The Vagus Nerve and Your Nervous System

When we're stressed, overwhelmed or constantly “on”, we often try to think our way into feeling better. But stress isn't experienced only through the mind. It affects breathing, heart rate, digestion, muscle tension, sleep and our ability to settle after something difficult. The vagus nerve is one of the important pathways involved in this relationship between the brain and body, and understanding it can give us another way of thinking about nervous system regulation.

What Is the Vagus Nerve?

The vagus nerve is the longest of the cranial nerves, travelling from the brainstem through the neck and into the chest and abdomen, where it communicates with organs including the heart, lungs and digestive system. Its name comes from the Latin vagus, meaning “wandering”, reflecting the extensive route it takes through the body.

It is a major component of the parasympathetic nervous system, which is involved in functions associated with rest, digestion and recovery. Rather than thinking of the vagus nerve as an on/off switch that takes us from stressed to calm, it is more useful to see it as part of a much larger regulatory system that continually responds to what is happening both inside and around us.

This is one reason stress can feel so physical. A difficult conversation may change your breathing or tighten your stomach. Anxiety can affect digestion. Feeling safe and supported by another person can sometimes allow your shoulders to drop or your breath to deepen before you've consciously decided to relax. Our minds and bodies are in constant communication.

You can explore this relationship further in Is Stress in Your Head or Your Body? and my Nervous System Regulation Practices resource.

The Vagus Nerve and Heart Rate Variability

You may come across the term vagal tone, which is commonly used when discussing how effectively parasympathetic influences are involved in regulating the heart. One way researchers investigate this relationship is through heart rate variability (HRV), the natural variation in time between individual heartbeats.

HRV is influenced by many factors, including breathing, physical fitness, sleep, age and health, so it isn't simply a score for how “regulated” your nervous system is. However, particular measures of HRV can provide useful information about parasympathetic activity and how flexibly the cardiovascular system responds to changing demands.

Breathing illustrates this beautifully. Your heart rate naturally changes slightly as you breathe in and out. Slowing the breath, particularly without straining, can influence this rhythm and is one reason breathing practices can change how we experience our bodies.

The Gut-Brain Connection

The vagus nerve also forms an important part of the communication network between the brain and digestive system. Crucially, this communication travels in both directions. The brain influences digestion, but signals arising from the body also travel back towards the brain.

This helps explain why emotional experiences can be felt so strongly in the gut. You might lose your appetite when anxious, experience “butterflies” before something important or notice digestive symptoms becoming more pronounced during periods of prolonged stress.

The relationship is much more complex than the vagus nerve alone. The enteric nervous system, immune system, hormones and gut microbiome are also involved, but it provides a fascinating example of why separating psychological and physical wellbeing isn't always particularly useful.

The Vagus Nerve and Inflammation

The vagus nerve has also become an important area of research because of its relationship with immune signalling and inflammation. Research associated with neuroscientist Kevin Tracey described an “inflammatory reflex”, a neural pathway through which the nervous and immune systems communicate.

This area of research has contributed to medical interest in electrical vagus nerve stimulation for certain conditions. It is important, however, to distinguish clinical vagus nerve stimulation from the gentle practices commonly described online as “vagus nerve exercises”. Breathing, humming or yoga are not equivalent to medical vagus nerve stimulation, but they can still be useful embodied practices for working with breath, attention and nervous system state.

Can You Tell If You Have “Low Vagal Tone”?

Online discussions sometimes attribute a very broad range of symptoms — anxiety, poor sleep, digestive difficulties, inflammation, emotional dysregulation and fatigue — to “low vagal tone”. In reality, these experiences can have many different causes, and symptoms alone can't tell us how well someone's vagus nerve is functioning.

What can be more useful is noticing your capacity to move between different states. How easily do you settle after stress? Can you recognise when you're becoming overwhelmed? What helps you reconnect with your body? Can you rest without immediately needing more stimulation? Can you move from activation towards settling and then mobilise again when life requires it?

Nervous system regulation isn't about remaining calm all the time. A healthy nervous system needs access to activation as well as rest. The aim is greater flexibility and capacity rather than permanent relaxation.

