This Is What Your Nervous System Has Been Waiting For | A Guided Somatic Rest Practice

Elisha's Space: There is a kind of tired that sleep does not fix. You've had the sleep, maybe you've had the therapy, maybe you've even said the prayer. You know, the long one, the sincere one, the one you met with everything in you. And you woke up the next morning and your chest was still tight. Your jaw was still clenched. Your shoulders were still somewhere near your ears. This episode is not going to explain that to you today. We're going to move through it together. Wherever you are right now, whatever you're carrying, you are safe here. This is your space. Welcome to Elisha Space, a sanctuary for healing growth, and for the kind of honest conversations that actually change things. I'm Elisha, your host, a counselor, an author, and someone who has sat in the same stuff places you have. If you've been listening for a while, I see you. I'm so glad you're back. And if you're brand new here, welcome home. Today's episode is different, and I want to be upfront with that. From the very beginning, there is no whiteboard today, no outline, no teaching framework. Well, there is a framework, but it's not for your mind, it's for your body. So today I'm going to guide you through a somatic rest practice, ⁓ a Nervous system specific experience built around four simple movements: arrive, regulate, receive, rest. This episode is for the person who is exhausted in a way they can't explain. It is for the person who has done the intellectual work of healing, who could give a TED talk on trauma responses, but whose body hasn't received the memo yet. It is for the person who knows all the right things, believes all the right things, and still cannot come down from high alert. Today's episode is practical, clinical, but pastoral. So stay with me. And before we begin practice, I want to give you 30 seconds of science because I know that for many of you, especially if you are a trauma survivor, knowledge is not just power, knowledge is safety. Here is what is happening in your body right now as you listen to my voice. Your nervous system has two primary branches. One is the sympathetic nervous system, what most of us know as fight or flight. That is the branch that has been working over time. That is the branch that is responsible for the tight chest, the shallow breath, the sense that something is wrong, even when nothing visible is wrong. And then there is the parasite. Sympathetic branch, the rest and digest system, the one that says you are okay, you are safe, and you can put down the weight. And running through the center of that parasympathetic system is a nerve called the vagus nerve. It travels from your brainstem. Through your heart, through your lungs, through your gut. It is the biological pathway of calm, of regulation, of peace that is not dependent on your circumstances being resolved. What I am about to guide you through is specifically designed to activate that nerve. This is not visualization, this is physiology. And it is also, I believe deeply, one of the ways we partner with God in the restoration of these bodies that He made. So let's do it. Here is what I need from you before we begin. If you are driving, Please do not close your eyes. You can still listen. You can still receive the words, but save the full somatic practice for when you can be still. Come back to this episode. It will be here. If you are able, find a comfortable position right now. You can be sitting, you can be lying down. Let your body tell you what it needs. Let your hands rest somewhere natural, your lap, your sides, wherever they land. If it feels safe to do so, I invite you to gently close your eyes. And if closing your eyes does not feel safe, that is information. Good information. Your body is doing its job. you can keep a soft downward gaze ⁓ resting on a fixed point in of you. There is nothing you need to accomplish right now. Nowhere you need to be, nothing that needs to be resolved in the next 20 minutes. We are going to move through four movements together. Arrive, regulate, receive, and rest. Your body already knows how to do all four. We are simply going to remind it. Let's begin. The first thing your nervous system needs is When it has been stuck in survival mode, is permission to notice that the immediate danger has passed. We call this the orienting response, and we are going to practice it together right now. Without moving your head too much, I want you to slowly, gently, let your awareness drift to the side of your space. If your eyes are open, let your gaze follow. Don't analyze what's there. Don't judge it, just notice a color, a shape, a texture, light or shadow. Now let your awareness drift to the left. Same thing, just noticing. Now let your gaze or your inner awareness settle back to center, forward still. That movement, that slow, curious scanning, sends a message to your nervous system. It says, am looking for danger and I don't see any Your body hears that, your brainstem receives that, the amygdala, the part of your brain that fires the alarm, begins to quiet. Now let's ground further into the physical space of your body. ⁓ I want you to without changing anything, five things you can feel physically now. First, ⁓ The weight of your body against the surface beneath you, the chair beneath you, or the floor or the bed, feel how it holds you. Second, the temperature of the air on your skin. Cool, warm, notice without judgment. Third, the texture of what your hands are resting on. Fabric, skin, whatever it is, feel it. Fourth, the The contact of your clothing against your shoulders, your back, your arms. And fifth, the rhythm of your breath without changing it yet, without correcting it, simply noticing it arrive and leave. You have arrived. You are here. Your nervous system is beginning to receive that message. Now we are going to use the most accessible vagal nerve activator you have, the one that costs nothing, requires no device, is always available, your breath. Specifically, we are going to use an extended exhale. When your exhale is longer than your inhale, your vagus nerve is directly activated. It slows the heart rate, it signals to the brainstem, we are not running, we can rest. This is not visualization, this is physiology. Here is the pattern we'll use. Inhale for four counts, hold for one, exhale for six counts. I'll count with you. Follow my pace. Let's begin. Inhale, two, three, four. Hold. Exhale, two, three, four, five, six. Again, inhale, two, three, four, hold, exhale, two, three, four, five, six. One more time. Inhale, two, three, four, hold, exhale, two, three, four, five, six. Notice your body in this moment. Is there any release anywhere? A drop in your shoulders, a loosening in your jaw, a softening behind your eyes? Whatever you're feeling, it's welcome here. You don't have to perform peace. We are practicing the pathway to it. Now let's do one more round. And this