Today’s nugget is one of the most sneakily simple yet powerful things I’ve done over the last 3 years.

It’s taken me from feeling near constant low-level pressure and anxiety to feeling truly relaxed most of the time.

Wanna know what it is?

Tending to my nervous system.

I know it might not sound that sexy. In fact, I thought something so subtle couldn’t possibly deliver wow-worthy change in my productivity and money, specifically.

I mean, “What does a bundle of nerves have to do with my bank account and my schedule?” I thought.

As is often the case when we’re not open, I was wrong.

When I first heard Erica Chidi Cohen say that productivity might be a trauma response I heard a very loud record scratch in my head.

My body knew it was true for me.

So I did what I always do when I’m fascinated: I went on down the rabbit hole and I’m still not out. I don’t think I ever will be.

When it comes to nervous system healing, the better it gets the better it gets. I just keep discovering more and more layers of healing and joy and miraculous “polish over here and it shines over there” moments.

Tending to my nervous system has helped me in my marriage, with mothering, with my focus, with content creation, with public speaking, in friendship, with my money, with my sleep, and most of all, with being able to feel the general feeling that I’m ok. Hallelujah.

We’ll probably get into a little bit more of how the nervous system works and why it’s connected to absolutely every area of our lives in a future Dispatch, but for today I wanted to give you my top 3 nervous system healing tools.

• Singing

When we sing (or tone even if there’s no melody) we stimulate the Vagus nerve which sends a message to your body that it’s time to relax and de-stress. Try it right now. Sing a few lines of your favorite tune and notice how you feel afterwards.

• Breathing into my lower, back ribs

Take your hands and feel where your lowest rib is in the back. Take a breath in and send your breath to that place. Try it for 3 breaths. Notice how you feel. Breathing in this way activates the parasympathetic nervous system, i.e. the rest and restore response, and I use it all the time during calls, while driving, while trying to not lose it on my kids, etc.

• Rocking

You don’t have to be a baby to feel soothed by rocking. That’s why an entire piece of furniture exists for this very practice. But you don’t need a chair on rockers to do it. Just start swaying back and forth rhythmically. Bonus points if you give yourself a hug at the same time. Doesn’t that feel nice?

Here’s the thing:

Experiencing life to the fullest requires us to first feel safe.

Most of us weren’t raised in environments where we felt safe all the time so our nervous systems have some patterns that need to be healed. 

This is totally possible…for anyone.

And when you do it, you’ll stop unconsciously doing things to bring yourself back to the same nervous system set point that you experienced growing up just because it feels like home to you.

One day you’ll wake up and find you’re not doing that bad habit you used to do all the time that you couldn’t get yourself to stop doing and you’ll realize you didn’t even have to do anything specifically to stop.

You just healed your nervous system enough to stop the pattern without having to try.

It’s very #doless.

Xo,

Kate