Maximising High Performance - Mastering Stress, Cultivating Resilience and Building Adaptive Reserve with Eliza Kingsford

1:24PM Jul 11, 2023

Speakers:

Angela Foster

Eliza Kingsford

Keywords:

nervous system

work

state

system

deposits

sympathetic

shutdown

body

people

capacity

activated

regulated

recognise

call

ventral

eliza

physiology

life

activation

feel

Welcome to the high performance health podcast. My name is Angela Foster. I'm a former corporate lawyer turned health and performance coach. And each week, I bring you a new insight biohack or habit to help you unlock optimal health and longevity and higher performance. Thank you so much for joining me today. Now let's dive in.

If you are sympathetically activated or we're in dorsal shutdown, you are going to execute a certain way of thinking feeling talking behaviours, you're going to do things differently.

My friends, if you are somebody who feels like they want to have more energy, and you're not kind of consistent with that energy, you feel busy all the time, a little bit overwhelmed, and you kind of in your head, you have this idea that you do breathwork and meditation and exercise and all the things that you should be doing more often than you're actually doing. In reality, you're probably not putting yourself first enough. And this is important because having enough recovery is what helps us build what's known as adaptive reserve. It helps us to become more resilient, it improves performance and our output and also it just makes life all round, more enjoyable and gives us higher energy. And in today's episode, we're going to be talking all about the nervous system and the vagus nerve and how you can really gain back control. My guest is actually a second time guest on the show, Eliza Kingsford who is a licenced psychotherapist and nervous system practitioner, who helps clients identify and regulate their nervous system so they can get out of their own way, remove obstacles and overcome self sabotage. Analyses work has been featured all over the place on Dr. Phil, Dr. Oz NBC health, Mind Body green and more. She's also the author of Brain Powered weight loss. Last time she came on the show her episode was really popular, and I'm excited to welcome her back to talk all about the nervous system and how you can really build up that adaptive reserve and gain more energy. So without further delay, let me introduce you now to the lovely Eliza. It is so good to have you back on the show, Eliza I'm sitting down with Eliza Kingsford today, many of my longtime listeners will remember Eliza from I think 2021 Yeah, prophesied as you believe it's been that long. I know. I can't believe it's gone that long. I think we were still we're still kind of in semi lockdowns with COVID Yeah, spoke. Yeah. Yeah, we were just chatting offline. It's funny how we follow each other's content. So we still feel connected. And I think just as soon as we got on, we picked up where we left off, which is so nice. It's lovely to have you back.

Well, thank you. Thank you. I'm really Yeah, I'm glad to be back with you. It's it's fun. It's really

fun. So since we last spoke, you have been getting deep into the nervous system and regulation and all kinds of things that we were just talking about offline, which are really interesting for me. Do you want to first just for those new listeners, we have nurses all the time, introduce yourself and what you do. And then I think we're gonna dive into change and personal growth.

Yeah, I'd love to. Um, yes, so it's interesting you know, my my path over the years has had many twists and turns but ultimately, I'm a trained psychotherapist by trade in clinical psychology, and really got interested in the fields of body image, you know, weight management, some people call it food addiction, whatever you want to call it, people struggling with their with their weight. I started initially in what we call traditional eating disorders and with anorexia nervosa and bulimia nervosa but but quickly came was quickly drawn to people struggling with their weight. You know, they're struggling to lose weight or struggling to feel good in their body or, you know, disordered eating or struggling with body image all of those things, and spent and have spent most of my career doing work in that area. And what was so interesting is that the things that led me to deeper dive into my education and the places that I've gotten more training, more extensive training, around behaviour, trait behaviour change and cognitive neuroscience and you know, most recently the nervous system is that I wanted change I wanted people to work with me or work with the clinicians I was training and and actually change transformation true change where they would learn and change and be able to be able to transform somewhat permanently I hate to say the word permanently but but feel like there was lasting transformation rather than sort of this. I changed a little I go back I changed a little I go back and so it got me really, really interested in what what helps people change what gets in the way of people like to Willie changing because many people want to change, I want to do it differently. I want to be different, I want something to be different, but I just I don't know how to get out of my own way. And that's what led me to all of this different deep science. How does that work? Why don't people change? Anyway so I have spent most of my career trying to answer that question what really drives change? How do people do that? What gets in our way and as you said, most recently, I spent the last couple of years really really diving deep into the nervous system and I throughout the years of building these steps of change that I believe really strongly in and the research and the science really supports this this kind of last piece and whoever knows if it's the last piece but for me, this last piece of the puzzle is this nervous system work and and really the way that our physiology informs everything we think do say and feel and we can ignore it and if we do ignore it, then creates a huge roadblock or huge barrier to us being able to change so that's a quick and dirty bringing bringing us up to speed.

