Important Vagus Nerve Nonsense Compliments of Western Medicine

Image from this article: https://www.thecut.com/2019/05/i-now-suspect-the-vagus-nerve-is-the-key-to-well-being.html

I have been teaching about the vagus nerve for years, sharing this post and the post I wrote on how I discovered this vagus nerve healing fun, before vagus nerve - yoga science research was becoming more mainstream. 

Recently, I learned some interesting information in regards to the vagus nerve and western medicine.  Someone I love had a spell that medical people refer to as a vagal response. Have you ever heard the term "vagaled out."
When the spell was first happening, I checked for the obvious
-stroke check first and when I was clear that was not the issue... I quickly checked heart rate and heart beat strength.  Heart rate was way down & thready feeling, person feels like they are going to faint, and loss of color in the face. So I knew we were most likely dealing with a vagus response. 

I, of course, looked up information to share with the one weaving this spell, so their body's response would be better understood.
In looking up vagus response information, I tapped into all this research on how the medical field now knows that a toned vagus nerve supports weight loss. 
A paragraph from one study:
    A number of studies have demonstrated that pulsed electrical stimulations on vagus nerve could induce multiple physiologic functions related to food intake, energy metabolism, and glycemic control, which can result in appreciable weight loss20–22. An implantable vagus nerve stimulation (VNS) device for weight control was recently approved by Food and Drug Administration and commercialized20,23. Major concerns of current electrical stimulation are potential compensation mechanisms that blunt physiological responses14 and vicinity tissue damage that induces adverse effects17,24,25. In addition, the electrical system is bulky and complicated in operation. All the electrical stimulations need to be programed externally and the device needs to be charged periodically13,26. How to achieve real-time-responsive and self-sustainable stimulation remains a major challenge for this promising weight control strategy.                                         National Library of Medicine

I underlined the last sentence because, instead of recommending a inner conscience connection lifestyle habit, AKA Yoga, the medical field came up with an electrical implant to intermittently stimulate the vagus nerve to possibly tone it.
AND, the medical field seems clueless about Yoga and its ability to tone the vagus nerve.
Hmmm, maybe this is Yoga's beautiful method of supporting weight loss and healthy lifestyle choices: vagus nerve toning!

Instead of recommending Yoga for the vagus nerve's toning and health, let's do the typical western medicine quick fix BullShit (another word for nonsense) and implant people with electrical stimulation devices.
Toning the vagus nerve with Yoga prevents you from missing all the benefits of doing the actual work , a truly toned vagus nerve with the side benefits of weight loss: 
-Calmer disposition 
-Deeper breathing habits & lung capacity 
-Stopping the negative self talk 
-Ability to choose healthier habits without struggle or feeling bad
-And so much more. Read my many posts on Yoga's benefits, several of them being about weight loss benefits... the Sages of India knew what they were up to!

The field of western medicine have suppressed what the sages of natural medicine have known for hundreds and hundreds of years:
-Take this lab created pill instead of an herb, Nature's healing food.
-Have this surgery instead of changing your eating and lifestyle habits.
-Let’s implant this vagus nerve electrical stimulation device instead of teaching you time honored, Yoga inner conscious connection habits. 

Trust me, I am grateful for western medicine. In emergency situations, trauma, and acute issues; western medicine shines.
For the healing of chronic lifestyle diseases, western medicine leaves a lot to be desired.

If you believe in the ability of your body, mind, & spirit to heal itself... western medicine loses its pull to have you right where they want you: buying their medically recommended drugs, surgery, etc. 

Change Doesn’t Just “Happen”...Be The Change You Want To See In Yourself. 

https://www.paulayoumellrn.com/sacred-circle-mentorship

Sacred Circle Wise Women Mentorship™ was created to support students and clients with the tools to make lifestyle changes, to be able to self heal, and to Create Constant Calm with the tools of Yoga. When I first started teaching Sacred Circle, in person classes, we did Yoga together weekly. I taught the various tools of Yoga (it is not just poses) as a means of calming and toning the parasympathetic nervous system (vagus nerve). Just like doing daily push-ups creates whole body physical strength… having a daily Yoga practice creates whole body-mind-spirit strength! You are fortifying yourself to face the challenges of life with a skip in your step.

