Coming Home to Your Nervous System — Why it Makes Sense to Work With the Vagus Nerve
Understanding the vagus nerve, chronic survival mode, and why gentle support can make all the difference
The vagus nerve is a part of the autonomic nervous system (ANS), and is fundamental to our experience of life and how we move through it. Knowledge about the vagus nerve and its role in the ANS, and how you can work with it to feel better, can help you change how you navigate life and how you feel in life from the roots up.
I like to use the analogy of a tree: the autonomic nervous system could be compared to the roots of a tree. They are invisible, but critical for health, functioning, nourishment, stability, growth and connection far beyond what the eye can see. A tree can only grow as strong and healthy as its roots allow.
Just like the roots nourish the tree, your nervous system nourishes
your experience of life — often beneath the surface of your awareness
If you’re feeling stuck, tense, or disconnected — whether from yourself, from others, or from your desires — working with the vagus nerve can support you in shifting these patterns at the root.
Your vagus nerve plays a key role in your wellbeing
No matter which path you take towards more self-connection, self-agency & inner empowerment, spirituality or healing: A well-regulated vagus nerve is a vital foundation for making that path more accessible, smoother, easier, and more sustainable. Only then can we genuinely feel inner joy, simply be, connect with ourselves, find peace within, and follow new heart-led paths without being held back by old survival patterns or inner resistance.
Why does working with the vagus nerve make sense?
The autonomic nervous system (ANS)—which includes the vagus nerve—is essential for your survival.
It’s connected to every organ in your body and has a huge impact on your psychological and emotional wellbeing. It works beneath conscious awareness and rational thinking — constantly scanning your body and your environment to determine whether things are safe enough for you to relax, or whether it needs to activate a survival response.
Your ANS has a vital job:
To keep you alive, safe, and functioning optimally. You simply couldn’t survive without it.
In order to do this, it works with three core states:
Safe
Mobilised or ‘unsafe’ (e.g. fight or flight)
Immobilised or ‘unsafe’ (e.g. freeze or collapse)
No one state is better than the other — we need a combination of all three states to function optimally and navigate the ups and downs of life.
When you are not in danger, these states actually blend and work together to give you the energy you need, moment by moment.
We’ll explore each state briefly below — but remember, the ANS is complex, and still being researched.
This understanding is based on the Polyvagal Theory developed by Dr. Stephen Porges, who also created the SSP (Safe and Sound Protocol).
The 'Safe' State — and why it's essential for self-connection
When your ANS evaluates your environment as safe, your vagus nerve activates what’s known as the ventral vagal state — a mode of calm, connection, and ease. (You don't need to remember the name — it’s the principle that is helpful to know.)
This happens entirely beneath your conscious awareness. You can’t easily switch it on just with willpower or positive thinking — your ANS decides, based on how it has been shaped over the course of your life.
Only when your ANS is in this safe state can you fully connect with your true self. That’s when you can feel relaxed, creative, joyful, connected, and calm. And because the ANS affects every system in the body, the benefits ripple throughout.
When your ANS ‘feels safe’ and is well-regulated…
Your body works in harmony, and you feel grounded, calm, and more able to connect to your true self.
You might experience things like:
❁ A deep sense of wellbeing in your body
❁ Inner joy
❁ Access to your full potential
❁ Creative flow
❁ A feeling of optimism and lightness
❁ Openness to new experiences
❁ The ability to relax easily
...and many more
When this state is ‘on’ and well-regulated, you have the ability to navigate the stresses, ups and downs of life and shift easily into ‘rest and digest’ whenever you can.
When your ANS ‘feels unsafe’ or is in survival
When the ANS senses that something isn’t safe, it shifts into survival mode.
This could be:
The fight or flight response
Freeze or faint response
Maybe you’ve heard the term “the 4 Fs” — Flight, Fight, Freeze, and Faint.
There are actually more, like fawn and please & appease, but more about those another time…
In truly threatening situations, these survival responses are life-saving. But what happens when these states become chronic?
Chronic survival states are more common than you think
Many people are stuck in chronic patterns of survival without realising it.
This isn’t your fault. These states operate in the subconscious and are often the result of early conditioning, trauma, ancestral themes, chronic illness, or other kinds of long-term stress.
Because they're so automatic and invisible, it’s helpful to learn how these patterns can show up in everyday life. You may not even realise your body is stuck in a survival response. It might not feel like "survival mode" — especially if you’re highly functional or outwardly successful. But underneath, your system may be signalling that something isn’t quite right.
Let’s explore what nervous system regulation — and dysregulation — can look like in daily life.
What is Regulation?
Regulation refers to how smoothly your nervous system can shift between its different states. A flexible nervous system constantly adapts to life’s demands — moving between calm, activation, and recovery as needed. This balance is what allows us to respond appropriately to what’s happening in the moment.
