Healing Anxiety and Depression Through Nervous System Regulation With Amanda Armstrong

In this episode of A Healthy Push, I’m joined by Amanda Armstrong, a mental & physical health coach and the founder of Rise As We. Amanda also hosts the Regulate and Rewire Podcast, where she shares insights from her healing journey and research-based tools for regulating the nervous system to heal anxiety and depression.

Amanda’s Journey with Anxiety, Depression and Nervous System Regulation

Amanda's battle with anxiety and depression started at age 14 when her mother became ill, and she took on the responsibility of caring for her three younger siblings. This added pressure of balancing home life and school pushed Amanda into a constant state of over-functioning and survival mode, which took a toll on her nervous system.

As Amanda’s need for achievement grew, her mental health deteriorated. Seeking traditional treatment through medication and therapy, she was frustrated that nothing seemed to bring lasting change. The turning point came when Amanda learned to view her anxiety and depression through the lens of nervous system regulation—a transformative shift that she now teaches others to embrace.

Understanding Anxiety and Depression Through the Nervous System

Amanda helps individuals heal from anxiety and depression by focusing on the nervous system. She explains that in recent years, neuroscience has revealed that 80% of the mind-body connection is rooted in the body. While some may find relief through talk therapy, for others, discussing past trauma without understanding their nervous system can worsen symptoms by reactivating the body’s stress responses.

When we don’t have the tools to regulate our nervous system, the brain and body can become stuck in a constant state of survival. This perpetuates feelings of anxiety and depression.

The Nervous System Ladder

Amanda introduces the concept of the Nervous System Ladder, which is based on polyvagal theory. Picture a ladder with three color zones:

• Green Zone (Top of the ladder): When the nervous system is calm, we can rest, engage socially, and be creative. This is the parasympathetic nervous system at work.

• Yellow Zone (Middle of the ladder): As stressors build up, we enter an activated state where emotions like anxiety and anger reside.

• Red Zone (Bottom of the ladder): This is the shutdown state, where the nervous system collapses, often leading to feelings of depression.

Amanda explains that staying in an activated state for too long or carrying stress over time can push us into the red zone, resulting in shutdown or depression.

The Vagus Nerve and Its Role in Healing

The Vagus nerve is a crucial player in the body’s stress response. It is the longest cranial nerve, connecting the brain to nearly every major organ. Amanda explains how Vagal tone, similar to muscle tone, can be optimized through healthy actions like diet, exercise, sleep, and social engagement.

Laughing, for example, has been shown to activate the Vagus nerve, offering a simple yet powerful tool for stress regulation. Amanda goes into greater detail on the Vagus nerve in our conversation and reveals that her upcoming book, Healing Through the Vagus Nerve, will dive deeper into this topic. The book is set to release at the end of May, and you can learn more about it here!

Listen to the Full Episode

Amanda shared incredible insights and actionable tools to help heal anxiety and depression through nervous system regulation. I loved this conversation, and I know you will too! Don’t miss the full episode to hear more about Amanda’s journey and the practical steps you can take toward healing.

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TRANSCRIPT

Shannon Jackson  00:01

All right. Today on the podcast, I have Amanda with me. And she is the host of the regulate and rewire podcast. She's a coach and a somatic and trauma trained practitioner. And I'm really excited to have her here with me because we're going to be talking about something that I really haven't talked about much on the podcast, but it's such a big and important topic. So before we go there, Amanda, welcome to a healthy push podcast.

00:25

Thanks for having me. I'm excited to be here.

Shannon Jackson  00:27

Yeah, I'm super excited. So we're gonna be talking about anxiety and depression and a lot of things mixed in there. But before we go there, can you just tell people a little bit about you and how you got into this work that you're in now?

