Stress, Burnout, HRV, Coherence & The Vagus Nerve

A discussion on a wide array of topics including biofeedback, resilience, Coronavirus Anxiety, and the impact of social distancing, along with Stress Technology. HeartMath is a simple approach to transforming your stress, boosting your resilience, and living your life with more health, more happiness. and, most importantly, more heart. It is a system of fast, easy, and powerful self-awareness and self-regulation techniques which are easy to learn and designed to be used “in the moment”.

Transcript

I'm excited to present a conversation with Gavin Andrews who's the Managing Director of HeartMath UK in Ireland.

I've known Gavin for a number of years since training with him as a HeartMath coach and one of the great things about spending time with Gavin is that he really practices the HeartMath way.

Now in this hour-long video we cover a wide range of topics including the latest developments in the HeartMath trials with the NHS,

The trouble with well-being wearables,

Vagus nerve simulation,

Heart rate variability,

Burnout,

Coronavirus anxiety,

Emerging stress technologies and the latest developments in HeartMath.

It was a brilliant conversation and I'm sure you'll find lots of interesting insights in the next hour and I've put chapters into the description so that you can dip in and out as you find useful.

Find in the description a 10% discount code that can be applied to everything on the HeartMath UK website so be sure to head to the link or to listen out for the code later on in the video.

If you'd like to read a transcription of our conversation then head to hatson.

Coach forward slash Gavin A.

So now please sit back and enjoy an excellent hour of conversation with Gavin Andrews.

Gavin,

Welcome,

Thank you for joining me.

Thank you Matt,

Thank you.

And how are you doing?

I'm doing great you're not looking too good,

You've gone out of focus.

There we are,

Now you're back in focus again.

I'm doing good,

Thank you.

I think I hope I'm in focus,

I'm feeling in focus.

So how's things for you in the current state of lockdown and Covid and all that?

The strange unpredictable times we're living in.

Yeah things are good.

I almost feel a little bit guilty in saying that I've been doing really quite well actually.

It does make me feel slightly awkward saying that because I know a lot of people haven't been actually.

But I have and part of that's because of my own personal kind of practice and stuff and part of that as well is because I feel that we can help a lot of people in a type of work that we do and a type of work that you do as well.

There's a lot that we can do to help.

So I've been doing okay and lots of ideas for things popping up and lots of interesting stuff coming out of HeartMath in the US as well which is encouraging.

So I've been doing okay,

Thank you.

Yeah I'd rather not go into another period of lockdown and stuff but hey look there's things we can control and things that we can't so we'll deal with whatever comes our way.

Absolutely,

Focus in the right areas.

So yeah tell me a bit about yourself and how you've got to where you are now.

Okay wow okay well we won't go all the way because I'm nearly 48,

It'll take us a little while actually.

So my original sort of back,

Well I first thought I've always been interested in kind of personal development inclusive of all the kind of like you know big bigger questions in life,

Sort of what you might call spiritual although non-religious for me actually.

But I've always had a bit of an interest in that and I've always been a big science fiction reader and fantasy reader.

So it's always been a bit part of me that's sort of wanted to know well what's it all about and what can we do about it and how can we make it better and you know who am I and what should I do with my life and that type of stuff.

So that's yeah that has always been a part of me.

And then I guess I lost that part of me for quite a while.

I ended up spending a large chunk of my career in the media and latterly I worked for the Guardian which is a lovely company to work for.

But yeah just one of those periods where I kind of I don't know I lost 10 years doing something that I look back on I was like why did I do that I'm not really sure.

It had some benefits they were a nice company.

But yeah so and then basically what happened in order to take me out of that world was sort of a crucible moment in life.

I lost my first wife to breast cancer and it's one of those things that sort of just woke me up and you know just one of those times in life when you get forced to sort of reappraise things.

So that was really the route that led me to where I am now.

I decided to move out of my career.

I was finding it,

For want of a better word,

Meaningless actually.

And I had a bit of an existential crisis going on and I had a period of grieving to do.

And I actually went back to university and I did an MBA,

A business master's.

And on the business masters the thing I enjoyed the most was stuff about leadership.

The MBA I did was heavy on the leadership side of things.

So I got really into leadership.

But I was less interested in how you might you know just be a business leader and kind of boss people around and tell them what to do.

And I got more more interested in self-leadership.

So this you know some of the theories around things like emotional intelligence and authentic leadership.

And that really led me to the work that I'm doing now.

And well how do you really work out who you are?

How do you work out what you want in life?

And how do you go about making sure that you stay connected more often to who it is you really are?

And so for me that was the sort of emotional intelligence side of things.

I recognized when I got stressed I tended to lose my way and I tended to do and say stupid things and not be the best version of myself.

And when I was feeling good you know things tended to flow.

And then one day I went to a strange lecture about the physiology of leadership and some chap called Andy Pellant who's my business partner now started talking about this thing called heart math and he did a demonstration on a bit of technology.

And I thought wow that's pretty cool that emotional intelligence actually is a theory but this is this is a practice this is a this is something that you can do and I've just had the evidence that these techniques actually have an impact as demonstrated by this technology.

So I was just instantly hooked to be frank Matt and I spent the next must have been about five years just by practicing heart math myself in terms of the techniques and I bought one of the old gadgets the MWave PSR.

Yeah the old MWave PSR just like flashed red blue and green you know and it was very basic but I liked it and it I liked the fact that it it didn't lie to me about how I was feeling and I liked the fact that it gave me that feedback on the technique practice you know.

So yeah I'd been practicing the techniques with the biofeedback for a number of years and I started to bring it into then I moved into university lecturing and leadership and management coaching and training and consulting and I brought more of the heart math stuff in as a sort of foundation stuff in the lead training.

