I’d estimate more than 90% of my clients with health issues, especially gut dysbiosis, typically have an origin tied to disrupted vagal tone. Optimizing the vagus nerve can lead to huge improvements to your health. This thread will provide a deep dive into the mechanisms and

The vagus nerve serves as the main connection between your brain and gut, as well as various other organs—the heart, lungs, liver, pancreas, and spleen. The brain exerts top-down control over the rest of the body, influencing vagal tone, but there is also bidirectional

The vagus nerve (cranial nerve X) originates in various nuclei in the medulla oblongata of the brainstem, and it then descends through the neck into several autonomic ganglia to innervate several organs. These branches spread out like a tree, which allows the vagus nerve to

Proper vagal tone leads to optimal gut motility, absorption, digestion, and excretion, while breathing, heart rate, and blood pressure also run correctly. 90% of parasympathetic fibres derive from the vagus nerve.

Beyond the gut/enteric nervous system (esophagus, stomach, intestines, etc.), heart and lungs—it also innervates the liver, kidney, pancreas, gallbladder, and spleen. Therefore, addressing vagal function should be prioritized as a potential root cause, especially when health

The vagus nerve comprises two nerves—the left and right vagus nerves, each containing about 100,000 fibres. Cerebrospinal fluid (CSF), which is made up of 99.8% water, is also found here in proximity to them. Which is fundamental to the flow of energy/information.

Unfortunately, the modern world often keeps us in a chronic sympathetic state and destroys vagal tone. Here are the main ways to mitigate this & repair your vagus nerve:

1) Mindset Nothing disrupts optimal parasympathetic-sympathetic tone than a compromised mindset—consisting of chronic stress, buried trauma, negative emotions, and entrenched thought patterns. This alters hypothalamic-pituitary-brainstem signalling towards a chronic sympathetic

Whenever you’re in this state of sympathetic drive—heart rate increases, breathing patterns change, and discomfort/anxiety kicks in. What’s interesting is the fact that focusing on your breathing during this can lead to re-calibrating your autonomic nervous system towards

Much like light is the main driver (zeitgeber) of circadian rhythms—slow and long nasal breathing is the #1 zeitgeiber for innervating the parasympathetic nervous system, and driving vagal tone. Whenever you feel not at ease and/or stressed -- use it to override the sympathetic

Buried trauma is also huge, as it causes energy deficits throughout the whole system—our body is investing as much energy as possible to never “wake up” that trauma. So it’s important to optimize your health through addressing all fundamentals, to set your biochemistry up to

Water stores memory, and water networks are found all throughout your body—we are literally 60% water by weight, and 99 out of 100 molecules in our body are H2O. Understanding that water stores memory/information is crucial to understanding how it ties in with stored trauma.

Sometimes you may need to give it an extra nudge to release trauma—these are some further recommendations. What's interesting is that D-serine may act as a gatekeeper of trauma release in the brain via its interactions with the NMDA receptor. https://x.com/jack_schroder_/s...

Mindset is truly everything. https://x.com/jack_schroder_/s...

Further address your mindset by: mindfulness practices (gratitude, meditations, journalling), butyeko/pranayama breathwork, myo-fascial release/massages, heat/cold therapies, talking to someone you trust, therapy (CBT), emotional freedom technique (EFT), and EMDR therapy.

2) Biomechanics & Posture The more I learn about this topic, the more I value its importance. The modern world robs us of collagen tensegrity, as well as dehydrates us and destroys the quantum properties of water/fascial networks. When we add poor posture/biomechanics on top

Tying it in with the vagus nerve: issues like a ruptured spine, head-forward tilt, TMJ dysfunction, and chronic neck tension can all compress or irritate the vagus nerve, impairing its signalling. Beyond this, poor breathing can cause poor biomechanics, just as poor biomechanics

We need to address this carefully, especially in modern life. Our posture can be negatively affected by daily activities, particularly in indoor office jobs where computer screens are poorly positioned. Looking down at phones with hunched shoulders, sitting incorrectly, lacking

The best way to achieve optimal biomechanics is to start by improving your posture. If you work at a desk, make sure you're using tools like a laptop stand, a standing desk, an adjustable chair, and proper desk height to avoid straining your neck and back. It’s also important to

This one will ruffle some feathers—but 99% of people doing centralized weightlifting exercises are actually worsening their postural issues. A lack of core engagement, lifting ridiculously heavy weights driven by ego or competitiveness, and poor technique further exacerbate

This can be optimized by a postural assessment, with specific recommendations around myo-fascial release, as well as a balance of mobility, flexibility, and strength-related exercises using correct technique. These adjustments, in addition to addressing all the fundamentals of

It’s also important to note that dehydrating and collagen-degrading effect of blue light/nnEMFs. The problem with these in the modern world, along with other factors mentioned above; including stress, trauma, and poor biomechanics/posture, is that sympathetic tone is often

Elevated cortisol unzips collagen's triple helix and induces swelling—this is something we actually want to happen to help us wake up. However, we need to rezip those collagen networks through sunlight exposure throughout the day, especially IR light. If we fail to mitigate the

Beyond this, both your light environment and biomechanics being optimal are fundamental to your lymphatic system flowing nicely. This acts to remove metabolic debris, neurotoxins, and various chemicals out of your brain and body. If this doesn’t work properly, and there’s

3) Light Environment Addressing the above posts—digging deeper into why it’s so fundamental to get this right: sunlight stimulates the vagus nerve, while artificial light does the opposite. The light that hits your eyes and skin dictates the activity of hormones and

A well-known effect of blue light is the fact that it drives excess cortisol release in a non-quantized fashion; which leads to suppression of your vagus nerve due to its downstream effects on the sympathetic nervous system. More on POMC biology here: https://x.com/jack_schroder_/s...

This also drives excess inflammation, mitochondrial dysfunction, loss of melanin/melatonin, and dehydration—as mentioned previously. It also causes an imbalance of sex hormones with lower testosterone/DHT and DHEA levels; causing something known as pregnenolone steal syndrome.

The effects of nnEMFs beyond the above also directly effects Ca2+ channels within our biology. This leads to excitotoxicity, most important to note is the effect it has on GABA/glutamate balance. Chronic Ca2+ influx results in glutamate overactivation, which prevents the ability

3) Diet, Nutrients & Supplements When it comes to optimizing your vagus nerve, you can take advantage diet, nutrition, & supplements. However, it’s important to note that the above are more important, and you’ll be pissing in the wind if none of that is addressed. Let’s start

When it comes to diet, you want to be eating seasonal with an emphasis on a variety of animal foods, eggs, seafood/shellfish, fermented foods, dairy, fermented foods, fresh herbs/spices, and then a seasonal variation in fruits, vegetables, and starches. This ensures that you’re