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Oh my gosh. Yeah, a number of different things. I suspect. One of them is that I don't think we're taught to dream that way beyond childhood. Like, I really think that our society and the system and the culture that we're that we're raised in does not teach us to dream like that outside of that childhood age, and I couldn't exactly pinpoint when and where that stops. But but as children, you know, even though they do it less, we encourage them to do that. What do you want to be in? What do you want to do? And the child says, Well, I'm going to be an astronaut. And we say, that's amazing. Of course you are. And it's all fun and games, right? Then at some point, we start to put in what we think of as, like the sort of safety barriers, right? It's, it's kind of like, okay, well, that's fun to want to be an astronaut, but how are you going to pay the bills? Right, or, you know, that's nice that you want to be an artist, but will that really make money. And that that dialogue, that narrative starts to shift, which is actually more powerful than we know, from a, from a cognitive perspective, from a, from a, you know, sort of reticular activating system and an nervous system perspective, that narrative shifting, starts to drive our system in a feedback loop that says, Oh, this thing that I'm dreaming about, I'm learning through what people are saying how they're reacting, what they're not saying what they're telling me instead, my system, my nervous system is learning that it's not, quote, safe, I'm going to use the word safe, but I can talk about what that actually means. It's not safe to do that. Right? So when I now say to my dad, you know, maybe I'm 12 1314, who knows, when it actually starts to shift, it's probably a slow progression. But when I now say to my dad, I'm gonna be an astronaut. And the response is, that's great, but how are you going to make money, let's start to teach my system, a belief that astronauts don't make money, or astronauts aren't gonna be able to pay the bill. So I start to unconsciously move away from that dreaming, and move towards what I've been taught is important, which is, you have to make money, you have to pay the bills, you have to, you know, and I'm over generalising here. But that does teach our system what is possible or not. So then you fast forward that to someone like you said, who is now whatever in their 30s 40s are looking to be an entrepreneur, they want to, you know, lose, lose the weight from their wedding, or whatever it is. And you ask them, what is it that you want, but they've been trained for decades to go, it's not about what I want. It's about what's really what's reality? What's safe, what's realistic, what can I accomplish? What are my skills, right, the system and the brain is trained not to think in terms of what is possible, it's trained to think in terms of what's right in front of me, and what is realistic. And so I do this even with, with all of my programmes and clients who do this sort of who I am becoming exercise to get them to think that way. Well, what is it that you want? You know, what you don't want you don't want to think and feel like this, but what is it that you want? And it's a very difficult exercise for all of them. Because they haven't been trained to think like that. They've been trained to think, well, I want this, but like you said, I want this but, or I'd have this, but that's the way that they're trained. And so it takes a retraining of the brain and the system to think like that, and it doesn't come naturally to most people.

And when they start to then think, because I do this as well, when my clients, and I'm curious as to what you find here. So they start to think actually, okay, fine. What do I really want? What does that look like? And it starts to feel quite exciting, then the real, the real journey begins, right? Because it's almost like learning to drive, you don't really learn how to drive until you're out on the road, because then you meet challenges. And I always think you, you're never going to stick with it unless you have a big why right? And you really want it because there are going to be challenges along the way. But that's when I think people get in their own way. Because they can't maintain that level of kind of, I suppose optimism to a degree that they're going to get there and that the universe has is CO collaborating right with those collaborating with them on their plan, and will help them so then they start to have the sorts of new we don't even know who those thoughts came from. Right? They could be for conditioning from parents, from their peer group from teachers, it's could be from anywhere. Yeah, but they also are a little bit and I'm interested what you have to say around safety there. Because if there's money in the equation for survival, I think it becomes a lot more difficult whereas when people get to that point of okay, I have enough now I have enough to live on comfortably. Now I can start to create my dreams, but that's quite difficult because they're not always starting from that playing field. If you see what