And it really resonated with lots of people and I realized you know actually if you can just get yourself into this state the state that we call coherence then more often than not not only will you be emotionally intelligent but you're also going to be more creative and empathetic you're going to come up with better ideas you know more innovative you're gonna be better at listening to people.

So yeah it just all sort of flowed from there really and then it wasn't until 2012 that I formalized my relationship with heart math and Andy and I become business partners and that's when actually we we became heart math UK and Ireland so it was actually quite a long long journey.

What was that advert in the 80s the Remington advert you know I like the company so much I bought it so well I didn't buy heart math they still they still own themselves but yeah I'm yeah I'm the lucky guy that that represents them over here and looks after the selling of the products and the delivering of the training and the spreading of the message really.

Yeah really interesting I was reflecting on your your sort of experience with the heart math I mean I remember having early M wave buying an early M wave I think when when my kids were really kids really young and my youngest was quite ill and I had a I was running a business and I was really crumbling under the under the pressure and I remember hearing about heart math somewhere and buying and buying an exhaust what seemed like an exorbitantly expensive bit of kit with some lights on it yeah and just feeling better and I think you know that there's something about that there's that moment when you something else starts telling you about how you're really feeling which is pretty magical and I yeah we've seen it so many times with people the first time they get that feedback that you're maybe telling yourself a lie in terms of how you are is really profound and something that started me I really started me going off in this in this direction in terms of initially helped me very much through my own dark times came out thinking hang on a sec this is something that everybody why does not everybody know this and people use this yeah yeah plus it's extraordinary geeky so it ticked that box yeah you know if you like gadgets and it's good as well yeah so and so how's heart math UK now what's yeah good so we we've been in business since since 2012 and we initially focused on just a couple of things which was selling the products obviously because that's an important part of what we do so and you know we sell them on Amazon we sell them on our own web store so that was that was one of the things we focus on initially was just building the market over here and then the other big piece was was getting people to be out there delivering it so that was training coaches so we you know how much because it's such a simple approach you know and it lends itself to all sorts of applications whether that be your kids test anxiety or behavioral problems through to things like sports coaching through to you know management leadership coaching or increasingly health professionals using it to either help themselves with their stress or help their patients with you know their conditions and empower them to take more control of their health it's really important to us that we get more and more people out there you know people like you've trained with us to spread the word and to use it in the world in which you have passion and expertise so that was yeah that was we spent our first few years building that and got it up to a to a good place and yeah we've we've been growing since then I mean there's been all the innovation on the way so we we no longer have the little Mwave PSR handheld thing that you and I both bought and we've you know things have moved on to smartphones so there's the Bluetooth sensor now that makes life a lot easier and yeah recent innovation really has been the whole weird heart thing which is trying to take the message of heart based living you know connecting more with with your heart connecting more with the hearts of other people and then enabling people to come together in small groups to practice heart coherence meditation so that's been a that's been a big passion of mine and just getting that out there and getting we've got over 100 groups now in like 22 23 different countries and so that's a nice vehicle because it does it you know it doesn't require you to be interested in tech or buy a piece of technology or anything like that it's really just a way of helping people who were interested in connecting with the heart bit more got a sense of I want to connect with myself I want to connect meaningfully with others and actually in the current circumstances where we are having to separate physically yeah the whole things online as well as has been great timing so so yeah there's there's always a lot going on this there's other side projects and things we can probably chat about those in a bit you know I'm very passionate about the power of art and music to help people manage their stress and stuff so yeah there's times are good and I think actually what I'm seeing more and more of is the medical world is taking more of an interest in this type of thing it's taken a long time and at times it's been frustrating but on every coach program that we've had over the last couple of years we have always had someone from the NHS on on the program I'm really interesting on the last couple of programs we've had as well we've even had cardiologists coming on our program oh interesting yeah really and and you know because they're cardiologists I assume that all cardiologists would understand HRV and coherence and they don't it's just not part of the training which was a surprise to me but of course once they get an insight of this thing you know exists and it's there they get it very very quickly obviously and what's encouraging is they're kind of blown away by what coherence is and what it can actually do for you you know physiologically so that's something else that's that's been building and I'm very excited about and and it looks like we're gonna have a couple of NHS you know independent proper NHS clinical research projects running using HRV biofeedback and inclusive of the heart math techniques as well and if we think about what is going on in the NHS at the moment and the fact that you know it's getting harder for people to go into hospital there's you know longer waiting lists for things as well we need to shift the model to one where we empower people to take a bit of control and responsibility for their own health and so tools simple tools like self-regulation HRV biofeedback that are cheap and you know have no side effects at all but actually really quite effective I think you know they have an important role to play in what the new model needs to look like so I'm kind of juggling all of these different balls and projects which feels good it's exciting maybe there's too many on the go actually yeah I think it's really interesting point you make there in terms of you know the explosion in technology health measurement technology and people having smart watches and being able to measure their stress levels and the knock-on of that is people now have well-being anxiety so whereas before they blissfully ignorant that they were stressed now they know they're stressed and if they're lucky their phone tells them to breathe out a couple of times or something and they don't have the skills and knowledge to go and do something about it you know or they might have read and I think you know I'm sure you hear this all the time prospective clients say and I tried meditation and it doesn't work for me yeah it's probably because you are so far off the window of tolerance that the thought of sitting with your own thoughts is actually painful yeah I think that's that plays a large part in it for many people I think also unfortunately a lot of people are expecting a quick fix and and meditation for most people will not be a quick fix it's something that you've got a you've got to give it a chance you've got to settle into it you've got to give it some time you've got to give it some repetition and and of course you know if you do for 90% of people meditation and mindfulness are going to be extremely beneficial but unfortunately we've got ourselves into a world where a lot of people aren't prepared to to give it the time and effort and they do want a quick fix and so that's where some of these technologies can be more appealing I think but at the end of the day there are no silver bullets you know there's well if you really if you really want to take control of your life then even some of these technologies that might you know zap the vagus nerve and give you an instant relaxation here which could be really beneficial if you've got hangs up high anxiety for example but again you you're not learning a tool for yourself or skill for yourself we you and I both know that you can activate that response for yourself and for some people it might take a bit more practice but you can increase your own vagal tone you don't need to go straight down the route of zapping yourself and then relying on that not to say that those things aren't useful because they are they have a place so yeah I think one of the things that heart math maybe has as a benefit is you know you even if you don't get the sense or you can't feel that what you're doing is good for you or putting you in a different state unfortunately most people can't feel to begin with then the technology will tell you so we do often find that we've had people come to us you say well I tried meditation and I tried mindfulness and it's not for me I can't do it so so what's this and how is it different and then when they have a gadget to look at and they have something to do as in to focus their attention on a you know on a breath pacer and to focus attention on being told to feel pleasant feelings but they're getting the feedback in real time from the screen it does seem to work for for a group of people who need that instant feedback and then what's great of course is once you see that relatively quickly you can begin to bump your score up you know just by getting the breathing right you can begin to get the score up that's an interest in instant validation and it's an instant reward for as well so oh well you know in the space of just a few minutes I've gone from a 1.

