Nervous System Regulation Practices
Many of the challenges that bring people to coaching and somatic work can have a nervous system dimension. Anxiety, chronic stress, emotional overwhelm, difficulty slowing down, people-pleasing, perfectionism, persistent muscular tension and burnout can all affect, and be affected by, the way we respond to stress, uncertainty and perceived threat. Our relationships can be influenced too. When we're activated, overwhelmed or disconnected from ourselves, it can be harder to recognise what we need, communicate clearly, set boundaries or respond to another person with the flexibility we might have when we feel more settled.
The practices on this page offer different ways of working with the body, attention, breath, movement, sound and emotion. Some are intended to support settling and grounding, while others may help you become more aware of sensation, emotion, tension or habitual patterns. The intention isn't to force yourself into a particular state, but to develop a greater capacity to notice what is happening within you and discover what genuinely supports you.
For some people, a practice may bring an immediate sense of calm, grounding or presence. For others, slowing down can initially make them more aware of restlessness, tiredness, tension, emotion or thoughts that were less noticeable while they were busy or distracted. What matters is how you respond to what you notice.
This is why pacing is important. More isn't necessarily better, and regulation isn't measured by how relaxed you can make yourself become. You might begin with only a minute or two, notice what happens before, during and afterwards, and gradually discover which practices feel supportive for you. If something feels overwhelming, you don't need to push through it. You can stop, orient to your surroundings, move your attention elsewhere or return to something that feels more familiar and grounding.
Over time, these small experiences can help you develop a more responsive relationship with your body and emotions. Rather than trying to override what your system is doing, the invitation is to become more curious about it: What am I noticing? What happens when I stay with this for a moment? Do I need more activation or less? More contact or more space? What helps me feel more present and able to choose how I respond?
The practices below offer different starting points. You don't need to do all of them, and there isn't one practice that will be right for everyone. Experiment gently and notice what works for you.
Vagus Nerve Practice
The vagus nerve is one part of the parasympathetic nervous system and is involved in communication between the brain and many of the body's internal organs. Practices involving breathing, vocalisation, movement and attention are often used to support settling and regulation, although the nervous system is considerably more complex than a simple “on/off” switch between stress and relaxation.
This 45-minute guided practice that you can follow as a complete session, or you can experiment with some of the individual exercises for shorter periods.
Watch the vagus nerve practice on YouTube
I've also written more about the vagus nerve, stress and some of the ways it is commonly understood within nervous system work.
Read: The Vagus Nerve – Your Body's Stress Management System
Self-Soothing Practice: Safe, Peace, Hope, Calm
This is a simple somatic practice for bringing attention to qualities such as safety, peace, hope and calm and noticing how your body responds to them. Rather than trying to convince yourself that you should feel safe or calm, the practice allows you to notice whether even a small sense of one of these qualities is available.
It can also be interesting to notice if a particular word or feeling is difficult to connect with. In Indian philosophical traditions, the term samskara is sometimes used to describe impressions or conditioning created through previous experience. I offer this as one way of understanding how our past can continue to influence our expectations, reactions and habitual ways of responding.
Watch the Safe, Peace, Hope, Calm practice
TRE® – Tension & Trauma Releasing Exercises
TRE® uses a sequence of exercises designed to activate the body's natural tremoring response. Tremoring can help release patterns of muscular tension and holding, and many people experience a sense of settling, openness or release afterwards. It can also bring greater awareness to areas of the body that have been braced or held and, at times, emotions may arise alongside the physical movement. The practice is less about making something happen and more about allowing the tremor to unfold while staying connected to your experience.
Read my guide to TRE® and tremoring
Emotional Digestion
Sometimes we become so caught in the story surrounding an emotion that we have very little contact with the emotion as a direct experience. At other times, we may feel something intensely without understanding what it is communicating or what we need to do with it.
Emotional Digestion practices offer another way of meeting emotion. Noticing thoughts and stories while also becoming curious about sensation, impulses and what is happening in the body. The intention isn't to get rid of the emotion or force a release, but to develop greater capacity to experience what is present without immediately becoming consumed by it.