I do You and and what you just described is exactly what led me to be nervous system education and, and spending a couple of years really, really training and, and getting deeper education on the nervous system because of what you just said, which is okay, if somebody can get a, you know, connected to their why and be able to describe it and be able to, you know, feel it. Okay, great. That's what we teach people to do, right. But still, people get stuck in that feedback loop and go back to old behaviours. And, you know, the question was why, why do we do that? Right? We know better? Why do we do that? Well, turns out, if we skip the part of the process, that is, the nervous system dysregulation is the safety, which I'll talk about in a second, then we end up creating an even more fractured experience. So for instance, let's say you have somebody get connected to their wi, like, then they get excited, they have some optimism. But they can't maintain that they can't seem to get rid of the old habits or patterns, or whatever it is to be able to reach that now that they've been vulnerable and said, Okay, this is what I want, but they can't seem to get out of their own way can sometimes make it even worse, right? Because now they are, the discrepancy between the two is so obvious. And it can, they've seen what they want. They've said what they want, they've stated what they want, but he can't seem to get there. So that can make it sometimes for some people even worse,

because you're in the gap, right? The gaps about this, you're in the gap,

you're in the gap. And now the gap before you didn't even let yourself think about the gap, right? But now you're thinking about the gap gaps, he's gonna get yourself out of it. And the gap is huge, right? So here's the thing is that what I know to be true so deeply is that our system and I use the term system on purpose because it really is a physiology, it's not a conscious decision. It's the physiology if our system does not feel safety. And by safety, I mean, what it's not in the technical term is not in this ventral vagal state. It's not in a ventral vagal nervous system state of safety. The ventral vagal nervous system state is responsible for when we feel safe, connected, able to learn, able to grow able to dream. And when I say able to I really mean that there are functions in the brain and body that are sort of turned up or switched on, it doesn't exactly work like that, but don't make it understandable, turned up or switched on. There's there's there's functions in the brain and body that are turned out that switched on when we are in this ventral vagal connective state, that is our state of safety. And to be able to dream and hope and and, you know, think about what we want and then use optimism and and move point our thoughts in that direction requires us to be in that safety state. The other two states that we have our states of protection there, their mobilisation and shutdown. So the state that is most commonly known as fight or flight is the sympathetic state, right. And the sympathetic state is activated anytime our system physiology, scans the environment and picks up an unconscious cue of danger. Whether that's danger as in, there's actually an acute danger and I need to get out of the way of a bus, or danger as in I just received an email from somebody and it triggered me into you know, frustration, panic, anger, irritation, or even mild frustration, right? Like the body can send cues that says, Oh, I don't like that email, and can trigger us into a different physiological state. So we've got the sympathetic state, which is we know as mobilisation or activation, it's going to it's going to mobilise energy in our body to be able to deal with q right to deal with the trigger. The other state is shut down. So if we mobilise all this energy to deal with the trigger, that doesn't work, it's ineffective, right? If if it doesn't take away the danger, then our body says okay, I've mobilised all the energy that didn't work. I gotta go into shutdown now. And shut down is numb dissociation immobilisation shutting off like well it kind of like the Charlie Brown effect you know, we're sort of Charlie Brown is hearing his teacher want want want want while you hear the voice but you don't really know what they're saying. You've shut off you've gone somewhere else in your mind. That's a shutdown state. Right, and that's technically called dorsal vagal. So we have ventral vagal is connected, sympathetic in the middle is mobilising energy. And dorsal vagal is on the other side shut down and disconnected. Those are the three states of our nervous system. And only one of those states allows us to dream, be connected, connect to that vision, do the things that would drive us to that vision, right? Because if we're not in that safe and connected state, our body, our physiology shuts off access to all of the executive functioning skills necessary to be in that vision. And it mobilises access to the things that would protect us energy, we need to fight or flight shut down, we need to protect ourselves from danger. It's mobilising different resources in the body. So if we don't understand or become aware of when we get dysregulated, into those two protective states, and we end up getting really frustrated and wondering why we can't consistently do the things that we want to do or think we need to do to be successful. That that cover it in a nutshell.

It does. But it's kind of boring, because when you get into that state, actually, it's harder to come back from, because now you're almost like that kid that's tried, and it's like never works for me. It's that response, isn't it of like, why she didn't give up? Because you know what, this isn't never going to happen. For me. It's for other people. That's that you've reached that point, presumably?

