Calming Breath Practice With Vagal Nerve Movement

In this practice, we're going to do vagal soothing eye movements, noise, some Lion's Breath, and Bumble Bee breath to close. The vagal nerve is like the temperature control on your autonomic system that tunes into how safe you feel in your body and circumstances. A great way to start your day. Find a safe space and enjoy.

Transcript

The following practice is led by Sonia Lockyer,

Host of the Wellbeing Ritual Club.

So for today we're going to do a really lovely calming breath practice with some vagal nerve movement which means we're basically going to use our eyes,

We're going to use some vibration in our throat,

All of which gets to work with the vagal nerve and the vagal nerve is like the temperature control on your autonomic nervous system and really tunes into how safe you feel in your body and how safe you feel in your circumstances.

So vagal nerve activity really is amazing for supporting digestive system,

Cardiovascular system,

All the systems in fact but for me personally I find the work with vagal stuff really helps with digestion.

So that's what we're going to focus on today.

So let's start by sitting comfortably and as always my suggestion is to have your hips higher than your knees to be honest I haven't got that today but I feel super comfortable but if you can then get your knees lower than your hips.

You're welcome to sit in a chair,

You do not have to sit on the floor.

Everything that we practice today is a suggestion,

You can always alter what you're doing to suit what feels right in your body.

So sometimes it's quite nice to have the eyelids down and closed,

Other times it's more comfortable to just look down towards the floor and let your gaze,

Your focus expand,

You choose.

And we'll begin by being aware of how your inhale feels and how your next exhale feels.

And maybe just that is enough to allow the breath to start to soften and deepen and lengthen,

There's nothing forced.

Usually just turning awareness to the breath is enough to let that process begin.

And notice the sensation of weightedness in the lower part of the body particularly where you're sitting,

How it feels to connect with the floor beneath you.

And when you become heavier there notice how you can let the spine rise up from the sacrum.

So there's a quality of lightness to the rib cage,

Space of the heart,

Crown of the head.

Introducing some movement to allow it to feel good in your body.

Right ear drops to right shoulder,

Chin comes down to chest.

Left ear comes across to left shoulder,

Coming up and over.

And then switching directions.

Getting into how it feels,

Any sounds.

Coming back to center.

Bringing shoulders up towards your ears,

Rolling them back and down as you exhale.

And inhaling as they come up.

And then freedom in the space to make that movement quite spacious.

You might bring with it some wriggles.

You might have its own pattern.

And then circling elbows.

It might be a whole new set of noises and sensations.

And then full arm extensions.

And then lowering hands to knees and starting to circle the heart very slowly.

Quite broadly,

Broad sweeping circles with the heart.

You can always move forwards and back if circling doesn't feel steady for you.

And switching directions.

Coming to center,

Maybe circling hands.

Witches fingers.

And then turning,

Keeping your hands up,

Just turning over to the right.

And then laying your hands down so the left hand will come to knee,

Right hand comes behind you.

So it's less of a yanking yourself around,

More of an active twist.

Once you've found your position with your hands laying down on the floor and on your knee,

You can press down a little to let the ribcage float again.

Take some breaths there.

Realizing what you're able to notice.

And then raising the hands up off the floor and holding them just close to you as you come around.

And again,

We're going to come into an active twist rather than pulling ourselves around.

Notice where you come to and then lay your hands down.

As the hands press down,

See if you can lift up and take some breaths,

Twisting in the other direction.

Coming back to center.

And then lowering your hands to come into your lap,

Right palm on top of left,

Palms facing upwards,

Hands just gently cupping one another in your lap.

Feeling the breath as it enters on the inhale through the nostrils and how it departs on the exhale through the nostrils.

And then tuning our awareness to our internal world so that we can sense the feelings and sensations and language of our body.

And then letting your eyes gently open.

Just looking straight ahead,

Letting your gaze soften.

Notice what you can see out of the periphery of your field of vision.

And then see if you can get it a little bit wider.

So you're still looking straight ahead,

But you're noticing what you can see.

Whilst the gaze is straight ahead,

What can you see out to the side?

So it's like your scope of vision is widening along the landscape in the other direction.

Let me see if you can come even wider still.

And then bring your vision back in front of you.

You're going to bring your fingertips up in front of you.