5 to a 3 so this is great I can do this I can do this and there's the motivation to keep going with it yes yes so it works for you know for a certain group of people who particularly those who are interested in the tech and need the validation and the feedback yeah I think that's the great thing is that the inner balance is a trainer and at some point you want people to say hang on a sec I've now got that skill I don't need the trainer you know I want to use that skill before a big meeting yeah or when when I would previously have an argument with someone you know to actually apply it use the inner balance to train your capability to get better at it but don't use it as a crutch like all the other technologies and say I didn't have time I didn't have time to zap my Vegas nerve this morning I'm gonna have a terrible day which is which is the risk with all of this as you say there is no there's no quick fix and I don't think there's a free lunch either there's not unfortunately no there's not no and even with our stuff you know you you did you need to give it a good shot I mean I personally think based on my own practice but also with you know people I've coached and trained I really think it's 20 minutes a day of practice that makes the big difference that really hardwires this in I mean look you know three minutes here and there is better than nothing but to really read the rules you do need to be prepared to put in that type of effort I mean the nice thing with our stuff is you could sit on the sofa and you know regulate your breathing whilst looking at the bio feedback every now and again while watching TV you could do that so you don't have to go and sit on a czar's end cushion cross legs you know but it isn't magic it does take effort and the important piece as you've just said is it's not just doing it for the 20 minutes a day to get your booze that will that will do you lots of good it will balance your autonomic nervous system it will give you a regular arrest it will get in a prefrontal cortex it will change your hormonal balance that's all good stuff but what's even better is to then as you say you know when you don't have the sensor on you and you go into the meeting or the email pops into the inbox that makes you go oh god not that person again you know so then in real time practice the techniques whether it be the you know the coherent breathing by itself or to do the little bursts of bringing in the positive emotions before the meeting after the meeting to rebalance because you got stressed you know that integration into daily life that's when it really really makes a difference I think and that requires a commitment it's it's like it's a lifestyle then and although there's very few times when I might go a day or two without practicing this in any way you know if that does happen to me for whatever reason I notice it I find it to be uncomfortable but that's quite good then because it's it feels uncomfortable so then it's the reminder to me it's because I'm not doing my practice yeah yeah you've got that awareness detailed awareness of your state I mean and I I think one of the things I know you're so you need to have got to a certain tipping point to recognize you need to do something about it I own my own experience was it took me burning out realized that that wasn't the way and and that actually I think to get to the top end of burnout or the far end of burnout you you have to become pretty numb to what's going on yeah and and so the signals you know we talk about techniques such as heart math and a lot of people in the room particularly men it seems to me but will stiffen and go I handle stress really well and I've seen this on trainings and I've gone you've got the same biology as everybody else the likelihood is you are more numb to your stress than everybody else yeah and they look at me decide whether they want to stay in the training course that's a pretty uncomfortable thing to be set told yeah is there's no such thing as handling stress yeah that regard yeah the only general exception I've seen to that is when I've got and I've seen a triathlete on a course and you put out your butt heart math on those and those guys if they're regular trainers those guys have got beautiful HRV they get into coherence like that yeah I mean so I intended like not pick those as demo subjects because they make really lousy subjects yeah they do there's quite often in a room there's someone who's just like Zen and chilled out anyway it's just a genetic thing or like you say it's a sports thing and if you they've part of their sports training is that they know how to manage their state and self-regulate and so yeah but for those others some of the the sort of corporate athlete types and it does tend to be men like you say unfortunately who have this perception that well stress has got me where I am and it's my ability to kind of handle all this stuff that makes me strong and successful and it's like no you've kind of got there in spite of all of that actually and it's now it's just wear and tear and you can't you can't keep doing that forever that's where the burnout comes from of course is these people often say to themselves no I'm strong I can I can handle this in some ways it's maybe even their mental resilience that gets them into trouble because the mind keeps telling them you're okay you're okay keep going you know just got to do this you just got to do this and they're not hearing the body yeah they're not they're not recognizing you know the information that's coming this way which you and I both know there's more information that comes this way to the brain than the brain to the rest of the body and they're just not getting those those signals those cues and then eventually the body will just take over and go stop and that's when the burnout happens and unfortunately we do see more and more people finding themselves in that state don't we it's it's more and more common in in society and unfortunately as well I see quite a few people who sort of bounce from burnout to burnout not even learning the lesson so I'd say you know you're maybe in a minority of someone who's been there seen it experienced it and recognizes I don't want to go there again and so you've made a lifestyle change yeah I mean that's an interesting one I my best guess is that I've burnt out three times okay so it took you three times to learn the lesson I I could go there again you know I think I am wired I'm wired that way yeah really goal-focused tendencies towards alpha behavior all those characteristics I've got them but I'm aware of it now and I manage it and I'm more aware of the signals so when it does when I when I when it does you know I I recognize it and say hey hang on a second I recognize this I recognize this I might only be a very early stage but I recognize I've got to do something I'm also a worse combination that I am a I love coffee yeah according to my DNA I'm the I am genetically predisposed to not handling it very well and so I can you know it's I start to increase my caffeine intake I go hang on a second yes you know that acts for me that accelerates it so I think I've become more aware of it through learning these techniques and practicing yeah you know I think that's it I think that's as good as it gets I think you know unless you are a monk living in a cave and you don't need to worry about anything else in life other than meditating and someone else is bringing you your food I think for those of us that live in the real world it's kind of it's very challenging to be on an even keel all the time and I mean you know I've been doing this stuff for over well I've been practicing on my 13 14 years now you know I get stressed life is gonna throw challenges our way you know I have a need for achievement I want to achieve things as well and I want to be busy and sometimes it gets too much but so long as you have the self-awareness so long as like that window is relatively short where you record where you before you recognize no I'm actually putting myself under too much pressure here I can I can sense that I'm beginning to tip off in terms of performance and all of that although I'm getting a bit of information where's the where's the bad back up why is that happened you know what why is there a campaign to my shoulders at the moment as long as you get those cues and you act on them then I think really that's what it's all about because you'll you'll kind of you you're rebalancing yourself relatively frequently the dangers are when you're out of balance for too long yeah yeah absolutely and trying to make sure also you've got some some support systems in place which is really difficult at the minute and that people are looking out for you whether it's been in your team in your family and also I found the process of looking out for others increases your ability to look out for yourself which again I think is challenged in the current climate yeah it is it is the whole yeah separation thing the zoom thing the bouncing from zoom meeting to zoom meeting and you know the propensity to be never really quite fully present it's just like okay meeting let's get this done let's you know talk business let's do that relationship side can slip in the way that we're working at the moment but it doesn't have to and I think well I know that zoom can be it can facilitate a really strong and deep connection between people but you have to work at that you have to yeah you've got you've got to make sure that you are paying attention and actually my heart math practice enables me to do that because if I'm in my heart then I am connected with others I I do want to listen I do want to notice I want to hear I want to ask the question I don't want to dive straight into business you know and so it is gonna be more and more important I think it's the what's the old Alvin Toffler future shock quote you know the more high tuck the more high-tech the more high-touch and we're all having to be more high-tech in the way that we're engaging with each other through zoom etc and I do think that we therefore also need to be more high-touch as in the making sure the human side states as one of the reasons why I'm very passionate about we had heart actually is because the whole purpose of it is to bring people together in a zoom room to actively feel care and appreciation and compassion for each other and and for yourself so you know you like sitting there for half an hour basically feeling these feelings actively for each other and for self and and it's very very powerful and if we have got perhaps you know a six-month winter of unfortunately you know if not full on lockdowns then restricted ability to socialize then I think the the more people who can actively use zoom to connect in a meaningful way not just a superficial way then we could keep ourselves in a in a good place we can still have connection even if we can't be aren't in the same physical space as each other yeah I'll put a link to the website in the description that'd be cool it's open to anyone to join the group says you know they're popping up all over the place now so even if there's not one in your exact location there'll be one within you know 50 miles or so it doesn't matter if it's online anyway you could join someone's group in America we don't mind just just join a group you know you mentioned previously about your love of combining music and that's consolidated in am I pronouncing it right Syntropy yeah Syntropy Syntropy yeah so Syntropy is a bit of a side project I was I was hoping it might be something that my u.