Practices That Can Support Regulation

There isn't one exercise that “resets” the vagus nerve, and different practices will feel supportive to different people. I prefer to think of the following as ways of working with the body and nervous system rather than techniques for forcing ourselves into a particular state.

Slow Breathing

Slowing the breath can influence heart rate and parasympathetic activity. You might experiment with allowing the breath to become slightly slower and fuller, noticing whether a comfortable, longer exhalation feels supportive. There is no need to force an exact breathing ratio.

Sometimes breathwork feels calming; at other times, becoming more aware of the breath can initially make us aware of tension, emotion or restlessness that was already present. Both are useful information.

Humming, Chanting & Vocal Toning

Humming, chanting and vocal toning combine breath with sound and vibration. A long hum or sustained vowel naturally lengthens the exhalation, while the vibration can be felt through the throat, chest, face and sometimes much more widely through the body.

Sound is something I use regularly within somatic and de-armouring work. It can support expression as well as regulation. Sometimes allowing something that is difficult to put into words to be experienced through breath, vibration and voice instead.

Movement & Yoga

Slow movement, yoga, stretching and restorative practices can help us notice where we're gripping, bracing or disconnected from sensation. Movement can also be useful when stillness doesn't feel regulating.

This distinction matters. We sometimes assume that an activated nervous system needs to become still, but for some people movement, shaking, walking, pushing, stretching or making sound may be a more accessible route towards regulation.

You can read more about spontaneous trembling and movement in TRE®: Why Does the Body Shake? and Spontaneous Movement, Somatic Release & Kundalini: Why Does the Body Shake?

Temperature & Sensation

Changing temperature, such as cool water on the face, can produce noticeable physiological responses. Cold exposure has become popular in nervous system conversations, but more isn't necessarily better. Intense cold is itself a stressor and won't feel regulating for everybody.

I prefer curiosity over prescription: notice what happens in your body rather than assuming a practice is beneficial simply because it is described as “vagus nerve stimulating”.

Connection With Other People

Regulation doesn't happen only when we're alone. The presence of another person can profoundly affect how we feel. A warm voice, eye contact, touch, being listened to, or simply sitting beside someone we trust may change our breathing, muscle tension and sense of safety.

This is sometimes described as co-regulation or tribal-regulation. It is also one of the reasons relational and group work can offer something that solitary nervous system practices cannot. We learn about ourselves not only by turning inward, but through what happens in our bodies when we are with other people.

Regulation Isn't Always About Becoming Calm

This is perhaps the most important thing I have learned through working with the nervous system.

We can easily turn regulation into another form of self-control: I'm anxious, so I need to calm down. I'm angry, so I need to regulate myself. I'm activated, so something has gone wrong.

But anxiety, anger, excitement, grief and activation are not necessarily signs of dysregulation. They are part of being human.

Sometimes regulation means settling. At other times it might mean allowing ourselves to move, cry, express anger, ask for support, establish a boundary or recognise that we're tired. A practice can also bring us into greater contact with sensations or emotions we hadn't previously noticed.

The question therefore isn't simply “How do I activate my vagus nerve?” but perhaps “What does my system need right now, and can I become sensitive enough to notice?”

Building a Relationship With Your Nervous System

You don't need an elaborate daily routine to begin working with your nervous system. A few minutes of breathing, humming, movement, orienting to your surroundings or consciously noticing your body can become small opportunities to interrupt the accumulation of stress during the day.

Over time, these practices can also help us develop something more valuable than the ability to make ourselves calm: a better relationship with our own internal experience. We begin to recognise activation earlier, notice what supports us, understand our patterns and develop more choice in how we respond.

If you'd like practical ways to experiment with this, visit my Nervous System Regulation Practices, where I bring together breathwork, vocal toning, TRE, psoas practices, EFT, movement and other embodied approaches.

Exploring This Work With Me

Nervous system awareness also forms part of my coaching and somatic work. If stress, overwhelm, emotional patterns or persistent physical holding are affecting how you feel, work or relate to others, we can explore what is happening through both the mind and body rather than treating them as separate.

Depending on what you need, this might include coaching and emotional awareness alongside breath, movement, embodiment and nervous system practices, or more directly body-led work through Somatic Bodywork & De-armouring.

Please get in touch if you’d like to book a free 30-minute discovery call to explore how this work might support you.