing your awareness to your body helps to relax tight spots and to calm your mind.
Start at the crown of your head and move toward your feet, covering all body parts. Pay attention to areas where you feel sensations, tightness, and pain.
Take an extra breath or two to bring your awareness deeper into these places inviting every inhalation to be a coming home and every exhalation a letting go.
This practice helps keep you grounded in your body and helps bring you closer to the parasympathetic nervous system, helping your body let go and heal.
Find Calm
Gentle yoga and meditation help you to let go of low-level stress. These practices also help you to become more aware and lessen nervous system reactivity. This enables the body to react differently to stressors with a calmer approach.
Research supports that yoga can help regulate the sympathetic nervous system and the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis.
Move
Moderate physical activity supports a shift out of stress mode while activating the hormonal production of the adrenal glands. On the other hand, high-intensity activity can drain the adrenals, so moderate is best.
Walking and gentle hiking are good activities, especially if you can get outside and reap the benefits of the outdoors.
Sleep
Last on the list, but definitely, not least, is sleep! Adults need somewhere between 7 and 9 hours of sleep per night. Yet, according to the CDC, 35.2% of U.S. adults report sleeping on average for less than seven hours per night. In addition, adrenal overload often causes low energy and low sleep quality.
One way to combat this is to reset your circadian rhythm by going to bed and waking at the same time every day. Also, getting 15-20 minutes of sunlight exposure within three hours of waking. Sunlight is a natural alarm clock for your body. Also, avoid bright lights at night, at least a few hours before bedtime.
This prevents the wiring of your brain just before trying to turn it off for sleep.
If you feel tired and on edge, choose one thing on this list of six activities to balance your nervous system and start there to bring your nervous system back toward a state of balance.
Over time listening to your body and giving it what it needs can help us live a more balanced and joyful life!
About the Author
Hope Knosher is the founder of Healthy Living With Hope and Hope’s Yoga. Based in Atlanta, Georgia, she is a Certified E-RYT500 Yoga Teacher, Certified Health & Wellness Coach & Certified Yoga Therapist with the International Association of Yoga Therapists.
Hope and her work have been featured in numerous publications, including Reader’s Choice “Best Of Atlanta” by Atlanta
Magazine, one of Atlanta’s “Over 40 & Fabulous” by Best Self Atlanta, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution for her work with cancer survivors, MindBodyGreen, Noteworthy, Mantra Yoga & Health and cover features with Northside Woman and Yoga Magazine.
Hope’s weekly yoga classes are open to everyone in Johns Creek, Georgia. She also offers corporate yoga & meditation, wellness coaching, and workshops. Hope is a regular guest speaker on yoga, Mindfulness, and Health & wellness topics. Learn more about Hope.
Contact Hope here or subscribe to future posts here.
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