00:42

Yeah, so just personal life. I am a mom, I grew up in California, I now live just outside Washington, DC. So I went from one coast to the other here in the United States. And I help people heal anxiety and depression through a nervous system lens. And the way that I got into what I do is, through a lot of personal experience, also a lot of professional training. But I struggled, I think I've struggled with anxiety. For a really, really long time. My mom got really sick. I'm the oldest of four kids. And my mom got really sick like brain tumor cancer six spoiler alert, us okay, like she's still with us and amazing, and we're so lucky. But that happened when I was 14. And I often through a lot of healing work have come to see that like my childhood ended my childhood ended very much at 14 because I stepped into this role of making sure that my siblings were taken care of. And I think that very much was when this like playfulness side of me died and kind of the anxious, overachieving need to make sure all of my i's are dotted T's are crossed, not just for me, but for all of those around me, happened. And that led to a lot of over functioning, I would say I was somebody who I was on the track team, I was in a performing program I worked I, when I was in college, in grad school, I was taking 22 units of grad school credit, which is like almost double what people usually do, oh, while being president of the Habitat for Humanity club, working two part time jobs, and like not oftentimes because I had to, to get by, but because that was the level of busyness that felt the most safe for me that felt the most known the most normal for me. And so it just put my nervous system into this place of survival mode all the time. But it's also a hard thing to get out of because you're, you're praised for that level of productivity, like, oh, my gosh, Amanda, I don't know how you do so much. I don't know how you do it so well. And what I know now it's like, because that was my whole sense of self was this productivity based self worth. And every time I got praised for it, it reinforced it. And I got into my 20s. And that was where it like really started to take its toll and show up in my life in real ways. I would, I would say almost always I was higher functioning anxiety, higher functioning depression, even when it did turn into depression for me. I think because I had this other part of me that was like, so wired for productivity and praise, I still got up and went to work, and very few people knew, and then I would just come home and totally collapse. And that like poster child for, you know, depression can look like this, it can also look like this. And I tried all of the mainstream mental health support options. I went to the doctor. And I was like, Look, I'm really struggling. And I want to I want to know, why can you help me know why. And like so many people's experience I left about seven minutes later with a prescription in hand and very little support and figuring out why. And then I went the traditional talk therapy route. And it felt nice to have a person to talk to you about this. But it felt like this merry go round of talking about the same things over and over and over and over again and not ever feeling like that translated to feeling better in my daily life. It didn't translate to doing different in my daily life. And I was just frustrated like, well, maybe this is just how I am. Maybe this is just something that I have to deal with my whole life. And for me what really flipped the switch was learning about my nervous system. I'm learning to understand anxiety and depression through a nervous system lens. And quite quickly, after learning about that, I was so much more able to change certain things about my behavior that were facilitating stress physiology, it immediately built so much more context around my struggle and normalized it all of a sudden, it wasn't like, oh, there's something innately broken about me. But all of these symptoms make sense, right? Your listeners are listening right now. It's like, no wonder you were anxious. No wonder you that eventually led to depression, like you were chronically over functioning all the time. Something I think could be helpful for those listening. Do you mind if I take a minute and just talk about what I mean when I say like anxiety and depression through a nervous system? Lens? Yes, yes,

Shannon Jackson  05:50

that's was something I was gonna ask you. So go for it. Okay.