Sacred Circle Mentorship is now an online teaching & learning experience with the HIGHLY recommended option of joining the Yoga piece. Classes start Monday, September 14th, 2020. This is the 2020 5 week session teachings of the Earth Element. Earth Element focuses on physical health; a great place to start the years mentorship work.

Read here for more info on the self healing mentorship: https://www.paulayoumellrn.com/sacred-circle-mentorship

• A functional medicine health coaching experience to teach you the lifestyle medicine habits to put into place in your self healing life. 

• Sacred Circle is the perfect weaving together of the lifestyle medicine teachings (in the mentorship) and the vagus nerve toning through gentle, very beginner's yoga (in the yoga research group) so you can be the change you want to see in yourself! 

Read Here for more info on the Yoga education piece.

• This September is a special Yoga Education Research 12 week session. I am grateful for everyone who joins to contribute to the science of Yoga, Vagus Nerve info, and betterment of health & healing modalities for everyone interested in slow health education & slow healing. Thank You.

• Our purpose & your perfect opportunity: to tone your vagus nerve to keep you in rest and digest mode, calm you down so you can be in a comfortable personal space to make, and keep making, the lifestyle choices that will self heal your body, mind, and spirit and support weight loss and self healing.

• All classes are being taught virtually on Zoom (link to be sent to students soon).

• All classes will be recorded and sent to everyone so you can view again OR if you need to watch the recording because the live time doesn't work for you. Many students do this, join the class and watch the videos later (on their own time) to learn, grown, transform, & self heal. Modern technology has its advantages. 

  
  If you are looking for change, want to self heal, and want to tone that vagus nerve for a lifetime of advantages...

• Join me on September 14th for the Earth Element Session of Sacred Circle.

• You will be glad you did. I will be glad you did. We will be glad people ready to learn, grow, transform, & self heal.

The Wind/Air Session of Sacred Circle will begin in later October after a 2 week break post Earth Element learning. Two weeks gives time for assimilation and integration of the health education information before we learn new information.

Slow Health Education, Slow Healing

In 1986, the Slow Food Movement began in Italy. This was a movement to reclaim cultural food, the art and healing benefits of in-home cooking, and the sustainable farming of whole, real food grown locally.  This was a grassroots effort, that is now globally strong, to reclaim food from the corporate strangle hold. 

It is time to put this same grassroots action into our health care system.
Health care in this country, right now, is really just about disease management: how can the medical system suppress your ill health symptoms just enough to keep you functioning and somewhat happy.
Our current health care is not about actually restoring true vibrant health OR about true prevention of illness.
True prevention would teach you proper healthy care of the body, the real way to nourish the body with food, and actually prevent you from succumbing to degenerative lifestyle diseases.

Slow Health, Slow Healing is what I am about.
Slow Health, Slow Healing is what Sacred Circle Wise Women Mentorship™ is about. 

People have become accustomed to instant gratification with their health.
For example, if one goes to their primary care with high blood pressure issues, they are given a prescription medication and within a few days their blood pressure reading is "normal" again. (I use this example because it is an easy one to think about, a very common problem in our culture, easy to visualize the blood pressure cuff and reading procedure, and thoughtfully consider the situation and apply its concept to other health issues.)
No effort outside of filling the prescription and popping the pill daily. 
The question is: has any healing change been made, in the person's lifestyle choices, to change what actually created the downward spiral of personal health leading to the high blood pressure?
Everything seems fine, the numbers reading on the sphygmomanometer are within normal range again.
Here is where the problem lies: if zero lifestyle changes have been made, the lifestyle habits that created the high blood pressure (body damage symptoms), then the damage to the body is still happening.
The pretty number on the sphygmomanometer just hides the fact that nothing has really changed. A band-aid has been slapped on the problem. The problem will eventually lead to more problems unless change is made.
This story line can be used with any ill health symptoms and our "health care system's" business of just managing symptoms / controlling symptoms with artificial means. 