S.

Friends might be interested in but they've got their own interest so it's not it's not it's not a heart math project so yes so Syntropy it's one of those things that just kind of popped up and flow during the lockdown actually and so a friend of mine Ali she's one of our coaches she's another heart math coach she's an artist and she had created an installation which used heart rate variability to power the installation so you you would go in and you put an M wave on your ear and then the feedback from the heart rhythms would would would change the installation in terms of the colors and the kind of movement and frequencies of the display so I'm so she's pretty cool in terms of the art that she's doing yeah it's very cool and she contacted me and was saying I quite like to make some breath pacers and that's a great idea because actually the inner balance breath pacers you know we're revamping the inner balance app it's gonna be much more engaging it's looking a bit a little bit tired and I thought well also you know what about people who don't want the technology it'd be quite nice to create breath pacers and I'd had this idea about geometries as well I just like geometries and I think they're interested in kaleidoscopes and things like that and Joe dispenses into some of that that type of stuff so we were just talking about this idea of maybe using art to pace breathing and then at the same time another friend of mine Mark who makes chill-out music like 8d chill-out music started talking to me about binaurals and said you know about them I was like well I don't really know about them I've got some binaural stuff and I find it to be quite good for getting into certain mental states but if you're looking at binaurals then why not look at coherence because as far as I'm aware not many people are using coherence in binaurals so anyway you know he makes proper music it's the 8d and the binaurals is a more subtle aspect of it and I just thought why don't we all just get together and see if we could do something so Mark had some tracks anyway and and Ali listened to the tracks and she thought well we'll create some art she found some new way of creating these lovely geometries and it just worked so well you know I'll briefly describe them then you can tell me what you think of them but they're these just these beautifully exquisite geometries that sort of emerge over five minutes and they're wonderful to look at I think I mean it's kind of psychedelic in a way they really take me somewhere just chill out music and it's really beautiful but it's not too obtrusive or you know it's not taking too much of your attention and the 8d works nicely in terms of it kind of moves you around in your head a little bit and the binaurals are very subtle but they do a bit as well and so we created one and we just thought there's something in this so we decided to set up a separate business,