05:53

So when we talk about your nervous system, we're talking about mind body connection. And what we've learned in the last decade of neuroscience and psychology research is that 80% of this Mind, Body conversation originates in the body, which is why so many people don't see a relief. Many, many people see a relief, from anxiety, depression, through traditional talk therapy. But the the underground conversation that's not being had that I hear from hundreds of people every month about is that there is a huge group of people who don't, who have had a similar experience to me where they're like it, it feels good to have somebody to talk about all these things with, but I'm not getting better. And there's even another group of people who going to talk therapy actually makes their symptoms bigger makes their symptoms worse, because what's happening is their body is stuck and trapped in the state of survival mode. And your your brain and your body don't know the difference between talking about the past and reliving it being there again. And so when we don't have an understanding of our physiology of our nervous system, when we don't have tools to help us settle and feel safe in our body, while we talk about these things, it can reiterate that lack of safety. And so the nervous system, the way that I love to teach it is based on the nervous system ladder, which is founded in something called the polyvagal theory. And I want you to all maybe close your eyes for a minute. And imagine a ladder. And on this ladder, there's three color blocks. At the top is the green zone. So there's a green color black. In the middle is a yellow color black, I call it the yellow zone. And at the bottom is a red, a red color block. So that's the red zone. Now you are standing at the top of this ladder holding a bucket. Now this bucket represents your nervous systems capacity for stressors. When the stress load on your nervous system is light, you're standing at the top of that ladder holding that light bucket no problem, you're in that regulated Green Zone state. This is what we call our parasympathetic nervous system state this is rest and digest, where we can be socially engaged, where we can be creative, our brain and our body are all working together. Like a really awesome symphony, our brain is listening to our body, our bodies listening to our brain. And life happens, your day happens and stressors get added to that bucket. And when that bucket starts to get so loaded down, it pushes you further and further down the nervous system ladder. First into that yellow zone. This is our activated state. This is where things like anger and anxiety can live. Our body's default response to stressors is our fight or flight response. That's where it goes first first usually is flight can I avoid this thing that feels threatening to me and if I can't avoid it, well, I'm going to put up my fist, I'm gonna try to fight it away. And that's where we can stay for a really, really long time. But eventually, life either adds more stressors to our bucket. Or we're just carrying a heavy bucket for too long, but that bucket gets heavier and heavier and heavier, it pushes you further and further down the nervous system ladder into that red zone. This is a shutdown state. This is where depression lives. And what I love so much about understanding physiology in this like metaphorical way but that's what happens on the inside. When you're triggered into a state of fight or flight. Your pupils dilate, your vision narrows your respiration changes your heart rate changes. So imagine you have spent years and years and years and years and years in a state of chronic stress. That is a metabolically demanding state to be in. It's like a race car Write a racecar is not just your everyday commuter car, it is being pushed to its limits go Go, go, go, go, go go. And a car can only do that for so long before it shuts down and needs to go to the mechanic for a long time. That makes sense. And yet as humans, we think we have this like limitless capacity to push into push into push. But when we are in states of anxiety for too long, it can shut our system down. And so that's what I share this with the context of my own personal experience of I operated at that really gogogo level for years and years and years. And for me, it actually was a really devastating relationship break, it was a breakup in my 20s That was like the last drop into my bucket that just pushed me into that red zone. And I stayed there for a long time that kind of I went from like, I have to I have to I have to to why does it even matter? Why does it even matter? If I go to work? What doesn't even matter? If I show up? Why does it even matter if I, you know, call my friends. And this understanding anxiety and depression this way, not as these isolated diagnoses, or these ways that I was born are these things that I just had to manage the rest of my life. But actually, all of my symptoms, all of me made sense through this nervous system lens. And I started to ask this question of like, what if my nervous system is actually operating exactly as it's supposed to, based on my past lived experience and my current life circumstances. And that's kind of become the entire framework for how we support clients is like, let's for a minute, just assume that you're not broken, that there's nothing innately wrong with you. Let's look at your struggle, your anxiety, or your depression. And just assume for a minute that it makes sense. Let's assume for a minute that all of these symptoms, the way that your nervous system, your mind and your body is showing up. Let's assume that it's working exactly as it should, based on your past lived experience, and current life circumstances. Now, can we collect enough of those pieces to where you can see that? And it doesn't take a rocket scientist, all of your listeners are hearing the tiny snippet of my story that I shared with you. And you're like, yeah, that anxiety makes sense. Right? Yeah, we've all experienced deep grief and heartbreak in some way. It makes sense that that was that last drop in your bucket that shut you down into depression. And so anxiety is the warning. And then depression is the shutdown. Anxiety is the Hey, pay attention, Hey, pay attention. And if the stressors in our life either get too big, or they simply last too long, that is oftentimes when that depression sets in. And I even love early on in our healing in the healing journey we work on with clients is to invite them to ditch the terms anxiety and depression entirely. What if instead of saying like, Man, I woke up really anxious, it was oh, I woke up really activated. Or today is such a depression day today, I'm feeling really shut down. And what they find in changing that language is that it puts them back in a place where they feel like there's something they can do about it. Because there are so many somatic tools and practices, there are ways that you can tangibly shift these physiological states in your body to move more towards regulation. And so that was a really long answer to your How did you get into the work that you do? And what is the work that you do? And why do I do it is because it felt important to me as I got to the other side of anxiety and depression and had tools to know how to stay there. Now, that doesn't mean I'm not a robot, doesn't mean I don't sometimes have anxiety show up in really big ways. It doesn't mean I don't have days where I'm so overwhelmed or shut down. I'm a working mom of two tiny humans, like Yes, life gets overwhelming. But I've made the changes in the way that I was living my daily life, the relationships that I expose myself to that my baseline nervous system state is green and steady yellow, and I have the tools to recognize when I'm in yellow when I'm in red, and how to walk my myself back to a place of feeling more grounded and more regulated.