I support people's health around many, many of these lifestyle related health issues: (yes, working in cooperation with one's primary care practitioner IS ideal)

• high blood pressure and cholesterol issues

• cardio-vascular disease

• overweight and underweight

• thyroid health

• auto-immunity

• gut health

• anxiety, depression, and mood issues

• on & on

In the first couple of weeks of making lifestyle changes, a person's ill health symptoms can transform quickly. 
A good habit, I tell my clients, is to write down exactly how you were feeling (in body, mind, & spirit) before you start making changes. 
Then you can go back and put yourself back into this ill health feeling in 2 weeks, 2 months, 6 months, a year later.
Never stop reminding yourself how far you have come, how much positive change you have made, and the impact it has had on how you function, feel, and interact with yourself and others. 

After lifestyle transformation, if we could step back into ourselves to exactly one year ago and have this HUGE "Ah Ha Moment", we would 

• bow in gratitude to the work we have done with & for ourselves

• say a deep prayer to all of the powers that have held us together to accomplish what we have accomplished

• vow to only continue stepping forwards in the Slow Health & Healing process

I suggest you do this self evaluation, look back on my progress, journal keeping. Not daily, don’t stress yourself, but just often enough that you see the milestones of recovery AND can look back on how bad things once were. That is such a beautiful reminder to keep moving forward!

Slow Health Education & Slow Healing is what we do in Sacred Circle to Transform your health.

Fall and the Earth Element (The Physical Body's Health) is the perfect place to start on this Sacred Circle Year Health Coaching Experience. Fall, and back to school, has always signaled a new start, transformation for me.

Each Slow Health Education Session is 5 simple weeks long. Join one, to see how you like it, maybe you will be in love with learning how to slow heal yourself and then you will keep coming back for each 5 week session and another Element of Learning.

Mentorship is open to anyone & everyone who wants to learn to slow self heal their health back to vibrancy.

Skip Excuses, Find A Way!

We intuitively know when something needs to             change in our lives; something needs to shift.

Self Healing begins with making change; shifting habits in our daily lives.

Make the shift; create the change you need, you crave, now.  Skip making more excuses.

Try these life changing steps:

1.  What is the problem, challenge?  Write it down, give it a face.

2.  Brainstorm:  How can I solve this problem, fix this life challenge?

3.  Pick the best option(s) from above and move forward... start making change today.

4.  Creating positive action around change prevents looking back at life with regrets.

5.  Love yourself and others unconditionally!  Peaceful, loving kindness makes change easier on you and everyone around you.

You Do NOT Need Me

      But that's ok 'cuz I have Lily...               and we need each other!

You read that correctly. You do NOT need me.

Your body will heal simply by switching to a whole food diet.

May I refer you backwards to a previous post: Longevity Recipe

When you swap out your current eating habits for a 100% whole food diet amazing things will happen:

• You will no longer crave sugar, salt, garbage food stuff
• You gut lining will heal
• Your gut microbes will re-balance themselves (and the whole cascade of good things that happen when gut microbes are balanced - think neurological, immune, digestive... whole body health
• Your weight will normalize for you
• Body aches will lessen and maybe just completely disappear
• High blood pressure and cholesterol will wave bye-bye
• Adult Onset Diabetes will exit your life
• You will feel so good you will change other lifestyle habits because feeling good begets wanting to feel even better
• And it all snow balls on, and on, and on

What I CAN do for you is this: give you tips on how to speed up your body's amazing healing process:

• herbs and supplements help hurry the healing process along nicely & naturally
• foods that will have health restorative effects specific for your body's needs
• foods better avoided for your specific health needs
• lifestyle choices to accelerate that feeling of crazy, good, vibrant health...
• online classes to study health in the comfy space of your home! ($35 an online class and subsequent classes only $25)

And all with a smile, hug, and healing love!