Syntropy Partnership,

To create Syntropy States so we've got eight of these things now only one of them's a breath pacer actually and that's quite subtle the rest of them are designed just to take you on a bit of a five minute relaxation journey and we themed them around energy centers,

Ali's very intuitive in the way that she does her art and yeah we just always get them out there and so we we shared them with some some coaches and then we just put them on the website for sale £19,

They're pretty cheap,

We've got some phenomenal feedback from people so we think we're on to something and the plan actually is we're gonna turn them into an app and and then curate artists and musicians to to come in and to contribute so the idea is you'd have all sorts of different types of art maybe photography and film as well and a different you know you'd have some maybe you know like electronic music like we're using at the moment or you might have you know real instruments acoustic or you might even just have like a harp just playing a note or something like that but with the visual and they yeah they do you don't need to do they're passive you just sit and watch it as you know and but for some people that seem to be powerful so I don't actually know what what experience you had of them what do you think maybe this is but yeah that's a distant I don't know I'm currently working out how to do a video on them yeah so I'll do a video on them I think they're really first of all I'm I'm annoyed that they're better than the better than the one that I did for my coaching clients okay you don't want to use it I did it and I've got just got one on the YouTube channel which is a really rudimentary breathing pacer so my initially my initial fear was annoyance because it's way better you know I think that yeah don't worry about my my limited graphical skills but I think they I think that I think they're great I think they're really they're really good they they all elicit different feelings you know I mean I guess that's a real personal thing I love the breath pacer I think it's really important that that people have access to a breath pacer that isn't in a balance you know either they can't afford it which definitely an issue increasingly I think at the minute yeah definitely I and the idea of being able to get into coherent a little just a little helping hand in coherence you know people still use my rudimentary one and it's great because it means they get that experience of what it's of what it's like so I think that's great and then I think that is giving people a reason to stop is one of the is one of the real challenges and I think it it gets your attention and then you start to you know feel and experience it and it's interesting because I spoke recently to Stefan Chmielek who is the inventor of the Sensate Pebble you know and he's his primary drive to that he's been experimenting with sound for decades in terms of how sound affects the nervous system reaction and brings calm and the idea that there are a lot of people out there who just never stop and so the idea of giving them something to stop with in a similar way that that's one of the things that half in a balance does yeah I think I think the videos also give people a good reason to stop you don't have to do anything yeah you're all we're all masters at watching the telly yeah we're not asking anyone to develop a new skill so as an entry point for for stopping and taking a moment and noticing what effect things have on you fantastic that's good to know yeah we had a lovely bit of feedback from a customer who said that she uses them to give herself a little treat so she she's like well I don't really want to do my emails or my accounts whatever it is and but if I do them then I'll give myself five minutes of one of those Centropy States videos I thought that's quite nice actually I like I like the idea of that and I think one of the ways it works for people as well is that you know we all have too much screen time I appreciate that and we can say to people you shouldn't you know go away and do something else but if you sat in front of your computer and you just want a five-minute pause between answering your emails and engaging in a presentation then actually they work really quite nicely because although you're at your screen they are inducing a relaxation response and they are disengaging you from whatever it was you were doing before and I mean as you may have experienced they sort of put you in a little bit of a trance and they sort of drift off somewhere for a bit and and I think that's a you know again it's valuable they're another tool that people can use just to get a little bit of downtime a bit of rest before they then engage in the in the next task so so what's your space really excited we've got the apps in development at the moment and the idea is that we will grow it to become a library of all sorts of different nice art and music relaxation aids yeah simple yeah I think that's an interesting angle if we're in this for the long haul which is what it's increasingly looking like you know that many companies ought to be providing those sorts of things in to stop the back-to-back zoom calls yeah well that's one of our ideas is here that might be a it might be a you know potential market I mean the businesses state not not to kind of again dis other other approaches and things so I think it can be quite easy for organizations to take the route where they say well you know we'll give everyone headspace we'll give everyone calm and that's us doing our bit and it's like well that's great and it and it's a good thing and they should do it but actually you know what most people don't sustain their use of those things you know the after 30 days only 4% of people apparently still using those types of approaches that's that's that hadn't been commonly known into some one did some research relatively at Rady University but that's the reality of it and so like a gym membership in February it's like a gym membership and it's also like gadgets I appreciate that you know I've bought gadgets and I don't use them consistently and so what I think is important actually is that there is a portfolio of tools that people can use so yeah give people a go a headspace and calm and if it works for them and it sustains brilliant but it is not going to work for and be sustained by most people so they need another tool and I'm not suggesting that Centropy States is going to necessarily have a you know a usage beyond a certain percentage of this you know it's normal what's the average person only uses five apps but they've got you know tens of them on their phone so this is just normal for the world we live in and so yeah I think organizations need to get a bit smarter about what they're offering in terms of well-being and not just taking that approach of well we'll give everyone a mindfulness app we'll get someone to come in and teach a yoga class a couple of times a week and we'll do some salsa dancing and other people to go for a lunchtime run we've got all the bases covered you haven't and now you're asking people to work from home and people are being made redundant so there's people who are left behind working for home are under higher pressure and they need more help and assistance so I think yeah organizations need to be looking at some some of this other stuff I make it easy for people to fit into their day so five minutes on your computer while you're at it great yes people that need gonna need more help more high-tech more high-touch yeah I like that high-tech high-touch that's really cool Alvin Toffler not me he said it in the 