Yes. And so this is the beauty of doing nervous system work is that while you would be correct in in saying that, that's the poll is to is to, or that's the common response is to say, well, that see, it happens for other people, not for me. The goal in nervous system work is about building what's called capacity and flexibility. So first, the awareness of which state we're in, then the flexibility to be able to move between the states. So knowing that the physiology is flexible, malleable and fluid. So sure, if I am triggered into a shutdown state that ultimately makes me want to go see this is, you know, only available for everyone else, it's not available for me, I'm kind of in my shutdown state, right? The awareness, ah, I am in a physiological state here. And I have the ability and flexibility to move myself out of it. Right. So we teach them the skills and how do we get ourselves out of a state of shutdown like that. And it's absolutely possible for everybody to be flexible and move through those states. The capacity piece is that, the more we become aware of our nervous system, what triggers us into activation or shutdown, when we're there, the more we become aware of it, the more we can now build what we call capacity in our nervous system, so that we have the ability to meet the challenges of our life, the demands and the challenges and the circumstances of our lives with more capacity so that we don't get dysregulated so easily. So what's happening for people is that as they stay in these activated and shutdown states, they are what I call it sort of like they're draining their bank account, right? They're they're, they're taking withdrawals from their nervous system bank every single day, with every decision with every frustration with every trigger with every cue, they're draining their bank account, without putting deposits into their bank account, which is what we can do with nervous system regulation, without putting deposits in their bank account. They just keep pulling from there. They keep withdrawing, right. And if you put deposits in, well, now you have a more balanced bank account. So you have the ability to deal with life circumstances in a totally different way. You know, how, you know, there's those people that you probably know them who seem to kind of let things roll off their back easier, right? Things happen and they don't get as bothered, right? They're not as activated from a nervous system language. They're not as activated or they don't get shut down, right. something bad happens and they kind of, okay, yeah, that's frustrating and I don't like it, but it's going to be okay. And other people will say, how do they get like that? It is a balance of nervous system regulation. That's what's happening is that those people have a larger capacity to deal with the circumstances of life as they come because their bank account is more balanced. They have more deposit

One of the many benefits of being part of my membership the female biohacker Collective is that you get to ask my special podcast guests your questions, and my members have the wonderful opportunity of asking Dr. Mindy pals their questions in relation to fasting, optimising around the menstrual cycle, and perimenopause and a whole lot more. If you'd like to be part of an amazing community of women and get your questions answered alongside monthly live masterclasses, biohacking toolkits and live challenges with me and my team, then head over to www dot female bio hacker.com. To learn more, that's WWW dot FEMA biohacker.com. To learn more. So I mean, that's really interesting. And I'd like to talk to you about how you build those deposits. I guess the the dorsal synthetics as a parasympathetic system, you're speaking of there, that would be when someone reaches burnout as well, right? Because if I look back on my own journey, just so we can kind of bring it into context, people practising as a corporate lawyer that was very sympathetically engaged, yeah, just push on, push on, even when you're not sleeping, then I had my kids, and the first one was born by emergency C section, and then had all three by C section within sort of four years at this point is sympathetic, sympathetic, sympathetic, right? In the end, my body's just gonna go shut down, it has to actually preserve life, because now we've just depleted on every level. And that, for me, was mental physical shutdown.

Now, there's a perfect example, what you just described, because, yeah, because in the reason why it's so perfect is because I think as a culture, many people are on the verge of what you're just describing, and we cognitively override it. And we say, I got this, I got this, I got this, I'm just so busy, you know, I can do this. This is this is part of my job, this is what I'm supposed to do. And like I'm just gonna go Go, go, go, go, I got the kids, I got the I got the job, I got it all we cognitively override what's happening in the system. And the physiology is so much smarter than we are right, the physiology in the background is saying, you've got your gas, you got your foot on the gas and the brake at the same time. And you can do that for a while, it's gonna be fine. But at some point, if you keep your foot on the gas and the brake, something's going to wear out and break down. And so you keep taking deposits or you keep taking withdrawals out of your bank account. Right, got work. Your your child comes with an emergency C section that is absolutely sympathetic overdrive. You're taking withdrawals, withdrawals, withdrawals, not very many deposits, because you don't have time and capacity for that. Right. So eventually, you're exactly right. The body says, All right, you're not paying attention, you know, not on purpose, right. You're not paying attention. But the only option I have now, because I'm out of resources. I've been breaking and gassing too long. A shutdown. Right. So it will shut down in your body. It will I don't know, if you had physical symptoms. Actually, I think I do know that you have physical symptoms. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, the body will shut it.

