From how deeply we sleep, digest meals, hold energy, stabilise mood, and even balance blood sugar, our nervous system is quietly running the show and shapes how we feel, moment to moment.  

At the centre is the autonomic nervous system, the part of your nervous system that runs in the background, regulating things you don’t consciously think about: heart rate, breathing, blood pressure, digestion, and stress responses. It’s constantly scanning your environment for cues of safety or threat and adjusting your physiology accordingly. 

This system has two main modes. One prepares you to act, mobilising energy, sharpening focus, and increasing alertness, and the other allows you to recover, by slowing the heart rate, supporting digestion, and engaging in repair and deep rest. In a healthy system, we move fluidly between these states throughout the day. Stress rises, then falls, and activation is followed by recovery. 

Nervous system dysregulation happens when that rhythm is lost - when the body struggles to return to baseline and remains stuck in a heightened state of alert, even when the threat has passed. 

Why the Nervous System Becomes Dysregulated 

Modern life is a perfect storm for chronic nervous system activation. Persistent stress, emotional overload, poor sleep, irregular eating, excessive stimulation, and unresolved trauma all send the same message to the body - stay on guard. 

Unlike short-term stress, which the nervous system is designed to handle, chronic stress keeps the system switched on for too long. Over time, this blunts the body’s ability to shift into recovery mode. Even subtle stressors like constant notifications, skipped meals, caffeine dependence, or lack of downtime can reinforce this pattern. 

The nervous system doesn’t distinguish well between physical danger and psychological pressure. Deadlines, relationship strain, financial stress, or emotional overwhelm can all activate the same physiological pathways as a real threat. When the body never fully receives the signal that it’s safe to stand down, our physiology stays in the fight or flight mode.  

What a Dysregulated Nervous System Looks like 

Because the nervous system interfaces with every major organ system, dysregulation rarely shows up in a single, obvious way. Instead, it often feels confusing, inconsistent, and difficult to pinpoint. 

You may notice symptoms that skew toward heightened activation (anxiety, restlessness, racing thoughts) or, at the other end of the spectrum, shutdown and depletion (exhaustion, brain fog, emotional flatness). Sleep will often feel light or unrefreshing, digestion may become irregular, and energy can fluctuate without a clear pattern. Even at rest, the body may continue to hold tension, commonly in the jaw, shoulders, or abdomen. 

These patterns can look like: 

• Cognitive and mental focus 
  • Racing thoughts or difficulty switching off 
  • Brain fog, reduced clarity, or slowed thinking 
  • Difficulty concentrating or staying organized 

• Emotional impact and mood 
  • Persistent anxiety or inner restlessness 
  • Emotional reactivity and feeling easily overwhelmed 
  • Emotional flatness, numbness, or reduced pleasure 

• Sleep and recovery 
  • Light, disrupted, or fragmented sleep 
  • Waking unrefreshed despite adequate time in bed 
  • Difficulty falling asleep because you feel wired  

• Digestive system 
  • Irregular digestion (including changes in motility or bowel patterns) 
  • Appetite changes that feel out of sync with routine

• Energy regulation  
  • Unpredictable energy highs and crashes 
  • Fatigue that doesn’t match activity levels 
  • Reduced resilience after stress or workouts, including poor recovery 

These are all signals; our body is communicating that it’s finding it difficult to return to baseline in an environment of chronic stress or overload.  

5 Evidence-Based Things You Can Do About It 

The good news? The nervous system is highly responsive to both conscious and unconscious signals of safety. Here’s how: 

Breathwork  

Breathing is one of the most direct ways to influence the nervous system. Slow, intentional breathing stimulates the vagus nerve and promotes parasympathetic activity, which helps the body shift out of stress mode. This is reflected in improved HRV and reduced markers of stress physiology when people practice regulated breath exercises. (1) Even short exercises like box breathing can have an impact, and will only take you a few minutes a day.  