Shannon Jackson  14:42

Yeah, I think that awareness is so huge. i It's so incredibly helpful to look at things through this nervous system lens because they think we tend to just feel what we're feeling right and we're just sort of jolted by it and we analyze and then we convince ourselves like this isn't normal. I shouldn't be feeling this way. And what can you do to fix it? And instead, if you slow down and pause and say maybe does this make sense that I'm feeling the way that I do? And maybe I can just let myself feel this way a bit, and not try to like, do all the things right. But I like everything that you shared, you answered so many questions that I was going to ask you. But I think so much of what you shared is going to resonate with so many people like, high functioning, like I just I did this, I continue to do the thing is like, I'm showing up, I'm going to work or I'm going to school, but it doesn't feel good, right? Like it is so freakin hard. And people don't even know like that this is going on. And that that was it for me. And people ask me, Did you struggle with depression? And honestly, I'm seven years recovered? And I'm like, I think so. I think so looking back, I'm like,

15:54

what if we? What if we changed that terminology? Yeah. And we said, okay, when you were struggling, you know, instead of did you struggle with depression? Did you feel really shut down some days? Yeah. And the answer is like, yeah, obviously. And this is why some people would have a pattern we see often and people who are like, Oh, no, I don't have depression. But when I say okay, well, let's, let's look at this nervous system letter. Do you ever experience this pattern where you have some, a few really high anxiety days? And then a couple days where you're just like, I'm exhausted, I'm shut down? And they're like, yeah, that like, yes, they can see that cycle over and over and over again. It's like, go, go, go, go, go. And then you're just like, I can't go today. I can't go today. But then there's that inner urgency of like, but you have to go, but you're like, I can't write. And now all of a sudden, there's this light bulb that goes off of oh, okay, so you don't have to label it depression. In fact, I think that this pathology model is really detrimental in like these labels, because also, the same symptoms that check enough boxes to get you diagnosed with anxiety or depression can have very different root causes. We see clients, and we are actually working on a program now where will where I will bring in a nurse practitioner onto our team as well and will facilitate at home blood testing, and even gut health analysis and things like that. Because what we see is there somebody who has checked enough boxes and been diagnosed with anxiety. And as they dig a little deeper as we do this, like whole human whole life approach. For some of them, it's like, oh, yeah, it's very clear. There's that childhood thing. Here's this like belief system. And for other people, it's like, I don't know if I see any of that and they go get bloodwork done. And they are wildly deficient in different vitamins or minerals, they have gut health imbalances, there could be a hormone imbalance. And unfortunately, that blood testing is not offered for mental health as often as it's offered for other things. And it really makes a difference, because when you just label somebody with anxiety, and it's like, okay, therapy or meds, like those are your mainstream options. Well, there's no amount of talk therapy in the world that is going to help you minimize anxiety symptoms that are caused by being under rested and over caffeinated, or that are caused by having too low progesterone that are caused by being wildly micronutrient deficient. And there are quite simple tests that we can run to see some of those things. And same thing with depression, like there's no amount of antidepressant that is going to get rid of depression symptoms that are caused by extreme social isolation, or nutrient depletion, or an living consistently in an unsafe or toxic environment. And so were the the mainstream Mental Health Options fell wildly short for me and have fell fallen wildly short for hundreds of people who found their way into my coaching practice to is that it was too focused on symptom management. And not enough focused on let's look at you as a whole human with a whole life and a whole past and try to make sense and I don't know that I necessarily want to blame doctors or, you know, therapists or anybody, I'm not blaming anybody, because we're in a mental health crisis, and doctors only have an average of seven minutes per patient. And therapists books are wildly packed right now their six month waitlist, and therapists aren't often supported in the deep work that they do. So it makes sense also, I have many, many therapists right now reaching out to me who found my podcast, who are like Look, nobody in school, nobody after school, no In supervision hours ever talked to me or taught me about the nervous system or the role that it could play in the symptoms that people are seeking out my services for the impact that trauma has on the nervous system? I know nothing about physiology, how do I know if maybe we're not seeing a ton of progress with a client that it's not because of something going on in their body? And what can I say and, and I love that therapists are reaching out and they're saying, hey, I want to learn more about this that I wasn't taught. My background, I have a master's in kinesiology, emphasis exercise Psych. So my university had, at the time, the only movement based intervention program for depression, that in the country that we could find, it was an exercise, not even exercise, it was a peer mentor, movement based program for students struggling with depression. And I was like that, that's what I want to research. That's what I want to study, I participated as a mentor first. And so my degree is curriculum. Lee is more exercise psych oriented, but we didn't have an exercise psych label at my school. So we just kind of made up my curriculum, so is half in the psychology master's program, and then half in the exercise science program. But I, my research looked at this overlap between community support, movement and depression, and these bidirectional relationships. So that's where I got started. And then after graduating, I actually got hired at Google headquarters as part of their corporate wellness team. And so I worked there in California for five years, my role was very much more physical health oriented, I worked as a personal trainer in the gyms did some more physical health initiatives. But in addition to having those on, on site, people, they also had therapists at their campus there. And so I had a really cool opportunity, because of my background to do some pilot studies with the therapist to look at this overlap between mental health and physical health. And those conversations were always really, really awesome, because it was, what I was trained in the way that I was trained was different. And so I think a lot of times, people see like mental health coaching space, or the rhetoric comes out, and I say things often, like, talk therapy isn't the right fit for everybody. It's definitely not the right fit for everybody for their whole healing journey. And it's interesting, who hears that as like, you're anti therapy. I'm like, no, no, therapists are life saving. If we need them, it's a both and, and the truth is that therapists are not often trained unless they seek it out themselves. In physiology and the role that plays in anxiety and depression. A client recently went to their doctor who was prescribing them anti anxiety meds, and said, Hey, can you talk to me about like the vagus nerve, and the role that that might be playing or the nervous system? And the doctor is like, Oh, don't worry about that. Don't worry about that. Do you know how much research we have that says, you should absolutely be asking those questions. But the other like systemic problem here is that it takes an average of 17 years. From the time something is found in a lab to when it becomes clinical practice. Yes, 17 years of a human's life is a long time for us to know better, but not be doing better. And there's just a, there's a better more comprehensive way for us to be caring for people who are struggling with anxiety and depression one that takes a look at our the physiology of psychology. Right,