time I want to add something, a somatic anchor. As you prepare to inhale, I want you to gently place both hands over your chest, your heart space, feel the warmth of your own palms. This is not a technique I invented. This is physiological. The sensation of touch activates the release of oxycotin, the safety hormone. Your own hands on your chest send a co-regulation signal to your nervous system. You are providing your body with evidence that it is not alone. Hands on your chest. Inhale, two, three, four. Hold. Exhale, two, three, four. Five, six. Again, inhale, two, three, four. Hold, exhale, two, three, four, five, six. One more. Inhale, two, three, four. Hold. Exhale, two, three, four, five, six, eight. Let your nervous system hear that you are not running from it. You are with it. Your nervous system is beginning to settle, your breath has slowed, your eyes are on your chest, and now I want to introduce something that is not separate from what we just did. It is the completion of it. Scripture. Not as information, not as correction, not as a checklist item, as medicine. We are going to use a practice called a scripture breath prayer. You simply receive one phrase on the inhale and release one phrase on the exhale. There is no analysis, no journaling prompt, no takeaway, just the word meeting your body, meeting your breath. The verse we are anchoring to today is Philippians 4 7. In the peace of God. Which transcends all understanding will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. His peace is not dependent on your circumstances being resolved. It is a regulated nervous system in the presence of a safe God. On your inhale, receive these words silently in your mind. The peace of God on your exhale, release guards my heart. ⁓ Let's breathe ⁓ Inhale the of God. Exhale guards my heart. Again, inhale the peace of God and Exhale, guards my heart. One more time, inhale the peace of God. Exhale, guards my heart. Let that land wherever in your body it needs to go. You were not designed to carry the weight of an unresolved world in a disconnected body. You were designed to be held by a nervous system that was knit together to respond to safety and by a God who is safety himself. We are in the final movement, and I want to name what might be happening in your body right now. Because this is important. You might feel sleepy. That is your parasympathetic system coming online. That is healing. You might feel emotional, a tightening in your throat, or tears that arrived without explanation. That is the thaw. The places that were frozen beginning to come alive. That is also healing. You might feel nothing yet. That is okay. Nervous system regulation is cumulative. You are not behind. You are planting something today. I want to pray over you now. Not a rushed prayer, not a transition to the next segment, a real one, a subtle one. Because prayer, I have come to believe, is not separate from somatic healing. It is the deepest form of it. It is co-regulation with the safest relationship in the universe. Father, I I am grateful that you made these bodies, that you knit together the very nervous systems that we are learning to regulate. ⁓ That you designed the exhale to bring us back. That you designed the heartbeat to be a rhythm of life, not of panic, that you designed the hand on the chest to communicate: I am here, I am safe. For the person listening right now who has forgotten what it feels like to be at rest, not performing rest, not faking peace, but actually bodily at rest. Would you remind them not the rest that requires everything to be resolved? The rest that is available right now in this breath, in this body, in this very moment. For the person whose body has been the site of so much pain, who has wanted to escape it rather than inhabit it, meet them there. Speak to their nervous system what words cannot reach. ⁓ You are Jehovah Shalom, the Lord of peace, not the peace that the world gives, not the peace that is contingent on good news or resolved circumstances, but the peace that guards, that keeps, that holds. Let them feel that today. Not just know it, feel it. And Father, thank you that healing is not a destination that they have to arrive at perfectly. It is a direction that they're moving in. And today they have moved. Amen. When you're ready and only when you're ready, begin to gently deepen your breath. Maybe let your fingers move, your toes. If your eyes were closed, let the light come in slowly. There's no rush. Notice what you notice. You are not behind, you are not late for anything. Whatever is waiting for you will still be there. You just gave your nervous system something it desperately needed, something it may not have had in a very long time. Proof that it can come down. I want to say something to you before we close. What you just experienced is not a trick. It is not positive thinking. It is not even technically faith. Not primarily. It is biology. The extended exhale you practice directly activated your vagus nerve, which communicates with your heart rate and your brain stems threat assessment center. The hands on your chest released oxycotin, your body's own safety compound, the oriented movement sent a no immediate threat signal to your amygdala. And the scripture breath prayer, that is where the clinical and the sacred converge because the word of God Of God is not merely information for the mind. It is, I believe, sustenance for the whole body. Body, mind, and spirit. Exactly the way we were designed. You did not just listen to a podcast today. You practiced. In practice, done consistently, does something the mind cannot do on its own. It rewires the nervous system. That is why the science of neuroplasticity, and it is also, I believe, exactly what Paul was pointing to when he wrote, Be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Not just informed, transformed. There's a difference. Before I let you Go. Here is your seven-day challenge. Come back to this practice once a day for the next seven days, not for hours, 15 minutes. You can return to this very episode, or you can move through the four movements on your own. Arrive, regulate, receive, rest. Notice what shifts, not because you need to perform healing, but because you're practicing the pathway to it. And if this episode helped you, share it. Text it to one person you know who is struggling, the one who said that they're fine, but you can see in their eyes that they aren't. Send it to them. That one act might be the most important thing you do this week. You can find my free start guide on my website. It will walk you through additional somatic regulation practices you can use daily. The link is in the show notes. If this is your first time at event, Lycia space. Make sure you follow or subscribe so you don't miss what's coming next. We are in a rich season of this work. I don't want you to miss this. Until next time, you're not too much, you're not too far, and you are not alone.