PS If you honestly want to self heal... browse about my website. Between the free information, you tube video links, and my online classes... you can heal yourself. 

The Sun Radiates Life Into Everything!

Some Of The Sun's Awesome Gifts:

• warms us every day even when we can't see the glorious sun (When you lift the corner of the cloud, the sun is ALWAYS shining." Eli, my 14 year old at 8 had figured this one out!), this solar warmth drives weather patterns
• stimulates photosynthesis
• stimulates Vitamin D production in your skin and many other living being's skin as well.  Vitamin D is needed for bone health, skin health, mood health, immune health (think cancer, MS, metabolic disease-diabetes, & auto-immune disease prevention)
• promotes the production of melatonin so you can sleep well every night and the production of serotonin so you fell happy & energetic during the day

The list of the sun's contributions to human and planetary health is a very long one. Without the sun... we would not be here; everything would not be here!  It is time for some Common Sun Sense.

                   Yoga Sun Salutations to the Rising Sun

Getting out in the morning sun helps you move through the day with flow, ease, and grace and supports sleeping better every night. All living things are meant to be exposed to the sun's light all day; from sun rise to sun set. (obviously being wise to not burning our skin... but more on that in a minute). Think of the cultures who begin their days with some form of AM exercise (movement magic eCourse), prayer, or meditation that is outside and facing east to the rising sun. Wisdom from the ages kept people healthy, wealthy (before wealth was measured in dollars and cents), and wise. 

Being Sun Wise:

• Get out every day and get sunlight on your eyes and your bare skin
• Avoid sun screens that are chemical based. The chemicals that prevent sunscreen are toxic, period. Most sun screen bases (the actual lotion the sun screening chemicals are in) are loaded with many other toxic chemicals. Check out Environmental Working Groups information on toxins in your cosmetics and body care products...http://www.ewg.org/skindeep/
• If you must use a sunscreen find one that is in an all natural lotion base and uses zinc and/or titanium dioxide for the sunscreen function. Avoid nano-particle sunscreens.
• When you have spent your time in the sun to promote health but avoid over exposure, sun burn, and sun damage... find shade and cover with clothing and a hat. 
• The high hot times of the day are approximately 10 AM to 2 PM depending where you are in the world (proximity to the equator) and the time of year. Be smart, use common sense, and get healthy sun exposure. Your vibrant health depends on it. Think of a plant and its need for sun. Put that plant in the closet and shut the door. How many days until that plant is dead? Bottom line: we need the sun... the sun makes us happy!

Sun Related Blog Posts:

Naked Sun Time!

Creating Inner SunShine!

Natural Skin Care For Prevention And Healing Sun Damage

Join My Movement Magic eCourse to

• increase your inner movement wisdom, 
• inspire yourself to make movement a daily priority,
• learn the many benefits of movement to each and every body part and system (all of your amazing body cells),
• and support your body in its need to move.

As Dr. Mark Hyman states: Exercise (Movement Magic!) is the biggest drug to reverse or prevent heart disease.  Here is the link to his video explaining this: click here.  If you want to hear just the part of exercise (it is a 10 minute video on food, supplements, & lifestyle) scroll to 6:30 and you will be at the start of his exercise chat.

The benefits of daily movement, moving all day long, are profound and beckoning you much like the sun is beckoning you outside! Moving, outside in the sun, is a double body healing bonus.

Click here to check it out and join this body, mind, and spirit moving eClass: Movement Magic eCourse   Class tuition this week is $30, (5 bucks off for Sun Celebrating) and if you have taken any other eCourse with me, I offer this course at $25 for you. 