80s so in terms of Heartmap assuming they're all back in their office now are they yeah so they had a bit of a scare themselves with the California wildfires and they were evacuated they were out of their offices for over three weeks and then actually you know going back they thankfully they're both of their offices survived which was when you look at the burn zone I mean a miracle really and and thankfully although unfortunately a couple of members of staff did lose their home but but everybody else's homes were fine as well so they're back they they I mean I was incredibly impressed and humbled by the way they dealt with it they were still you know I was having zoom calls with with Howard and Rowling and some of the folks there and they were practicing the techniques under the highest pressure you know they literally didn't know whether their homes and offices were going to be burnt to the ground or not so that was a yeah in all about six weeks of uncertainty for them on top of all of the the COVID challenges that they've had in California where you know they it's been pretty full-on there but they're back they're good they're working on lots of new stuff so the main thing a couple of a couple of things in the pipeline there's going to be a new online program called at heart facilitator which was being filmed last week actually so that's going to be beautiful high production values and it's essentially for people who want to learn heart method themselves but would also like to share it informally so it's not like a coaching certificate or program or anything like that but if you're say you know yoga teacher and at the end of a yoga class you wanted to share half heart locking which is actually teaching heart locking the whole program teaches heart locking if you wanted to be able to teach that like properly because you've learned it properly and to say I've actually got a little heart math badge it says you know I can do this then that's what it's for really so that's that's good because it opens up heart math to a larger group of people and people you just want to share it informally with what they're doing there is an inner the inner balance app is in development taking a bit longer than we would have liked but that will be completely overhauled so we recognize that it's a you know we've had it for a while it's a bit behind the curve and we need we need a new user experience we need it to be more engaging so yeah that's that's that's looking pretty cool and also some work being done with the global coherence app as well so that's the app that you can use for big meditations and you can log in and see everyone around the world meditating together and then everyone who's got one of the inner balance sensors could actually be included in the the recording of coherence so we can actually look at you know everyone's coherence level wherever they are in the world and then we work that out as an average and so see what the average coherence of the group is so it's a cool app yeah it's had a few glitches but that one now is in a new stage of development and can't really say too much about that one but there's this this hopefully gonna be a really cool application with that which means that everybody could be measured so not just people with a sensor which would be wonderful yeah I have a strange reaction with the global coherence app yeah I think my inherent competitiveness I struggle a bit to put that to one side so you see who else is on there and I'm I'm trying to say stop looking at the average score and stop trying to beat everybody I still have some work to do on that competitiveness this is the this is the downside of the technology yeah you've got to make the tech work that's I think that's the problem maybe the problem of society that we have as a whole is when we make technology work for us it's great it's amazing it's awesome stuff you know being able to get a cab just like that when you want one it's incredible but when we start to be impacted by it and compete with it or it starts you know like with social media kind of using us as a currency to send us information and a world view and sell us stuff then that's when we have a bit of a problem so yeah that you know the biofeedback it can be a problem if you've got a very high need for achievement and you want to beat your score all the time the dangers it could frustrate you and of course that's not what we're looking for we're looking for the opposite I think that's a I mean that's a learning path too isn't it I kind of it took me a long time of practicing heart math to come to terms the fact that each time I'm not always better than last time because things happen you know because I'm doing it after a busy day or I've had too much coffee or you know lots of different reasons and that's okay and you learn from that and also I do I use Muse yeah and you know Muse is a really interesting I think a whole biofeedback bit about when similarly to heart math when you drop into the red or in that case when the waves start getting really loud or the storm comes in it's okay that's that's all right but you're competitive don't beat yourself up which is clearly the way I was I've evolved is that competitive thing it's okay it's okay you'll get better by the fact that you correct and improve yeah then by beating yourself up because you didn't maintain a super high coherence and that's all part of the self-awareness self-regulation journey if when you start realizing that your sort of programming up till now predisposes you towards behaving like that there that it's then at that point that you've got the choice to to be able to change it when I was chatting with a mate of mine this morning I go on your Friday bike ride every every morning with buddy and we chat and he's telling me that he's come off Strava so come on Strava because what I realized was I was just kind of like you know looking at beating my previous times and seeing who else might have beaten my times and I just thought what's the point in that kind of on the level experiencing some stress as a result of doing something that should be really enjoyable and and having stopped being on Strava he's finding it quite liberating that he can just ride his bike around and do what he likes and you know just have fun so yeah you know they do tech is great I love tech I buy too many gadgets but we do need to be a bit careful that it doesn't actually end up inadvertently causing a stress or anxiety or frustration yeah so what what gadgets are you looking forward to or you got your eye on well I'm looking forward to the Mendy and I'm getting very very frustrated and having to do lots of coherence around the fact that it keeps being delayed I should have had it a couple of months ago I'm so the Mendy is a bit like the Muse and it's but it uses what's called functional near-infrared spectroscopy it's basically measuring the amount of blood in the prefrontal cortex and it's interesting it looks like a quite a funky gadget and I think it could work really quite nicely with heart math because what we know is when you get coherent so the heart rhythms go into coherence but the other impact we don't actually measure is what's going on in the brain and I I'm pretty certain that if I hit a high level of coherence then the Mendy will show the the activation of the prefrontal cortex so I'm interested in that and I'm interested in seeing if I can come up with any kind of ways of not just ways of coherence but ways of increasing the the prefrontal activity and I just want to see their app and see what the exercises are so looking forward to that one that looks pretty cool.

