Restore & Revitalise Yourself – The Heart-Mind Connection!
There’s a new relationship racking up column inches in the science journals: The one between your head and your heart. Could it be the key to manage your health?
Here is what you need to know! The mind-brain connection is gaining ground thanks to the latest buzzword in personal healthy data: A metric called “heart rate variability” (HRV). The newest area of interest for researchers, biohackers and tech companies alike is how HRV can be used to monitor your response to stress and, as a result, futureproof not only your physical health, but your mental health, too.
The Heart rate Variability is controlled by your autonomic nervous system. It has two different modes, the sympathetic nervous system (also known as fight or flight) and the parasympathetic system (rest and digest). Your brain is constantly switching between the two, to either stimulate or relax your body’s functions. The brain controls the heart in two ways: it works via a brake the vagus nerve to slow your heart rate down, and accelerates it via the sympathetic nerves, which trigger the release of adrenaline into the bloodstream.
Your heart rate variability is a marker of how well you adapt to stress. A deeper dive into the research suggests that stress could be the tip of the iceberg. Heartrate variability is the link between mind and body, strongly influenced by everything happening in the brain and also strongly influencing the brain itself, says says a well-known psychologist, whose researches suggested that Heartrate variability can be improved with mental training exercises. His team asked people to carry out a nine-month training programme, which included mindful meditation, breathing exercises and tasks designed to increase self-compassion and gratitude. All were found to improve a person’s ability to activate the rest-and-digest part of the autonomic nervous system. Such training could prove helpful for people suffering from depression opr social phobia.
The key thing is it shows people that methods they may think of as fluffy or New Age have a real impact on the nervous system and the heart. They already know that peoples Heart rate variability increase when they’re spending time in nature! More important than ever in these times, start slowly, but start, a walk in the nature and increasing your heart rate is a key thing of keeping you healthy, Bio Beats wristbands and Smartwatches are helpful tools to keep on track!