Shut it down. Yes, totally shut down a panic. So it just like takes your immune system. And obviously I had the depression with it. But then there's some degrees, right, who they seem to, and that was just conditioning really for honestly from that's the world of corporate law. Right. Yeah. But if you and I think that conditioning spills over into my personal life, because I remember midwives and things like that saying to me, nap when the baby's asleep. And I was like that typical type A personality, you know, pull all nighters needs to nap, I need to get stuff done, I'm gonna go and puree some butternut squash for my older one, like, and it's crazy, but you do it and then it shuts down. There is a whole bank of people. And this isn't just obviously we talked about weight loss, though there's, there's multiple ways you can be successful in it. But there are people who are very successful who seem to have this balance. So instead of going sympathetic versus intuitive, full steam ahead, and then gas and pedal and brake pedal at the same time because your body's trying to slow you down. There's this other format that people follow. And it feels like it requires a degree of the best self regulation and knowledge but also discipline, because it feels like you've got to learn to pull back before you're ready. And, and we we both obviously know, Ben Greenfield, it feels like he does this really well, because he talks a lot about I go in the sauna. I do my breath work I do. It feels like there's always deposits in as many as withdrawals. And actually someone like that is is incredibly successful. But there's a misconception right in the corporate world that actually that doesn't. Well, absolutely.

And there's a couple You're so right. And there's a couple things to say about that. That that are that are grossly misunderstood in our culture. So, you know, you mentioned Ben Greenfield and I wouldn't I wouldn't presume to know what's going on for him or why he does the things he does. But certainly, what appears to be true is that you're right in the discipline that he prioritises putting withdrawal or putting deposits in his bank, it that that moves to the top of his list will take care of myself, I put deposits in the bank, he talks a lot about taking care of his family, and you know, the things that he does to take care of himself, those move to the top of his list, which we're not taught to do that, right, we're taught to, and especially as as women not to stereotype, but you know, we're taught to give ourselves away and put everyone else first and make sure everyone else is taken care of. And the paradox of that is that, when we put ourselves at the top of our list and learn that discipline and prioritise deposits in our bank, not only do we actually have more capacity to help others, it's like the, you know, oxygen mask on yourself first. But going back to the executive functioning skills, we actually are more productive, we have more creativity, we put out better work, right? So it's possible that Ben Greenfield, I'm speculating here puts out better work was he has moved to the top of his priority list with all of the things he does to put deposits in his bank, right. So what we think is, Oh, I'm so busy, if I have extra time, I will try and meditate or somebody told me, I should do some breath work, or maybe I'll get an Asana in my extra time. It's, it's entirely flipped. The people who you're talking about that are able to, it looks like they're able to kind of go go go, but also take care of themselves. They have moved to the very top of their lists, and, and taking care of themselves in what is necessary for them to sort of make their engine run productively is priority number one, and everything else, work people family to come second, which actually makes them better. work, family, whatever, you know, so we're not really taught to think you have more capacity

that isn't that interesting? Yeah, it is. Yeah. Which is, it's fascinating to watch, it is fascinating to watch. And it's interesting, because it seems also to tie in with flow states, right. So I have an upcoming interview with Steven Kotler coming on the podcast. And when I dive into his work and flow states, he talks about the fact that you really be in flow in your work, you want to replicate flow outside of work. So he's big either believe on skiing, and I haven't interviewed him yet. So and, and that's really interesting as well, because that's kind of mirroring what we're seeing here. So unless you build that capacity by having that time, and it's the opposite to what we've been conditioned to in the corporate world, but also, I think you made a very good point that as women, and it feels for women, selfish, because maybe your mother put herself last, and that was just how it was. So she never went to that yoga class, because she was running around after the kids and then that just feeds in right becomes intergenerational.

