The autonomic nervous system
is formed by the sympathetic nervous system and the parasympathetic nervous system.
The sympathetic nervous system is responsible for the fight, flight, or freeze response. It
is activated in stressful situations and it is essential for our survival when there is danger.
The parasympathetic nervous system is the opposite. It is activated when we are not
in a dangerous situation. It is known as a system for rest, digest and recover.
So, today, let’s talk about how we can activate our parasympathetic nervous system.
The parasympathetic nervous system is one of the two parts of the autonomic nervous system.
When it is active, it constricts the pupils,
stimulates the production of saliva, and it activates the vagus nerve, a long cranial nerve
that contains motor and sensory fibers. It contains somatic and visceral fibers.
We have two vagus nerves, the right, and the left. Each one exits the brain and goes to almost
all viscera of the thorax and abdomen. It innervates the heart, the lungs,
the esophagus, the stomach, the liver, pancreas, spleen, kidneys, adrenals, and intestines.
There are a couple of ways to activate the parasympathetic nervous system:
1- Reduce the amount of stress you put on yourself. Reduce the amount
of news and social media you consume 2- Spend more time in mindful moments,
like mindful eating, mindful walking, meditation, gratitude, breathing, and contact with nature
3- And take time to do physical and mental exercises. Those are mind-body connections.
Before I continue, let me remind you that this video is for educational purpose only.
Talk to your doctor about your condition. And if there is an emergency,
go to the nearest emergency department or call an ambulance.
so, let's try this vagus nerve exercise, the first one is deep breathing,
and holding your breath that's very simple, so take a deep breath through your nose.
and hold, hold, hold,
as long as you can, and then breathe out quickly.
and empty your lungs at once, very quickl,y
and you can repeat this a couple of times during the day, especially in stressful situations. if
you feel too much pressure on your body or on your mind just remember doing this
breath-in holding as long as you can, and then breathing out, through your mouth very quickly,
so now we are going to do an exercise to activate our parasympathetic nerve system. we're going to
do a stretching of our scalene muscles, the neck and shoulder muscles, and we are going
to synchronize this with our eye movement, or breathing, and we'll hold there for 30 seconds,
so it's important that you find a comfortable place for you to relax, one side here will relax,
and the other one you're going to put your hand on the top of your head, and then don't need to pull,
just the weight here of your hands and you're going to look to your left and up, and when
you're doing this, you're going to breathe very slowly, you can breathe in through your nose,
and out through your mouth, and will hold for 30 seconds, so i'm going to start my timer here.
so here look up and to the left, take a deep breath, and just relax don't move your eyes,
breathing to your nose,
and that's 30 seconds, and then we're going to do for the other side the same thing, you put your
hand on the top of your head, and you're going to look at the right, and up, while you're breathing,
and we're going to do the timer here for 30 seconds up,
breathing through your nose, and out through your mouth,
don't move your eyes, keep looking up and to the right,
breathe slowly,
and that's 30 seconds. so the other exercise is very similar to this one,
but now the other hand instead of resting here is going to pull your spine, so to try to make
a curvature of your spine, at the same time that we are doing this, okay, so again 30 seconds,
hand on the top, looking at the ceiling, but this hand here will pull your spine, try to stay
upright the maximum that you can, and relaxed so 30 seconds, and up putting here, and this one,
uh,
so that's for that side, and now we're going to do to the opposite side, so 30 seconds,
and up looking, and now this hand will pull,
and that was 30 seconds, and now the other one is also 30 seconds,
you're going to lie down in a comfortable mat, on your elbows, the elbows below the shoulder level,
here, and you're going to hold 30 seconds, go the maximum that you can, here, up and you're going
to hold ,turn to your left, and you're going to hold on this position for 30 seconds, so let's go,
breathe slowly,
and we have to do this to the other side, so again 30 seconds here,
and we turn to the other side and hold on that position,
try not to move your eyes,
stay there you're relaxing, and stretching the neck muscles sternocleidomastoid,
and breathing slowly,
try to practice these exercises many times a day. and if you like this video don't forget to press
the thumbs up here, and to subscribe to this channel, and watch my next video here. Goodbye