Shannon Jackson  23:49

right. I couldn't agree more. I'm curious what you just said, Can we delve into that a little bit? Like what the heck is the vagus nerve? And how can it be helpful in relation to anxiety and depression? Yeah,

24:00

absolutely. In fact, I wrote a whole book on this that is available for pre order. So if you want to do me a solid and drop my pre order in the show notes, yeah, it comes out in May. It's titled healing through the vagus nerve. So your vagus nerve, and listeners, I'm going to get kind of sciency for a minute, and then I promise I'll pull it back into real life. But your vagus nerve is your 10th and longest cranial nerve. And it is also your most complicated so this nerve exits your brainstem. And if you just do a quick Google search, like vagus nerve, you'll see that this nerve exits your brainstem and then it travels everywhere. In fact, vagus is I think Latin for wandering, it's sometimes called the wandering nerve innervates up near your throat down into your lungs, your heart all the way down to your colon with these little branches, touching almost every single major organ in your body. And so when We talk about mind body connection mind gut connection. We're talking about the vagus nerve. And just like muscle tone, right? If I was to say you have high muscle tone, oh, that's, that's a strong muscle, that's a muscle that's working really well, we measure the vagus nerve functioning through similar terminology. So high vagal tone means you have a healthy vagus nerve that is activated, often, it's communicating efficiently between mind and body. When you have low vagal tone, it means that it's not as, as optimal. And we measure vagal tone, usually through heart rate variability. So as of right now, there's no direct way to measure vagal tone. And so instead, what we often do is we measure a lot of the different things that the vagus nerve plays a role in. And we're like, how well are those things happening, because that's going to inform us on vagal tone. And one of the metrics that we use is heart rate variability. And what we know is that over and over and over again, what we're seeing is that people who are chronically stressed people who have experienced trauma, people who are diagnosed with anxiety and depression, all have, or often have low vagal tone. And this is where I think sometimes we're looking for that, you know, magic trick and magic hack. And the vagus nerve is like a really trendy thing to talk about in the healing world right now. And there's all there's these devices that are like, you know, if you put this behind your ear, it activates your vagus nerve and your vagus nerve. And I think we a lot of times can take research really out of context. And obviously, people exploit that and try to monetize things. What we know more than anything that helps to improve vagal tone is healthy living, exercise, getting good sleep, eating whole foods, nutrient dense, Whole Foods. We know that healthy social engagement, laughing activates the vagus nerve, being outside, gardening, getting your hands and dirt has been directly correlated with decreased depression symptoms, because the dirt can change your gut microbiome, gut health. And so, so much of heal, I mean, again, bring this back to your body. Right? If you want to have really strong biceps, what's going to give you really strong biceps. Number one is avoid injury, avoid the things that could cause harm to that part of your body. And then to is consistent reps over time. And so if you're like, how do I improve vagal tone, while less of the things that harm your whole body system, because remember, it's got its fingers in everything. So how can I step into just a healthier lifestyle, also, knowing that somebody who's struggling with anxiety or depression has really low capacity for change, especially when you're living in survival mode, you are always going to default to your most well worn patterns and pathways, which is why you can no better logically but not do better in your life. And that's not because you suck, it's not because you lack willpower, or you're not motivated enough, it's because you lack capacity and resource in a very real way. And so I can sit here and be like, You know what you all should be getting eight hours of sleep, make sure that you're eating breakfast, because one of the number one things that correlates with anxiety is blood sugars that are out of control. And how many of you listening are skipping breakfast and caffeinated? Stop doing that, or you're grabbing like a bagel or a pop tart or something that's going to high protein, blood sugar regulating Breakfast has been such a powerful