And, exactly, and, and it's why I said, you know, that the that all of the things truly all of the things we think, feel, say and do originate first, in our nervous system. The so for instance, you know, being in a flow state requires, it requires a state of nervous system regulation. Because if you are activated by the things that you're stressed out about, or the to do list that you have to do, or you know, the fight that you just had with your spouse, if you are activated in that sympathetic state, you don't have access to the flow that would allow you to be afraid of whatever you're trying to create in the flow. And so if, you know, his idea of whatever it is, that keeps him in that flow state, out of when he's actually trying to get work done, is part of making sure that he's not activated going into the flow state. And this is the thing is that, for instance, let's say you put an hour in your calendar to, you know, get something done for work, be in the flow state, that's good and great, glad that you did that. But if you carry a dysregulated nervous system into that state, it's not going to be productive, your system is going to drive you to do the things to try and regulate itself. So for some people, that's food for some people that's scrolling for some people that's checking email for some people that's, you know, the sort of shallow tasks of check these boxes. And we never get into that flow state and we go on just not disciplined. No, you are dysregulated. And until you are regulated, you're not able to have access to those. Like I said, executor A functioning part of your brain that gives you access to creativity and flow. So I think what I get so fascinated by and I'm so passionate about is that we need to number one recognise and be aware of our nervous systems. And number two, give them the emphasis they deserve, which is they are driving our lives. If you are sympathetically activated or are in dorsal shutdown, you are going to execute a certain way of thinking, feeling talking behaviours, you're going to do things differently, when you're in those states, when you're in a ventrally, safe connected state, you're going to do things different. And if we don't start to recognise this and sort of live from that state, that's where we think that we don't have willpower, we don't have discipline, we don't have, you know, there's just something wrong with us. And we, you know, kind of scroll further and further down. I find that when when people really learn the ins and outs of this, how to recognise their own and then work with it. It's like a sigh of relief, they're going, oh, there's nothing wrong with me, personally, right? It's a tracking of the cues that my physiology is picking up on all day, every day, when no one is immune to this, we all have a nervous system. And all of them are picking up on cues all day long, differently, right? Like, they're different cues based on how we were raised. It's a whole nother conversation, but different cues, but all of us have them. So it's this thing that we chair as humanity, we have a nervous system. But if we could all start recognising it and addressing it from that safety state first. I mean, I believe that the sort of this is the way that we change the world. This is the way we change how we communicate with one another, how we do lives, how we do business, how we do health, everything sort of originates here in our nervous system first,

let's talk about because it's fascinating, how do we recognise first of all, and then we can talk about how to change it? Where we are, because sometimes people will feel like, yeah, just like, I've had an amazing day, even my kids will say this to me. Like, I feel like it's going too well. Do you know what I mean? So? And it's funny, isn't it? Because they've just been like, conditioned that something then happens at school? And it's like, oh, no, it's because I thought that when it wasn't at all? Yeah. So when how do we kind of assess? And should we be kind of checking in with ourselves when we wake up? How do we find out where we are first? Because we can't change it until we know right? We bring awareness?

Yeah. Yeah, I love walking people through one of my mentors is is that Dana and she created this sort of personal profile map. And I call it sort of the flavours of our nervous system, because everybody's flavours are completely different. For instance, a colleague of mine and I, that we work really closely together, her the flavour of her ventral system, which is safety and connection is, you know, a party with lots of people and connecting and there's, you know, dancing and music and all that kind of stuff like that feels safely connected to her. That is bordering on sympathetic activation for me, right, the party and the dancing and the music, too much stimulation, too many inputs, right? Like for my system, that feels like almost activation, my system connected state has to do with nature. soft, quiet, peaceful, right? And to her that might feel like, oh, geez, right. So this is and that's where it gets so interesting is that walking people through their own states, so your own flavours and it is unique to you. My husband's is not the same as mine, my daughter's is not the same as mine, right? So, ours are similar because we're in the same family but you know, it's different from from person to person. So, you you want to map out the flavour of your own state. So when I say safe, connected, creative, joy, all of those sort of words would describe the ventral vagal state of connection and safety. And you would want to say, All right, what are the descriptors of my ventral vagal state? You would want to take a moment and think, what makes me feel safe and connect it will make me feel safe and connected? What's the environment? What are the smells? What does it look like? What does it sound like? How do I know? What are the cues inside my body? Like am I feeling a big sigh? Am I feeling warm? Right? You start to really describe get very descriptive about what that state It feels like we have people write it down. Weeks of map it out. Who's there? What's it look like? What does it smell like? Sounds all that stuff. Then we move to the sympathetic state, which is fight or flight. mobilisation, right? Activation mobilisation, so your body has just sensed, there's a lion coming out of the grass. And there's activation, there's mobilisation, right? Where in your life? Do you sense that? Again, description? Who's there? What does it sound like? What's going on? What kind of environments? Where do you feel it? Work? Jim, home? Friends, you want to just start to pull in examples from your own life. So for instance, for me, and I have oftentimes with adults, I have them describe a place that would sort of be a representation of synthetic so for me, it places New York City, for me. It's overstimulating, how many sites, too many people, too many noises, too many blinking lights too much going on all at once. It's too much in my system. Or it's to do lists that never get checked off. Or it's feeling like you're always behind, right? Something like that. For somebody else. New York City could be amazing. Oh, my gosh, I'm totally eventually regulated in New York City. So it's not a right or wrong answer. It's just getting to know what's the state of your system, right? And bringing in as much description as possible to be able to describe that, we'll have people write it down, you know, so that they can always go back and add to it, you know, now, now that they become aware of it, they go through their day, go, oh, that got me into sympathetic, write that down, right, the grocery store line that's too long, the moment that you're stuck in traffic, right, you can feel your system, getting activated, write all those things down, so you become aware of it. And then the third system is shutdown, right? So it's that not to go into whole science of nervous system here. But dorsal vagal is the other side of of parasympathetic. And it shut down it is the body saying, I didn't have the energy to fight. Now we're in danger, I'm going to shut it down. To protect this last bit of energy that we have. It's shut down. So that's immobilisation shut down. That's dorsal. And we want to get a sense of what does that feel like? Are you right? individually? Is this when you just can't take it anymore? And you numb out with food or tv? Or for some people substances, right? Or sleep? Members? Get out of bed? Right? Or? Yeah. Or if someone had an argument with me or something? Because I don't really enjoy that confrontation? Yeah, I just go to sleep. Go lay down and just go to sleep. Yes. Go to sleep. So it's the perfect example. Yeah, yes. And that's your body saying, I don't have the capacity to have this conversation for whatever reason. I'm going to protect myself and go to sleep. That is an example of dorsal shutdown. Yeah. And so now we start to bring awareness to it, we start to go like you're, you're connecting these dots right now going, Oh, I did that when that happened. And I went to sleep as a child. Now you think about what do I do as an adult? Right? Do I, you know, if my husband and I get in an argument, how do I react? Right? Do I leave the room? Do I explode? Do I shut down, you know, whatever. There's no right or wrong to this. And the point in this exercise is not to judge ourselves for our reactions. It's to just become aware of them. Oh, this is an indicator that I've reached my limit here. And my body is responding by doing this, how interesting. First step is just building awareness of the states of our system. I was actually training a company on this a couple of weeks ago, and the one of the one of the employees said, Oh my gosh, that's what happens to me on Voxer. When I get a Voxer message, I'm noticing my heart is racing. And I, you know, I'm starting to get activated. And the story around that was like, I have to respond. And if I don't respond, then they're gonna think I'm not working. Right. So he's activated in his system, when he receives a boxer. And it's just, it's interesting to note, right? We don't need to make. We don't need to make meaning of it. We just note it so that now we can build capacity in the system and do it differently, right, once we're aware of what happens to us.