Need more motivation to move? Check out this 96 year old man and what moving his body has done for him: Click here

5 Reasons Chewing IS A Most Important Part Of Eating & Digestion

The story is that engaging those pearly whites in the chew process is the most important initial step you can take for the health of your digestive tract and your bodaciously beautiful body cells. Think how many people chuck food into their faces at break neck speed, chomp on it 5-6 times, and then swallow large chucks of food.

Pay attention the next time you engage in eating a meal. Are you a chewer or a chunk swallower? All these years picking on cows for their endless "cud chewing" and it seems those beautiful cows had it right all along.

Get chewing your cud people and here is why:

1. Chewing begins carbohydrate digestion: which prevents reflux as you are revving up the digestive tract with your chewing. The more you chew your food, the more messages are sent to the gut to get the digestive juices flowing. That means optimal hydrochloric acid for stomach digestion of food. Good digestion in the stomach sets the stage for good digestion throughout the digestive tract.

Little chewing = little time for messaging the GI tract to send out digestive juices = impeded digestion.

Most reflux is NOT an over abundance of stomach acids but in fact a lack of stomach acid (food sits in stomach not digesting and body's wisdom says "hey this stuff is rotting right here... let's get rid of it.” At this point the easiest way to get rid of stomach contents is up and out. Yup, reflux.).

2. Chewing food well feeds your beautiful gut microbes: You waste $$$ taking probiotics if you are not going to offer them kindness and feed them well. Be the gut bug hostess (or host) with the most-ess! Chew your food well. Doing so breaks down the food fibers, the starches, which feed the gut bugs you want surviving and thriving in your gut.

3. Chewing well prevents leaky gut: See above for how chewing feeds the happy, healthy gut bugs. When we are not feeding the "good" gut microbes to maintain a healthy and balanced microbial population, we can create an inflamed and irritated gut lining. This leads to leaky gut syndrome and contributes to many chronic, lifestyle related, health problems.

Belly ache or gut health... you decide!

4. Chewing food slowly and well promotes relaxation: eating fast, swallowing food practically whole, creates a stress response in the body.  Stress causes body tissues (muscles, organs etc) to tense, contributes to poor digestion, and chronic fight or flight response throughout body. This digestive tract and body tensing also contributes to constipation.

Chewing IS yoga for the digestive tract, nervous system, and really your whole body. You know how I love, love, love my yoga. Type Yoga into the search bar, below, and I will inspire you with the many body, mind, and spirit benefits of a daily Yoga practice.

5. Chewing food well means food is then swallowed in a liquid state this means your body, digestive tract, is better able to digest and pull the nutrients out of the food. 

This means your body cells are being better nourished by the whole foods you spend your hard earned money on. This is very important my friends. The more nutrients we can pull out of the food we eat, the healthier we will be. It is all about what nutrients actually got to your body cells. Poorly chewed food cannot be digested well and therefore the actual nutrition does not reach your intended body cells. Yes, your health pays dearly over the years.

Chew all food into liquid consistency. 30-50 chews per bite or gulp of food (Gulp: I am thinking about smoothies, creamed soups, etc. that are gulped down without any conscious thought of actually chewing.)  

If food is already a liquid or mushy consistency (soup, puddings, smoothies) take 20 to 30 conscious chews.  If food is solid, take 50 conscious chews.  

Example: blueberries and skins of berries require 50 chews. The soft inner part of berry will chew up quickly and naturally move down throat... keep chewing that blueberry skin 50 times. Yes, the cud will get smaller and smaller and the habit of swallowing before adequate chewing has taken place will be right there in your face (literally). Resist and keep chewing as the skins of blueberries are loaded with micro-nutrients and complex carbohydrates (fibers) that feed those gut bugs IF you chew it up well for your gut bugs to be able to use them. Trust me; the gut bugs (microbes) do not have teeth to do the chew job if you leave it unfinished. For goodness sake, show those gut bugs (who do so much for you) some genuine hospitality and chew, chew, chew!

Get Chewing & Get Healthy.