Legs Up The Wall  

Lying on your back with your legs up against a wall is a great way to destress at the end of the day (and has the added bonus of lymphatic drainage) because it reduces sympathetic arousal (in other words, combats the fight or flight response). This posture is even used in clinical relaxation strategies because it sends a signal calm of to the nervous system. (2) 

Calming Movement  

If you’re using exercise for stress release, you’re not alone. But, sometimes when you’re over stimulated and over stressed, intense exercise can add to the problem. If you want to specifically target the nervous system, try regular, low intensity movement – like walking, stretching, mobility and yoga – which supports autonomic flexibility. Gentle, regular movement helps your rest and digest system get stronger over time and also gives your body a way to release built‑up stress. (3) 

Mind-Focused Practices 

Mindfulness, meditation, or even brief moments of intentional stillness influence the same neural circuits that tie into nervous system regulation. Practising these regularly strengthens top-down control over stress responses, reinforcing a quieter baseline. (4) Try this: 

• The physiological sigh is two quick inhales through the nose (fill your lungs 80%, pause, and then inhale fully) followed by a long, slow exhale through the mouth; this fully inflates the lungs, clears out excess carbon dioxide, and the extended exhale activates the body’s calming response, which slows heart rate and can rapidly reduce feelings of stress. 
• The 5‑sense check‑in: sit comfortable, distraction free, and pause. Close your eyes, take 5 breaths and then silently name 1 thing you can see, hear, feel, smell, and taste, letting each sense pull you into the present moment. 
• The body scan: Close your eyes for one minute and slowly move your attention from head to toe, noticing any tension or sensation and breathing into each area as you go. 

Use Nutrition to Your Advantage 

What you eat tells your nervous system something every time you consume a meal. Caffeine, sugar, and alcohol stimulate sympathetic activation and interrupt sleep cycles when consumed in excess. On the other hand, balancing your blood sugar and supporting digestion with whole, nutrient rich foods, adequate protein, and plenty of fibre will help ground your mind. Supplements can also play a supportive role here; nutrients like magnesium help support neurotransmitters that promote calm and restorative processes. If you’re feeling tired and wired, try Essential Magnesium in the evening as a party of your wind down ritual. Hydration is also important; studies show that balanced electrolyte and nutrient intake can improve physiological stress responses and overall nervous system regulation. (5,6) 

McCraty R, Shaffer F. Heart Rate Variability: New Perspectives on Physiological Mechanisms, Assessment of Self-regulatory Capacity, and Health risk. Glob Adv Health Med. 2015 Jan;4(1):46-61. doi: 10.7453/gahmj.2014.073. PMID: 25694852; PMCID: PMC4311559. 

Tyagi A, Cohen M. Yoga and heart rate variability: A comprehensive review of the literature. Int J Yoga. 2016 Jul-Dec;9(2):97-113. doi: 10.4103/0973-6131.183712. PMID: 27512317; PMCID: PMC4959333. 

Shobana R, Maheshkumar K, Venkateswaran ST, Geetha MB, Padmavathi R. Effect of long-term yoga training on autonomic function among the healthy adults. J Family Med Prim Care. 2022 Jul;11(7):3471-3475. doi: 10.4103/jfmpc.jfmpc_199_21. Epub 2022 Jul 22. PMID: 36387716; PMCID: PMC9648241. 

Kirk U, Axelsen JL. Heart rate variability is enhanced during mindfulness practice: A randomized controlled trial involving a 10-day online-based mindfulness intervention. PLoS One. 2020 Dec 17;15(12):e0243488. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0243488. PMID: 33332403; PMCID: PMC7746169. 

Corti R, Binggeli C, Sudano I, Spieker L, Hänseler E, Ruschitzka F, Chaplin WF, Lüscher TF, Noll G. Coffee acutely increases sympathetic nerve activity and blood pressure independently of caffeine content: role of habitual versus nonhabitual drinking. Circulation. 2002 Dec 3;106(23):2935-40. doi: 10.1161/01.cir.0000046228.97025.3a. PMID: 12460875. 

Carter JR, Stream SF, Durocher JJ, Larson RA. Influence of acute alcohol ingestion on sympathetic neural responses to orthostatic stress in humans. Am J Physiol Endocrinol Metab. 2011 May;300(5):E771-8. doi: 10.1152/ajpendo.00674.2010. Epub 2011 Feb 15. PMID: 21325108; PMCID: PMC3093974.