And can I ask a distinction between a sympathetic state and they're part of the vagus nerve? The first one that you said that's activated? What did you call it where you're in that creative space which is

ventral ventral vagus.

So when You are conclusion or understand the nuance here, because it sounds like the sympathetic you're describing there is a very definite fight or flight, there's some form of threat. And then we have being in flow and creativity. What about when someone is kind of like, I guess a bit like me as a lawyer, they're sort of, they're in a doing mode, but it's not necessarily back active, and they're just kind of gunning for it and going for it. Where are they sitting on those? On the spectrum here?

You're so good. You're, you're so good. Yes, so that's what we would call a blended state. So we can get blended into ventral sympathetic. For instance, anytime I want to, I guess I'm in a blended state, because I'm excited. And I need the energy to be able to bring to the table, you know, a full conversation and to be engaged with you so that there is some sympathetic energy in there. But I am safely grounded in ventral. And that is a incredible distinction because it's somewhat nuanced. But there's a difference between when safely grounded and ventral. I'm excited to see you we haven't seen each you know, like, I feel I'm safely connected to myself. But I also have some of that sympathetic energy moving through me to give me what I need to get through that part of the day, right? Yeah, yeah. Then there is the we just we track it to make sure that it doesn't, we don't get what do we call what we call flooded and flooded into sympathetic, which means I'm no longer safely grounded and ventral I've been flooded into sympathetic and now I'm really just in fight or flight mode, right? So yes, we can absolutely be in that

into dorsal couldn't be like, if it was a different environment, for whatever reason, right? Maybe I'm a person, you're a different person. And we're in the Vironment, where actually is quite scary for you to come on to the interview, you could be so activated that when someone says like in an exam situation, my mind went blank, or they got up on stage and they can't speak, then that's the shutdown.

Yes, because the to do that it, you've got it, right. So the other state is, and people this happens to people all the time. So if I had, you know, some deep fear of public speaking or whatever, I could have come here. And we that's the other blended state, which is sympathetic dorsal, so that's the deer in headlights. That's what people know as freeze. You have a lot of energy in your system, the deer in the headlights, oh my gosh, I'm about to get hit by but I'm frozen. I should it shuts down, a completely shut down. And so there's that immobilisation, at the same time that we have such high energy. So that's that other blended state is dorsal and sympathetic. And that's the Free State is the lot of energy, but I'm frozen out of energy. But I'm immobilised. Right, so I go on stage. Oh my gosh, I'm so nervous. Nothing comes out. Right, shut down.