It would be really interesting when you've got that data so you've got a heart rate and what's going on the brain to synchronize that with visualizations yeah that's the future.

Proper tricky stuff for that.

You could you could well we're also looking at the VR stuff for Syntropy as well or the augmented reality but yeah so Mendy should be a good one oh goodness me I can't remember the name of it but there's a very simple gadget is the little pebble shaped thing that glows the colors of breath pace.

Milo.

Milo mellow whatever I mean that's that's a very simple idea it's not expensive gadget but I just again I quite liked the idea of it it looks nice like a little pebble in it and it and it paces you breathing doesn't have coherence in it which I think is silly but it's got other breath stuff in it.

I did speak to them actually.

Oh really?

What did they say?

Thank you for your thoughts.

We decided on these breath paces were the optimum ones but we'll take your thoughts into consideration.

Okay well they were wrong to leave out coherence they should have done a bit more research but anyway and the other one is I've been using I'm gonna wave my ankle at you if I may I've got one of the it's not I've not got an ASBO it's not a tracker but it's the Apollo okay I've had it for a month and a half I've got like well I've been doing an hour a day with it minimum I've got 40 odd hours worth of use of it this is a vibrating thing yeah so it's got a number of different frequencies in it that purport to activate the autonomic nervous system in different ways particularly the Vegas of course and I don't know I just I think it maybe on the wrong person to try it maybe it'd be better if someone say who had an anxiety disorder gave it again maybe they'd be able to notice a difference and maybe it's just because I'm quite used to the self-regulation thing that I'm not I don't think I'm getting any benefit from it I've given it a really good go it feels quite nice on my ankle when it vibrates but in terms of perceiving benefits I just don't think I have it's nicely made it's expensive it is expensive so yeah I think it's you know another one of the gadgets that I've purchased that I won't sustain my use of and I'll probably end up giving it to someone who I think it might be more beneficial for and I'd be I'll be interested I will find someone who's you know got some anxiety and give it to them see what they think of it I like the idea and it does seem to be quite well researched so like I said I'm not I'm not saying it doesn't work because it may well be very effective for some people but for me I just don't think it really adds a benefit to my to my practice and I've used I put it on whilst doing coherence practice and it makes zero difference to my achievement levels hmm about I think is I think it's incumbent upon us to look at these various because now everything works for everyone yeah the Nirvana Zen for the people who are in that stuck state who can't even sit still long enough to use heart math and I you know I'm sure we've both come across those yeah it's a good place to start it's not going to teach them self-regulation but it does work and it really does work I mean I know there's quite a big change in heart rate variability from that yeah that is expensive yeah and the sensei I've found quite interesting when using with our mainly because of its brings your attention to your heart because that's where everybody where you wear it yeah there is something really primal I think about that those vibrations on your chest hmm you know that kind of it's almost like the chanting nobody is his vibrations yeah I mean like you know drumming would have the same effect and and humming and you know monks chanting and stuff it's it's all doing a similar things frequencies isn't it and yeah so I can yeah I can see how yeah I hear good things about it yeah there's one I wanted to show you that I'm testing at the moment which is a beast oh my goodness that's huge looks nicely made is it's a nice piece of German tech it's called the bura stress releaser and it it's got heat by a heat and vibration and light and you can set it to whatever it's a breathing pacer you can set it to whatever breathing rate you want and put it into coherent yeah lie down and you put it and it vibrates the vibrates on your chest and you follow the pacer very nice so it's not me it's not measuring HIV it's just pacing yeah does it does it do it does it shine like something on the ceiling or something or is it just a bit of audio and it's got it's got binaurals it it paces the light so the light comes on and off so it's got it's a pacer but multi sensory pacer so the thing I really like about it is you can just lie down set it to coherent breathing and I've 20 minutes of just following the pacer without having to use the balance whilst using it I haven't I haven't yet that's a good that's that's interesting to see we'll see what it does to schools yeah yeah absolutely I will do that's that's good I've not done a video on this but it's quite a nice nice bit of kit but it's yeah German so all of the anything you see on the internet is all in German interesting bit of kit and yeah about £100 so it's quite a nice nice bit of kit I'll do a video that looks very well very reasonably priced for what it is it is yeah yeah a bit big not not quite as portable as the set as an as a sensei but say in something different yeah again yeah no that's so I think it is it's incumbent upon us to know what else is going on there because not all one size fits all and and increasingly people are going to these things and thinking that they're the answer and then they turn out that they're not so who do they turn to to say what is the best yeah it's the best thing because not everyone can afford to go for therapy or coaching or exactly yeah but we don't know what's wrong yet which is I think is more often mm-hmm yeah so yeah that's I think we just keep watching and and see what's exciting stuff coming out and it is all getting a bit cheaper as well which is which is important yeah it's exciting times I think there's some there's some amazing technologies out there and I think the VR and the AI stuff is going to be interesting as well certainly going back to what you're talking earlier about the NHS you know stuff needs to be delivered digitally and so that's going to create I think you know a real boost in innovation at the moment it tends to be stuck around the whole CBT thing like you know using AI for CBT it asks you a question you give it an answer then it asks you another question and another and it's like I'm not that's fine it's great but I think we need to be looking at other stuff that is engaging on the physiological level like the coherence technology and the you know the vagal stimulation and these are the types of things as well yeah I think I think in VR AI eye movement therapy as well would be an interesting yeah for sure within the VR yeah yeah absolutely so there's definitely an area to explore I wish I was still an engineer and could do those things I'd definitely be playing I have to resist the temptation to go and buy a headset reverse engineer it yeah having to resist those temptations but for more more gadgets cool well we've been talking things like that seems like it's been a bit bit about area probably yeah I should give everyone a break from their computers and definitely definitely what one thing I'd like from you Gavin is in terms of all the people who are watching who are in these uncertain times who little some little advice is that you could give them in terms of helping them deal with uncertainty in the situation they're going through at the moment one piece of advice what would you I think one piece of advice would be that you know how you are feeling is dictating how you're seeing the world and so it's not real and when we're feeling stressed we tend to view the world in terms of threat and problems and confusion and that's why we then get stuck in this kind of vicious cycle of anxiety and worry from heart mass perspective you know emotions of reactions but they're also choices and so my advice is to recognize that you have the power to choose how you feel some of the time so if you notice that you're getting anxious about something one thing that you can control because none of us can control the coronavirus situation of crisis or whether our jobs might be in danger or or whatever where we might even have lost our jobs one thing we can actually control is our breath and when we control our breath and we deepen and we slow our breath we begin to change our physiology we begin to change the way that the brain is operating as well so if you're feeling anxious if you're feeling worried don't worry about all that stuff just focus on your breath slow it down deepen it try and get your breathing to around about six breaths a minute for most people that's five seconds for an in breath and five seconds for an out breath but what's more important is that it feels comfortable to you so if you want to slow that up or slow that down or speed it up a bit that's fine but deepen slow the breath get it nice and balanced make sure the belly's relaxed as well what that will begin to do is to create coherence in in the system and what happens then is more information is going from the body particularly the heart to the brain and this ordered rhythmic information from the autonomic nervous system and the heart is sending the message to the brain which is saying in effect everything's okay there's order and there's stability coming back from the body here so you're sort of tricking yourself you're hacking into the autonomic nervous system and then that's sort of tricking the brain into getting out of anxiety and worry so the more you do the breathing the more we begin to get the prefrontal cortex back online again and when you do that you begin to see the world differently the feelings begin to shift and you begin to see even if it's just a realization I can't control this right now or I need to be patient or I don't need to catastrophize the world's not going to come to an end it begins to open up more and as you begin to get the prefrontal cortex back online as well you can then begin to regulate the emotion so it's possible then to shift your focus to well what what what can I be grateful for right now you know what could I be appreciative of or if I look out of my window what could I put my attention on that might give me some sense of awe whether it's the trees or the sky or whatever you know we we can choose our emotions and if we can choose more of the pleasant positive ones particularly the gratitudes and appreciations and the cares or the love that has an additional benefit well it increases our levels of coherence anyway so again it broadens even more the perspective we have on the world but it also begins to impact positively positively our hormones so we get out of this sort of trap of the adrenaline and the cortisol we begin to get into a place where we can produce hormones that are more beneficial particularly like DHEA which we need for vitality and it's compromised when we're under stress so we get some DHEA rebuilds us but if we can really tap into the gratitudes and the loves and the cares we we might even get some extra oxytocin as well which would be really beneficial and then it's really then about sort of you know getting this getting the seesaw out of the stress you know too much stress going on and getting yourself nice and balanced or if you really you know put some effort into this you can begin to tip it the other way where you're getting more of a ratio of pleasant positive emotions you're taking more control over how you feel you're using the breathing to keep yourself in balance as well and then you can even begin to shift those hormonal ratios you know quite a profound way so that would really be it it's like you know you don't need technology to do that obviously you can facilitate it but yeah these times when things are changing very fast we're confused there's a multiple narratives going on very easy to go down some rabbit holes with all that stuff is you can still control your breath and you can control your emotions what you put your focus on and if you do that you know you'll be in a good place to to respond appropriately and when we do come out the other side of all of this chances are you won't be burnt out you'll be in a good place still physically and mentally so that'd be the takeaway you know can't control anything else but you can't control your breathing and then you can control your feeling yeah that's great that's brilliant I think hopefully everyone can take that away and give that a go and if if and when people want to come and find out more about what you're doing where do they find you?