Read: A Guide to Processing Your Emotions
Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT)
Emotional Freedom Technique, usually known as EFT or tapping, combines focused attention on thoughts or emotions with rhythmic tapping on a sequence of points on the face and upper body. The technique draws partly on the meridian framework found in traditional Chinese medicine and combines this with elements of contemporary psychological approaches.
I use EFT as a practical way of staying in contact with a difficult thought, feeling or belief while bringing in a repetitive physical action. Some people find this reduces the intensity of what they're experiencing or gives them enough space to relate to it differently.
A short EFT video and step-by-step guide can help you learn the basic sequence so that you can experiment with the practice for yourself.
Toning
Toning uses sustained vocal sounds and the vibration created by the voice as an embodied practice. Sound can affect breathing, create vibration through the throat and chest and provide a form of expression that doesn't depend upon words. I sometimes use toning within somatic and de-armouring work, particularly where someone is exploring expression, inhibition or their relationship with their voice.
For some people, sustained sound practices can be surprisingly powerful, so I prefer people to experience this with appropriate guidance before using more intensive toning practices alone, particularly if they have a history of trauma or find strong embodied practices overwhelming.
In my own practice, I use the Washington Monument Frequency recordings created by David Sereda. This is an energetic/spiritual practice rather than something I present as a scientifically established nervous system intervention.
Washington Monument Frequency recordings
Fetal Curl
The Fetal Curl is a Core Awareness practice involving gentle curling and opening movements. It can be explored slowly as a way of bringing attention to the relationship between the spine, breath, psoas and the body's natural patterns of flexion and extension.
Rather than trying to achieve a particular release, notice how the movement feels, where it is easy or restricted and what changes as you move between curling inward and opening outward. Going slow in this and the next two practices really allows you to feel sensations and emotions more deeply.
Explore the Fetal Curl practice
Warding Off
Warding Off is another Core Awareness exploration, this time working with protective movement and the body's capacity to create space. I particularly like practices of this kind because boundaries aren't only something we understand cognitively; we can also explore what it feels like physically to push away, create distance, say no or protect our space.
Psoas Relief
The psoas is a deep muscle connecting the lumbar spine with the femur and is involved in movement and postural organisation. Because it participates in movements such as walking, hip flexion and stabilisation, it can be interesting to explore how it responds to gentle movement rather than approaching it as a muscle that needs to be aggressively stretched or “released.”
These simple fluid movements offer one way of bringing movement and awareness to this area.
Watch the Psoas Relief practice
Circuit Breaker: Short Practices for Everyday Life
Not every nervous system practice needs to be a 45-minute exercise. Often what is more useful is having something you can return to for one to five minutes during an ordinary day.
I created my Circuit Breaker playlist as a collection of short practices that can interrupt the momentum that sometimes builds when stress, thoughts and emotions accumulate throughout the day. Rather than waiting until you're completely overwhelmed, these practices offer small opportunities to pause, reconnect with yourself and notice what you need.
Explore my Circuit Breaker playlist
Bone Tapping
Bone tapping is a simple embodied practice that uses rhythmic tapping across different areas of the body to stimulate circulation, increase body awareness and support nervous system regulation. It can be particularly useful when you feel caught in your head, disconnected from your body or in need of a quick practice to help you become more present and grounded.
Finding What Works for You
Nervous system regulation isn't about becoming calm all the time. A healthy, responsive system needs access to many different states: we need energy to act, mobilise and protect ourselves, as well as the capacity to rest, connect and recover. The aim of these practices is therefore not to eliminate activation, difficult emotions or discomfort, but to develop greater flexibility in how you meet them.
You may find that some of these practices settle you while others make you feel more alive, emotional or aware. Your response may also change from one day to another. Try not to turn regulation into another task you have to perform correctly. Start small, stay curious and allow your experience to tell you when to continue, when to slow down and when enough is enough.
If a practice repeatedly leaves you significantly overwhelmed, dissociated or unable to settle afterwards, that is a good reason not to keep pushing through it alone. Working with an appropriately qualified practitioner can provide additional support and help you find an approach that is better suited to your circumstances.
