Welcome.
I invite you into any comfortable seated position.
For this practice,
You will need to have the area around your ears and neck clear,
So it's best not to use earbuds,
Headphones,
Or have on a top with a high collar.
Pause the recording if you need to now.
Let's begin by closing our eyes and acknowledging our surroundings,
Noticing your body being supported by the chair.
Begin to call your attention into your body,
Sensing how you're doing physically,
Emotionally,
And mentally.
I invite you to begin taking some deeper breaths as I explain the practice.
Our best defense against stress is to learn to stimulate the vagus nerve,
Which we will be doing along the energy pathway that the vagus nerve travels from the brain down into the torso.
The work that we will do along the neck is a practice that was inspired by the holistic healing work of Sam Zand,
Founder of the Anywhere Clinic.
Our tranquility breath practice will also help us stimulate the vagus nerve.
Because we will be working in sensitive areas,
It's recommended to stop the practice if you feel lightheaded.
Being lightheaded simply means your energy is flowing,
And that's good news.
Let's practice what to do if you feel lightheaded.
Take your hands to your upper thighs,
Take a deep breath in,
And as you exhale from your mouth,
Push your hands downward.
Let's do that again,
Inhaling deeply,
And exhale,
Push down.
Good,
One more time.
This helps us to ground into our body.
Nice,
Now take your fingers into your hairline and begin massaging your scalp,
Planning your finger pads,
Pressing and moving the skin around,
Moving to different locations.
This should feel really good.
Keep breathing deeply and massage that area at the back of the skull where the vagus nerve moves down into the neck.
All of the practices we'll do today will be very gentle.
We're releasing tension and enhancing energy flow.
I encourage you to pause the recording at any time if you'd like to linger in a practice.
Now drop your fingers down in front of your ears,
At the base of the ears.
Massage here in circular movements and go upwards.
It may be tender,
So just be gentle.
This area is innervated with the vagus nerve.
Now shift your fingers to the back of the ears,
Starting at the base of the ear behind the earlobe,
And this area can be very tender.
Massage gently,
Circling around with your fingers.
Keep circling and moving upwards behind your ears,
Breathing deeply.
You may feel tension releasing as you do this practice.
Nice,
Now release your hands and for a moment just shake them out.
Shake both of your hands out.
As we stimulate the vagus nerve,
As it moves down into your neck,
Plant your fingers at the base of your ears and feel where the jawline starts.
We'll be stroking downward right below the beginning of the jawline.
So simply stroke downward all the way down and past the collarbones.
This is a gentle stroke,
Like you're stroking a pet.
Just very leisurely,
Lightly,
Stimulating the vagus nerve as it moves down the neck and into your torso.
Breathing deeply.
And notice what you sense in your body.
Perhaps you sense more saliva in your mouth or swallowing.
You might sense yourself taking a deeper breath.
These are some of the signs of your body moving toward rest and digest.
Now release your hands,
But take your right hand and we're going to put it over the left upper chest,
Right at the collarbone.
Good,
Now just push the hand to the left and down the left arm and off of the left fingers.
We'll do that again.
And then rest the right hand on the upper left chest over the collarbone.
And then push outward toward the shoulder and down that left arm and all the way off the hand.
Shake it out.
And we'll do the other side.
Resting your left hand over the right collarbone.
And then push.
Push to the right over toward the right shoulder and down the right arm.
Squeezing the arm and off the fingers.
We're going to do that one more time.
Taking the left hand over the right collarbone and push over off of the shoulder and down the arm.
Shake both of the hands out.
Bring the hands to the thighs for a moment and just notice how your body feels.
We'll move deeper into the torso with our tranquility breath practice.
Place one hand on your heart,
One hand on the belly.
Exhale with me drawing belly to spine.
Inhale deeply.
Pause.
Open mouth slightly and exhale very slowly through that slightly opened mouth.
Inhaling.
Pause.
Open mouth slightly.
Exhaling very,
Very slowly.
Inhaling.
Pause.
Exhale slowly.
Inhaling.
Pause.
Exhaling slowly.
Two more rounds on your own.
As you let go of the breath,
Allow yourself to linger in what you've created.
Nurture yourself with a sense of loving kindness.
Wishing you deep peace,
My friends.