intervention for so many of my clients. But I can sit here and give you this protocol for you know, healthy living all stuff, you know, and you're still going to be two weeks from now two months from year to two years from now. Not actually engaging in that behavior change because your capacity hasn't changed. And also the truth is if you can step into some of that behavior change, your capacity will increase right healthy life. Healthy Life changes lead to a positive life changes lead to positive brain changes. And those positive brain changes help you to engage in more positive life changes. And so when it comes to this conversation around behavior change, it has to take into consideration the person in front of us capacity, the 24 hours of their day and what that looks like so many people were like yeah, when I asked for tangible tools, my therapist told me to Start exercising, well, like I can't get out of bed in the morning right now. And how am I supposed to start doing that? And so I think, Well, what I think we do really well in our practice is we say, Hey, these are the pillars of health, these all matter. And all of these things are going to take load out of that stress bucket we talked about at the beginning, and give you more capacity for that deeper work that also likely needs to be done. Because yeah, your child is really unpredictable, that really crappy thing happened to you. But we're not going to start there. Because right now, your buckets already full and doing that deeper work is going to overload your system and reinforce the need to stay stuck in survival mode. So what can we do right now to step just 1% into one of these areas of your life, the way that I help people heal, it's not a quick fix. It takes time, and it's 1% at a time. But over time working on our practice, you do start to sleep better, you start to nourish your body better, you have deeper relationships, and a stronger sense of belonging. That's like one of the number one things is like, when was the last time you played? And if you don't know, that's a problem. That's a problem. What feels fun for you, when was the last time you let yourself rest? Not because you deserved it not because you finished your to do list. Rest is a biological imperative. And so when we're talking about the vagus nerve in my book, it's interesting because I got approached by a publisher who was like, Hey, we wanna write a book on the vagus nerve. And I was like, Okay, I'm not going to write a whole book on the vagus nerve, because just focusing on the vagus nerve is problematic. But if you can let me write a whole book on understanding mental health through a nervous system lens, talk about the lifestyle pieces, all of it, letting the vagus nerve be the star of the show that it is when we talk about nervous system regulation. That's a book all right. And he was like, Yeah, that sounds way better. I was like, Okay. And this book is meant to be something that holds your hand and walks you through answering that question, it starts the first chapter is here's, here's some of the science about the nervous system. Hate and then the next chapter is like, okay, let's talk about the vagus nerve. And then the next chapters, okay, let's take a look at your nervous system. Let's see if we can measure your the health of your vagus nerve via either Do you have an aura ring or an Apple watch, and you can look at something like heart rate variability, or we can assess higher low vagal tone with pretty good accuracy by looking at certain some just cluster symptoms. If you struggle with anxiety or depression, you likely have low vagal tone, you just do. And so making your awareness of your vagus nerve and different tools, things that an ear massage or neck massage that you can do throughout your day. We know stimulator activate the vagus nerve in real time, now is doing like an ear neck massage, or your vagus nerve innervates really close to your vocal cords singing and humming. also activate your vagus nerve. Now, can you sing or hum your way out of depression or anxiety? No, no, right? But doing the certain exercises that activate your vagus nerve multiple times throughout the day. Those are reps like in a gym, those are bicep curls. Those are bicep curls. And also those can be really helpful tools in the moment you need it most. So the vagus nerve makes up 75% of that parasympathetic nervous system, that green zone state we were talking about. So if there's a moment, you can recognize I'm really anxious right now. And there's a particular tool that you know, helps to activate your vagus nerve and calm you down. Well, that can be a really helpful tool to add to your toolbox.

