You Can't Think Your Way to Calm — The Power of Polyvagal Theory and the Vagus Nerve
"You Can’t Think Your Way to Calm — The Power of Polyvagal Theory and the Vagus Nerve"
— Sally MacDonald
You’ve read the books, done the breathing exercises, and told yourself to “just relax.”
But the harder you try to think yourself calm, the more your body seems to resist.
Your mind knows the world isn’t ending — yet your chest tightens and sleep feels miles away.
If that sounds familiar, you’re not failing — your body is simply doing what it was designed to do: protect you.
At Strong Horizons in Carlisle, I support individuals and organisations across Cumbria to understand the science behind stress and trauma, the vagus nerve, and resilience — turning insight into sustainable wellbeing.
When Logic Isn’t Enough
For decades we’ve been told that stress management starts with mindset: change your thoughts, and your feelings will follow.
But calm isn’t a thought — it’s a state.
When your body senses threat, no amount of positive thinking overrides the ancient survival circuits that keep you safe.
This is where Polyvagal Theory, developed by Dr Stephen Porges, offers such powerful insight.
It shows that beneath every emotion lies your autonomic nervous system (ANS) — the part continually asking one question: “Am I safe right now?”
Polyvagal Theory rests on three key ideas:
Hierarchy – how we move between safety, mobilisation, and shutdown.
Neuroception – how the body subconsciously detects safety or threat.
Co-regulation – how connection with others helps restore calm.
Understanding these gives us a map for recognising what state we’re in — and what helps us return to safety.
It also offers a framework for managing our own health and wellbeing more effectively, and for understanding the behaviour of others with greater compassion and awareness.
The Hidden Hierarchy of the Nervous System
The autonomic nervous system (ANS) controls the body’s automatic functions — heart rate, breathing, digestion, and temperature regulation — without conscious effort.
It keeps the body in balance (homeostasis), adjusting how we respond to stress and helping us recover afterward.
Understanding this hierarchy is the foundation of nervous system regulation — the ability to return to balance after challenge.
Your ANS moves through three biological states. Think of it as a Traffic Lights of Tolerance™:
Ventral Vagal – Green Light: Safe and Connected
You feel grounded, curious, and capable. Breathing is steady, digestion works well, and your mind feels open and creative. You can listen, laugh, problem-solve, and connect with others.Sympathetic – Amber Light: Mobilised for Action
Your body senses challenge or danger. Heart rate rises, breathing quickens, muscles tense. You might feel anxious, restless, irritable, or driven to “push through.” This energy helps you meet deadlines or respond to threat — but if it never switches off, it leads to chronic stress and burnout.Dorsal Vagal – Red Light: Freeze and Shut Down
When the system detects overwhelming danger or exhaustion, it hits the brakes hard. Energy drops, your body feels heavy, time slows. You might withdraw, feel detached, numb, or “spaced out.”
These states are automatic, not chosen. You can’t “think” your way from red or amber back to green — but you can learn to guide your body there.
The goal isn’t to avoid these states, but to recognise and move between them with greater ease.
Why the Body Reacts Before the Mind
Every moment, your body runs a subconscious safety scan called neuroception.
It reads tone of voice, facial expression, posture — deciding in a heartbeat whether you’re safe or in danger.
If it senses threat, the body mobilises before thought kicks in.
That’s why you can feel anxious before you know why, or freeze mid-conversation. It’s not overreacting — it’s over-protection.
And if your history includes chronic stress, trauma, or relentless responsibility, your radar can become oversensitive — always alert, even when life looks “fine.”
The Antelope and the Modern Human
Imagine an antelope grazing peacefully on the savannah. Out of the corner of its eye, it spots a lion.
Instantly, its amygdala fires the alarm and its body floods with adrenaline and cortisol, preparing to run.
If the lion catches up, the antelope collapses into a freeze state — heart rate slows, muscles tighten, and natural painkillers flood the system. The lion, believing it’s dead, loses interest.
Once the danger passes, the antelope trembles and shakes, releasing the energy that had been mobilised for survival. Within minutes, it’s grazing again — calm, connected, safe.
Humans are built the same way — but in the modern world, our lions are different.
They’re the constant pings of emails, the difficult conversations that linger, the pressure to keep everyone happy. Each new demand re-activates the same ancient circuitry that once saved our lives. The body still releases adrenaline, tightens muscles, quickens breath — only now the danger never ends.
That unspent survival energy has nowhere to go. It lingers as tension, anxiety, or exhaustion — the biology of a system that never got to finish what it started.
When Survival Becomes a Lifestyle
When the body gets stuck in survival mode, it shows up in subtle but persistent ways:
Restlessness that never quite goes away
Forgetfulness, irritability, or decision fog
Feeling “on edge” or “flat” even when nothing’s wrong
Energy spikes that end in exhaustion
These aren’t personality flaws or lack of motivation or discipline — they’re signs of a nervous system working too hard for too long.
The Vagus Nerve — Your Body’s Internal Brake System
Within this protective network sits the vagus nerve, linking brain and body from face to heart to gut.
It acts like a brake pedal in a car — regulating how fast or slow you move between states of activation and calm.