When your ANS is dysregulated…
In this state, your nervous system struggles to shift fluidly between states. It becomes “stuck” in survival mode — even when you are no longer in danger.
You might think of it like this:
Your nervous system is scanning the world through a lens shaped by past experience — especially early life adversity, chronic stress, inherited patterns, or even modern lifestyle overload. This lens shapes and filters how you perceive the outside world and adapts your body to cope with the challenges and stresses in many ways. This can create patterns that quietly shape how you feel, connect, and live — even if you're not fully aware of it.
What can dysregulation look like?
When your ANS is dysregulated, it becomes hard — or even impossible — to connect with others from a place of ease, warmth, or authenticity. Many of the challenges that arise from this can go unnoticed for years, because of the way your ANS works beneath your awareness.
You may experience:
❁ Difficulty relaxing or switching off
❁ Feeling like you always have to ‘function’
❁ Chronic exhaustion
❁ Feelings of hopelessness
❁ Digestive issues
❁ Persistent sadness
❁ Loneliness
❁ Restlessness and inner agitation
❁ Negative thought spirals
❁ Burnout
...and many more.
So is it worth working with your ANS?
Absolutely. Supporting your nervous system to become more flexible and resilient is one of the most foundational steps you can take towards greater ease, joy, and self-connection.
There are so many things you can do to support nervous system and work with it.
Often simple things like slowing down, doing less, breathing consciously, becoming mindful of your body, going for walks in nature, doing yoga or qigong, singing, dancing, or connecting with like-hearted souls can help it to be more deeply regulated.
The nervous system is like the root system of your entire being. When it’s regulated, nourished and supported, everything else has room to grow. Remember my analogy with a tree at the beginning of this brochure?
If you’d like to explore this topic more deeply, here are a few places you might enjoy:
If you’d like to explore this topic more deeply, here are a few places you might enjoy:
For a more poetic exploration of how the nervous system connects with your soul and sensing field, you may also enjoy:
⟡ Your Nervous System Is a Portal to Your Soul
A gentle, poetic reflection on the multidimensionality of the nervous system.
For more in-depth educational explorations of the nervous system:
⟡ Being Who You Truly Are — And What Your Nervous System Has to Do With It
An exploration of how inner safety, nervous system regulation, and subconscious patterns shape your ability to access and express your true self.
⟡ Coming Home to Your Nervous System — Why it Makes Sense to Work With the Vagus Nerve
A clear, compassionate introduction to the vagus nerve and why it plays such a central role in wellbeing and inner connection.
⟡ The Missing Piece: Why Your Nervous System is Key to Lasting Transformation
A foundational look at the autonomic nervous system and how it influences your patterns, safety, inner growth, and capacity for change.
More about the Safe and Sound Protocol: music that gently helps you restore balance in your nervous system:
⟡ What is the Safe and Sound Protocol — and how can it support your inner journey?
A gentle, research-backed listening programme designed to help your nervous system shift into a state of inner safety. Created by Dr. Stephen Porges, a renowned neuroscientist and founder of Polyvagal Theory, the SSP is used around the world to support emotional regulation, resilience, and a deeper sense of connection.
More about my Nervous System Programme (can includes the Safe and Sound Protocol):
⟡ Nervous System Coaching with the Safe and Sound Protocol
A soft, grounded overview of my 1:1 nervous system support — blending the SSP, somatic practices, and intuitive guidance.
(Includes a short video introduction)
A gentle closing...
Your nervous system holds the roots of your joy, your aliveness, your connection.
It’s the inner foundation for your soul to blossom fully into life.
When you return to this inner foundation, you’re not just calmer — you’re living more deeply from your essence, guided by your own wisdom and wholeness.
This work honours a sacred return to your essence - a remembering of the wholeness that was always there.
So you can come home to the heart of your BEING
I’d be honoured to walk part of this journey with you.
Trauma-informed intuitive guide and soulful embodiment coach with a background rooted in science and spirit.
Your energy and presence are gifts to share with the world — even if they are deeply quiet. They are the very fuel that helps you transform your life and truly flourish.
You can tap into this when you ground in the essence of being you.
That’s what this blog is here to hold: reflections from my own long journey home to myself, interwoven with the insights I’ve gained through years of lived experience and training.
Warmly, Julia
This blog draws, in gratitude, on the work and wisdom of:
Dr Stephen Porges — Polyvagal Theory and the development of the Safe and Sound Protocol (SSP)
Deb Dana — Clinical applications of Polyvagal Theory in psychotherapy
Additional insights from my own professional training in (somatic) psychotherapy, medicine, trauma therapy, spiritual life coaching, and family constellations
And my own lived experience of healing from autonomic nervous system dysregulation