Shannon Jackson  34:02

Yeah, I like that. i It's so interesting, where my brain was going, of course, I'm thinking about all the clients and students who come to me and they've just been sold on the messaging of like, you just have to get out there and face the fear. And you just have to get out there and do the hard things. And you can do it and you have the capacity. And I'm just like, thinking right back to when I was struggling and seeing what I did wrong for so many years. And that's what people often get caught up in is I just need to get out there and face the things right I just need to do the hard things and show myself I can do it and I'm like but but wait, like what you're saying, right? You don't have the capacity to really do that. Nor do you have the tools or the resources. So let's put a hold on that. And you know, this is a big part of my program is like we don't even get to that stuff until like weeks into the program because it's like, we can't start there. If you don't have the ability to start there, and that's okay. And

35:03

and yeah, and that's okay. And it makes sense, right? And we think about something that feels really important for me is to redefine the way that we use the word trauma. Because for me, I would never have looked at what I went through with my mom as trauma. But any other mental health practitioners like, Yes, that's absolutely childhood trauma. You're you walked in on your mom having an active seizure, your dad wasn't home, and he didn't have a cell phone. So you at 14 handled calling the ambulance, getting your mom where she needed to go while also having your sister home and like, trying to curate that to feel safe for her. And like, that's trauma. But because I was like, well, it wasn't a sexual assault, or it wasn't a big car accident, or it wasn't war. It wasn't whatever, like people have it so much worse. So like, I'm fine, I'm fine, I'm fine. And I'm find my way through life until I wasn't. Yeah, until I really, really wasn't. And so the way I love to define trauma, trauma is not the event. Trauma is the way that you your nervous system in your body received that event. Trauma is anything that overwhelms your nervous system beyond your capacity to cope. It's anything that knocked you so far out what we call your window of tolerance or knocked you so deep into that yellow or red zone we were talking about, that you couldn't find your way back into that green zone. And when we talk about it's also like a really hot thing, like trauma is stored in your body do these exercises to release stored trauma. The kind of layman's physiology of this is when you are activated into that sympathetic state, you have muscle tension, right, your fight, you're you're preparing to fight or flee. And so a healthy stress cycle, because what all of this boils down to is basic stress physiology, stress is not a problem. Too much of it is a problem. We are regulated. And then we're we sense a stressor. And then either we fight that stressor off, we've run from it, or it just passes on its own. And then we reset. That reset is the thing that keeps us mentally well. But because of our various life experiences, and also because of just this toxic, modern world that we live in, in many ways. It's Go Go Go, go, go go go. From a young age, especially as women we are fed this messaging of not enoughness, unless we look a certain way, talk a certain way, get a certain level of attention from people. And so we're constantly on this hamster wheel of before we're ever able to get that reset. There's another stressor, there's another stressor, there's another stressor. And so our body is storing this unneeded survival energy, this tension in our body, because our nervous system always predicts more of what it's gotten in the past. It has to that's how we survive as animals. Be ready, be ready, be ready, be ready. And you know what, we aren't sure that that ever ended. And because I never had the support that I needed to show my nervous system that Oh, mom, mom is fine. We made it to the other end of that, in many ways, it still plays out patterns as if I'm that little girl, I'm not done with my healing. I support people in their healing, but I'm not done with it either. Because it's our lifelong work. And when we can just hold ourselves. So that's where that's I think where I want to bring this to is this messaging of like, just get out there and go, just get out there and go. There is, I think 2% of that, that's like, there's some truth in that, in that, if you are afraid of dogs, you logically know that that little that little poodle you're seeing across the street is safe. But you avoid that poodle, and you stay safe that reinforces to your brain to your body. Avoiding the thing I'm afraid of is what keeps me alive. Keep doing that. Right. So at some point, we do need to step towards the poodle, we need to help our mind and our body realize that life is different. Now not every dog is that one dog that got in my face as a kid. Not every restaurant is the restaurant that I had a panic attack in. Not every partner is the partner who X Y or Z. And so there's an element of Yes, eventually you're going to need to step into that But the thing you need first is healing that feels like a hug, is healing that feels holding is healing that feels soft. Because if trauma was something that overwhelmed your nervous system, either because it came too fast, too soon or too often, we also often think about trauma as the thing that happened to us. But it can also be the things that should have happened for us that didn't, as a child, having too little sense of safety, having too little space to be authentically ourselves, too little nurturing too little human touch, human connection, too little permission for our feelings. And so trauma can be an overwhelming amount of too much or too little. But if trauma is too much, too fast than healing has to be slow, and gentle, and holding and compassionate. And one of my favorite things about the early work that we do, and I'm sure you do as well with clients is when you can understand anxiety through this nervous system lens. That softening happens, I watch it happen in their bodies, I watch their face, brighten, I watch their shoulders drops 17 inches from their ears, I watch their fists release, when there's this moment of, oh, I make sense. I'm not innately broken. My these ways of showing up in the world that I hate the most, I can see that they have positive intent, or they did serve me at one point, because if they didn't, I wouldn't have them. And now the journey becomes not rewriting this narrative of brokenness or like white knuckling your life or pushing through, but I want to just lay down new patterns. I want to learn how to nurture myself through the hard moments in a new way. I want to be able to learn the tangible tools that help my mind and my body. Realize that this is now not then I'm here and not there. This is a safe person, not insert whoever from your past was belittling. Yeah, not safe in any way. And that is where that somatic work comes in. Because our body doesn't speak alonge logical language. You can tell yourself, you're fine as many times as you want. And I want to know, for those of you listening, how often have you told yourself, you're fine, and actually that works. You're like, oh, yeah, I'm good. You're white knuckling that I'm fine. I'm fine. I'm okay. I'm okay. I'm okay. I'm okay. But until you learn how to release some of that tension in your body until you learn how to shift your physiology in real and measurable ways, which you can do. That's what somatic healing is, is. It's this. Your body speaks the language of don't tell me I'm safe. Show me I'm safe. Right helped me to feel like we don't have to fight for our lives anymore. And that happens gradually.