So come to heartmath.

Co.

Uk that's simple enough and we're very happy to set up a little code for any of your followers so if people are interested in our products if they use the code HATSANDCOACH you but maybe you could pop it in the details well but if they use the code HATSANDCOACH or one word doesn't matter if it's uppers or lowers very welcome to a 10% discount on any of our stuff so there's there's an offer there and if you like the idea of a once a month heart focused meditation then check out weirdheart.

Com there's a little directory there and you can put in your location and find a group near you so that's weirdheart.

Com and I'll send you also a freebie Centropy States relaxation aid that you can let people have the link and they can download that so it's an mp4 that they can download so there's a there's a few things that might be helpful to people actually I'll tell you what the other thing is that is the HeartMath experience link so that's a free 90-minute HeartMath sort of e-learning program that yeah we can pop the link up for that and people can then they can experience the techniques and some of the scientific background to HeartMath as well and that's completely free.

Yeah okay yeah we'll put all that in the description also I'll put a link into your fantastic YouTube video that you did back at the start of lockdown.

Oh cool that's relevant again now because we're going into lockdown again so yeah I forgot about that one yeah there's a little video of stuff yeah.

So I'll put a link to that because that's great too so lots of materials to help people and Gavin thanks ever so much I think this has been really interesting for me and lots of good information to help people through the current situation and out the other side which is which is going to happen at some point.

Let's hope it's sooner rather than later yeah.

My pleasure thanks Matt I really appreciate it.

Thanks Gavin.

Thank you.

Brilliant.

Thanks for watching please remember to check out the description for the links for everything we've discussed in this video and remember to use the discount code HATSANDCOACH on the HeartMath UK website for any of their products you want to purchase and if you have any questions about anything we've discussed here please leave a comment and if you found it useful please click that thumbs up button so I know to make more content like this and for more great conversations and content on staying resilient click subscribe and I'll see you in the next video.