How to destress and down-regulate your nervous system with somatic awareness
Regulating your nervous system is something you can integrate into your daily life such that you not only destress and rejuvenate more effectively but you’ll also have the cultivated awareness to call on during intense moments where you want to stay present.
In late 2009 I set a goal of running the Los Angeles Marathon. I trained with a group that met by the Santa Monica Pier and we did long runs (13+ miles) every weekend increasing mileage up to 22 miles the week before the marathon.
Training for and running the Los Angeles Marathon brought many lessons – physically, mentally, and emotionally. The most impactful lesson I would say was – a deep connection with my body through somatic awareness.
We would run out, only to return to the Pier at the end of our run. Falling behind meant losing the group and for me (relatively new in LA), not knowing how to get back!
I learned very quickly to regulate my breath, focus my mind, and be with the sensations of my body. Little did I know I was cultivating somatic awareness which allowed me to self-regulate more easily in moments when my nervous system was freaking out from mental and physical stressors far different than anything I’d ever experienced.
I’ve since hung up my marathon days, my last race being the Brooklyn Half-Marathon in 2018. However, the somatic awareness that allowed me to get through those long runs has become a staple in my healing practice and work.
Somatic Awareness and Vagus Nerve Regulation
As discussed in our article on cultivating resilience, the vagus nerve is a key component of the parasympathetic nervous system, which is responsible for promoting relaxation and restoring balance in the body. Cardiac vagal tone, which changes can be measured by heart rate variability, is linked with self-regulation at the cognitive, emotional, social, and health levels (1).
When the body receives the signal to relax the parasympathetic response is triggered decreasing heart rate, blood pressure, and breathing. I later realized that the instinct to move through energy, emotions, and sensations on long runs to slow my breathing and heart rate down was an access point to nervous system regulation.
The ability to connect with the sensations of your body, somatic awareness in its simplest form, is direct access to nervous system regulation and is something that can be cultivated.
Don’t fret – you won’t need to run 13+ miles to experience these benefits.
Cultivating Somatic Awareness
The ability to be present with the sensations of your body gives you the power to relax ‘on purpose’. Learning to feel sensations of overwhelm, anxiety, grief, and loneliness in the body gives it the space to be processed, released, and integrated.
This in turn allows your body to down-regulate and shift out of the stress response instead of holding onto the feelings and often suppressing them when we don’t allow ourselves to experience them.
Cultivating somatic awareness is something you can do in your day-to-day activities, some of which you may already be involved in. Below are 3 steps to bring more intention to somatic awareness in these activities.
Integrate movement into your daily activity.
This can be as simple as going for a walk, doing a few sun salutations in the morning, or your daily workout routine. This doesn’t even have to be for long – one of my morning rituals during the colder months is what I call cacao walks. Where I make a milk drink using cacao instead of chocolate and go for a walk in my neighborhood.
A simple act of self-care that goes a very long way.
Connect to your breath
During your movement set a conscious intention to connect with your breath. You don’t have to control it just be mindful of your breath, how it moves through your body, and the sensations that accompany it.
Workouts such as yoga and pilates that coordinate breathing to movement are especially helpful here because you are intrinsically learning to breathe into the movement.
Feel the sensations
Be with any sensations that arise without judgment. Observe the tone of the sensation, where it is in your body, is it tingly, is it dull, do any emotions accompany it? Just be present.
This may be uncomfortable at first if you’re not used to allowing yourself to feel. It will get easier the more you do so. You may be surprised with what comes up – journal about it.
Regulating Your Nervous System with Somatic Awareness
With time you can learn to intentionally release and process emotional and sensational energy that you become present to.
Regulating your nervous system is something you can integrate into your daily life such that you not only destress and rejuvenate more effectively but you’ll also have the cultivated awareness to call on during intense moments when you want to stay present.
Our Happy & Peaceful Course has great exercises and journals to cultivate this practice. Specifically our framework, Dynamic Communication, introduced in this course helps to be with the sensations and emotions that come up and ground them to get clear on the communication – whether it is with others or yourself.
References
1 Heart Rate Variability and Cardiac Vagal Tone in Psychophysiological Research – Recommendations for Experiment Planning, Data Analysis, and Data Reporting PMC5316555
Hello, my name is Tiffany. My mission is to help you find soul-aligned solutions to birthing your vision on this planet.