Cured by Jeff Rediger

Author:Jeff Rediger [Rediger, Dr Jeffrey]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780241327609
Publisher: Penguin Books Ltd

THE WISDOM OF THE HEART

There is a window into vagal function, and it’s a biometric called heart rate variability. Heart rate variability, or HRV, is different from blood pressure or simple heart rate, which only looks at the number of beats per minute. HRV refers to the changing time interval between your heartbeats and captures a snapshot of the heart’s ability to flexibly respond to situations or stimuli. Your heart is not meant to beat at the same speed at all times; it needs to be able to change depending on your level of activity, emotions, and environment. High heart rate variability is good; it means your body can adapt your heart rate to your circumstances. It usually indicates a high level of ability to deal with and recover from stress. Low heart rate variability is concerning; it means there’s rigidity in the system, that it has become less responsive, perhaps due to chronic overdoses of stress hormones, hardening of the cardiovascular arteries due to inflammation, or other causes. Low HRV has been associated not only with anxiety and depression but also with an increased risk of cardiovascular disease and early death.

And most important, HRV is an excellent indicator of vagal tone. The higher your HRV, the more engaged the vagus nerve, and the more the parasympathetic is active in your system. What this boils down to is that HRV is a major, underutilized index of general health, and of vagal health specifically.

Can we use HRV in our everyday lives to help us understand our bodies better? Until recently, finding out your HRV wasn’t the easiest thing to do. You’d have to go to a doctor, have them hook you up to a heart monitor, and then study the readout from the software that analyzed the electrocardiogram. But lately, there’s been a proliferation of ever-more affordable devices combined with free downloadable apps that can give you a snapshot of your HRV. The technology is still developing, and some may be more effective than others, but at the rate things are going, it seems that it will only get easier to figure out your HRV and use it as a tool to navigate toward health and healing. And in the meantime, if heart rate monitors and apps aren’t for you, just be aware that any of the tactics we’ve discussed here for getting in touch with your body, bringing down inflammation, and shifting into the parasympathetic will also positively affect HRV. Practicing the relaxation response or meditation, getting to know your stress triggers, and learning about your body’s responses to stress and connection so you can more flexibly move into healing mode—all of these can only help improve HRV, and with it, vagal tone.

The heart is an important messenger, and there’s a reason that it has become such a powerful metaphor in our culture—the physiological changes that happen in the body in response to emotions and stress can make it seem as if those feelings are originating from the heart. No wonder the poets have long focused on the heart as the symbol for love and loss.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.