When the vagal brake is strong, you can press the accelerator (sympathetic energy) to meet a challenge, then ease back smoothly to rest once it’s over.
When it’s weak, the system jerks — you either race in overdrive or stall into shutdown.
Just as safe driving depends on knowing when to accelerate and when to brake, emotional regulation depends on the strength and responsiveness of your vagus nerve.
The emergency brake comes into play only in life-threatening moments — the instant freeze that stops everything to protect you.
We’re not meant to drive with that brake on, yet chronic stress can make it feel like we are.
Understanding Vagal Tone
Your vagal tone describes how well the vagus nerve functions — its capacity to slow the heart, regulate breath, and support rest and digestion.
High vagal tone brings flexibility: you can rise to meet stress, then recover quickly.
Low tone leaves you reactive, tired, or numb.
Some activities act as both tone builders and state shifters — supporting long-term resilience and helping in the moment.
Strengthening the Vagus Nerve (Long-Term Resilience Building)
These practices work cumulatively — like training a muscle.
They don’t just calm you in the moment; they rewire your nervous system for flexibility, recovery, and resilience.
Improvements in heart-rate variability (HRV) are one of the best indicators that your vagal tone is strengthening.
Slow, diaphragmatic breathing: longer exhales (e.g. inhale 4 / exhale 6) rhythmically activate parasympathetic pathways.
Cold-water exposure: splashing your face, brief cool showers, or outdoor swimming engage the vagus through the diving reflex.
Singing, humming, chanting, or gargling: vibrations in the throat and vocal cords stimulate vagal pathways.
Regular rhythmic movement: walking, swimming, cycling, or dancing balance energy and enhance overall tone.
Meditation or body-awareness practice: focused attention on breath or bodily sensations builds interoception and felt safety.
Safe social connection: laughter, conversation, and eye contact strengthen the social engagement system.
Gentle bodywork or massage: especially around the neck and head, activates vagal branches and supports parasympathetic balance.
Being in nature: natural sounds, movement, and light signal safety; regular time outdoors builds both short-term calm and long-term resilience.
Stroking a pet: rhythmic touch and connection release oxytocin, reduce cortisol, and enhance relational safety cues.
In-the-Moment Regulation (State Shifting)
These tools help when you notice your system tipping into fight/flight or freeze — bringing you back toward safety without suppressing emotion.
Hand on heart + slow breath
Humming or gentle vocal toning
Orienting to safety – slowly look around and name what you see
Gentle rhythmic movement – swaying, stretching, walking
A brief cool stimulus – fresh air, a cold object, or splash of water
Stepping outside for a moment in nature
Petting an animal or leaning into safe human connection
Each of these small cues signals to your body, “You’re safe now.”
Over time, they train the nervous system to return more easily to green on your Traffic Light of Tolerance™.
The Hidden Cost of Staying Activated
As Dr Gabor Maté writes in When the Body Says No, unprocessed stress doesn’t simply disappear; it embeds itself into the body.
Over time, constant activation can lead to real physical consequences:
Immune and inflammatory issues (frequent colds, autoimmune flare-ups)
Digestive difficulties (IBS, nausea, bloating)
Hormonal imbalance (fatigue, mood swings, disrupted cycles)
Chronic tension and pain
Sleep disturbance and exhaustion
These are not “all in your head.” They’re messages from a body that’s been running too long on emergency power.
As Bessel van der Kolk reminds us in The Body Keeps the Score,
“The body remembers what the mind forgets.”
Our physiology carries our experiences until we create the conditions to feel safe again.
The Power of Co-Regulation
If stress is contagious, so is calm.
Through co-regulation, our nervous systems tune to one another.
A steady presence — someone who listens, breathes, and stays grounded — can help another system find its way back to safety.
When you learn to recognise and regulate your own state, you not only support yourself — you influence everyone around you.
That’s leadership, parenting, and humanity at its most powerful form of connection.
You Don’t Need to Do More to Feel Better
The modern world rewards doing, so we try harder — to relax, to fix, to get calm right.
But what your body really needs isn’t another task; it’s permission.
Permission to pause.
To notice.
To breathe without rushing to the next thing.
You don’t think your way to calm — you feel your way there, one breath and one cue of safety at a time.
Turning Insight into Sustainable Wellbeing & Resilience
At Strong Horizons, I help people reconnect with their body’s intelligence — not just to manage symptoms, but to understand and address the root causes of stress, trauma, and dysregulation.
Using trauma-informed, somatic, and neuroscience-based tools, we look at how past experiences, trauma, chronic stress, and unmet survival responses shape how you show up today.
Together, we strengthen the vagal brake, build emotional flexibility, and move from surviving to truly living — with greater calm, clarity, and connection.
This trauma-informed approach to wellbeing supports lasting nervous-system regulation, helping you build real, embodied resilience.
If this resonates, you can download my free Regulate & Reset Nervous System Toolkit and start exploring your own Traffic Light of Tolerance™ — a simple way to map your nervous system and find your way back to green.
👉Download the free toolkit here
Strong Horizons — Empowering Resilience, Inspiring Growth