Now you've got something to actually focus on.

And slowly start to take the fingertips wider.

So you're still looking straight ahead.

You're just noticing where you're able to continue to see.

Even though the fingers are drawing further apart,

You're still able to see them.

And going slowly as you rush.

You might soon start to come to the place where you're right on the edge.

Notice where it is where the fingertips disappear,

Where you can still track them.

And then gently start to bring the fingertips back.

Very slowly.

Noticing the experience in your vision.

How comfortable your eyes are with this or not.

And then laying your hands in your lap.

And using the eyes again,

We're going to gently start to move our face in four directions.

So the eyes are going to guide you as you let your eyes take you slowly over to the right.

Your eyes will go first,

Your face will slowly follow.

All the way around.

And then your eyes will start to guide you.

They'll sweep to begin with.

And then it will slow down as you take your face over to the left.

And then from there,

Coming back to center.

You don't need to go at this pace.

You can go way slower.

I'm just talking it through.

And then you'll raise your face upwards.

But your eyes will go down as you look,

Almost looking snootily down your nose.

And then your face will start to turn down as your eyes rise up to the space of your third eye.

So I talked that through quite quickly.

You're going to do that whole thing slowly and a few times.

Okay?

When you finish the next round,

Just pausing in center,

And noticing how your eyes feel and how your body feels.

In the next practice,

What we're going to do is a lion's breath.

So you're going to take your hands as if they were little claws,

And you're going to bring them to the tops of your knees,

Your thighs.

Fingertips are down and your,

It's kind of like cupcake hands,

But they're claws.

And then flatten them.

And when we exhale,

You're going to,

So they're flat,

When you exhale,

They're going to come up.

And then as you inhale,

They're going to come down.

That's what's going to go on with the hands.

And your eyes,

You're going to try and bring your vision to the space of your third eye.

And as you breathe out,

You're going to stick your tongue out as far as it can go.

And I find this incredibly difficult.

It's like it's so programmed to be neat and tidy that the idea of sticking my tongue out and roaring is just like mortifying.

But it does feel amazing.

Now everyone else is muted,

So you're only going to hear me anyway,

So you can make the strangest of noises.

You breathe in through your nose and you breathe out through your mouth,

Stick your tongue out as far as it will go.

Take your eyes to the point of your third eye and bring your hands up into little claws,

Lion's breath.

So breathing in through your nose.

Let me do that a couple more times.

And then relax.

Anyone practicing with a pet near them,

The pet might be quite alarmed right now.

And then we're going to do bee breath.

We're not going to use our hands.

We're going to do eight rounds.

And as you breathe out,

Your lips are closed,

You're breathing in and out through your nose,

You're going to hum a little vibrational hum in your throat.

And let that just kind of build up its own momentum and feel how it goes.

Again,

You're only going to hear me,

Everyone is muted,

So you can make the strangest of noises.

Breathing in through your nose,

Breathing out.

Breathing out through your nose.

Meh,

Meh.

Mm.

Mm.

Mm.

Mm.

Mm.

Mm.

Mm.

Mm.

And then coming to settle,

Allowing the breath to find its own current,

Own gentle pace,

Breathing through the nose,

Acknowledging how it feels.

And dropping down into the very center of the navel,

The dantian,

The place of that inner smile,

Nothing to do with people pleasing.

So smile that exists within you,

It's a way of feeling.

And letting the energy of the dantian expand out through all the cells of your body.

And then bringing your awareness to your heart center.

Taking your next in-breath,

Drawing it into your heart,

And expanding out from your heart as you exhale.

It feels like your heart is being breathed.

Creating space for the heart to communicate with us.

Hearts speak in quiet whispers sometimes,

Not always.

Sometimes they have their own set of cymbals and drums.

But mainly in day to day the heart speaks in quiet whispers,

In feelings and emotions and sensations.

And just a moment,

Just to listen.

Perhaps there's an intention for the week ahead.

Bringing your hands to your heart center,

Dropping your forehead to your fingertips,

Offering the fruits of our personal practice to the collective wellbeing of all sentient beings.

Namaste.

Reviews

I am so enjoying your meditations and it is just what I need as I am experiencing heart issues and trying to find a way to navigate them without meditating. These have been soothing and helpful to me. Thank you🙏

I liked the movement.