Shannon Jackson  43:20

Yeah. Oh, for sure. Right. I say small steps consistently. And I think, you know, something I was thinking was when people ask me like, Shannon, how did you get to this place that you're at now? Right? And I'm like, Okay, this is a really big question. But I can answer it very simply, that I actually started supporting myself, and creating a healthy relationship with my emotions, like it wasn't one or the other. But for a long time, I just didn't think supporting myself was part of the picture. Like, why do I have to do that? Why is that important? I didn't even know. And so that's a huge piece. Right? What do you think a lot of people are missing is just simply supporting yourself. It's massive.

44:01

Yeah, that was one of the light switch moments in my healing was I was kind of just like venting to a friend. You know, like, how overwhelmed I was how much I was struggling. And she was like, well, like, what are you doing to meet your own needs? And she said, I looked at her like a deer in the headlights. And then she had a follow up question. She's like, Amanda, do you even know what your needs are? And I shattered, I started sobbing and sobbing because I didn't have a clue. At that point in my life. If you're like, Well, how do you take care of your needs? I don't know. I recklessly abandoned those 10 years ago, for the sake of what my little 14 year old brain decided was like holding my family together like I thought I was it.

Shannon Jackson  44:47

Yeah.

44:49

And and I think that's a perfect example because you know, my trauma comes not from anything anybody did wrong. It was just In life, and that experience was just as valid as other people's trauma for other reasons and other ways. And it was when I validated that, that that part of me that 14 year old girl was like, Oh, we don't have to run the show of your life as an adult as often anymore. Because you've offered me the validation and the holding and the witnessing. That I didn't get because all the people around me were also living in survival mode. And I, it was when I learned how to give that to myself to that part of myself. That all of a sudden, my symptoms softened, because that part of me didn't feel like she was still white knuckling her life. 10 years later, right.

Shannon Jackson  45:53

Oh, dang, Amanda, this has been such a good conversation. I have loved it. You're so like, simple, practical, just make sense. So if people are like, I want more, where can they find you and connect with you? Yeah,

46:09

I think my podcast regulate rewire is a really good place to start. That's where you get to learn in more depth over a lot of conversations. I have an Instagram, Amanda on the rise. And I respond personally to my DMs there, and then I have a book coming out. So healing through the vagus nerve. It's available for preorder. I am a first time author. So pre orders are really, really important. And anybody who does preorder my book is going to get a follow along video course as a free thank you gift. So that's an extra incentive to buy a book two months before it could show up to your doorstep because people are like, Why? Why preorder it I'll just order it when it's out. But it's, it's really helpful for me. And then you can learn more about my mental health coaching practice at Rice as we.com. So lots of places to find me in lots of different ways depending on what you're interested in.

Shannon Jackson  47:04

I love that we'll definitely share all the links. Thanks again, Amanda. This has been wonderful. Thanks