It's really interesting, because I want to talk about the deposits because Ash is an example today. So my son is doing his GCSEs, which is the end of high school here in the UK. And he's doing Bucha he had his fixie, he had a big exam this morning. He did it. And afterwards, it was that kind of slight rush at the end of this paper. But he actually did it very well. It's quite a perfectionist thing. And so we had a conversation afterwards. And then at first, the activation level is Oh, my God, I have so much revision to do. I just couldn't break because there's been so much activation, right? I need a break. I can't think about doing it. How can I do it? So anyway, we go out for a walk like literally just before I speak Yes. And he likes to walk quite fast. We go for a walk. And then I said I leaving him because I'm coming back to interview Eliza. And then just as I'm coming by, he calls me because I don't know what you think. But I think I can do that extra work. I think I can and he's just in case just pause this right because we chatted he's had a nice walk in nature like Yeah, and so now he's ready to take on more, which the easy thing to do, which I'm guessing is kind of this wrong conditional if had would have been too. Oh my god, I've got limited time I need to get straight back into that revision but brains not really even able to take it so he is that working example now of greater efficiency later because he put it together.

I love that you've I'm like dying over here that you brought up that brought up this exam because that's exactly that's exactly. It's a perfect example of how this works. We're conditioned to I'm studying I'm studying I'm studying revision, right? You call it revision? Yeah. So it's this revision revision revision. And I'm deep into it and just go just power through it, just do it. Just do it. Just do it. From a physiology standpoint, activation activation activation activate at some point if he's feeling flooded and overwhelmed by the amount of information, that flooding and activation is going to take over his capacity to be able to learn, right so he's at that point, he's fighting himself. Perfect. You went for a walk. That is one of the truly regulating nervous system things we can do in sympathetic is that we go for a walk we still have energy in the system. It's regulating his system. It's bringing his safety back online. Right? So you're going for walks. So there's the nature aspect, there's outside, you're moving the body, you're going for a walk, giving the brain arrest, right? He's regulating his system. And then he calls you and says, I think I can do this, again, his executive functioning switched right back online, fully connected again. And I know that I still need the energy to study. Right, so now he's in this blended state, I'm safely connected, I still have the energy to study. And off he goes. The beauty of how we can use this work is that there might have been a previous version of him that is saying, I can't I study, why can I just have to focus? Why can't I pay attention? I have, he's fighting with his system when he's doing that, right? When we teach people how to do this work, now he says something like, Ah, I'm sure I mean, whatever he calls it, I have people name their states, right? So like, let's say, he says, you know, I'm an activation, right? Notice is it I'm an activation to be efficient, I need to get myself back into safety. So we're gonna leave, I'm gonna go for a walk, you know, we go through, like, what are people's regulating resources and skills, pick from my roster of things that I can do, right, I'm gonna go for a walk on a clear, I'm gonna in maybe it's 10 minutes or two minutes, who knows, he gets himself back into the state. And he says, Okay, I'm gonna go back to my back to my work. If he can carry that skill with him through life, the paradox of that is he may be thinking, an outsider goes, you're gonna waste your time and go for a walk. And the opposite is true. No, I'm being efficient with my time, because the moment I'm flooded, I'm not efficient anymore. I got to get back into a regulated state. And then now I can learn. And so the quicker he's able to recognise he's flooded, get himself back into regulation, go back into that regulated state, boom, he is more efficient with his time, he will be learning better, it will sink in, in a different way. And he's actually moving ahead when he does that. So this is what I love about it is that it? It gets us out of this, like, this cognitive overdrive of there's something wrong with me, or what's wrong with me, or making stories about ourselves and has a pay attention to the physiology and work with the physiology. And the cues it's giving us to create sort of more efficiency and effectiveness down the line.

Oh, interesting. Fascinating, and how, just like, how would we know? Sorry, I

was just gonna say another example. You know, people are always asking me, How do I get myself to just not eat the food, like, I just don't even want to be drawn towards the food, that's not good. For me, this is the way that we do that is that we recognise when the food is a byproduct of dysregulation. And so we focus more on the regulation in the system, the more regulated I can keep my system, the less the system is going to be looking for the food. So like when somebody says, Yeah, I don't know, I don't, I just don't eat that. Like, it doesn't occur to me. It's because they have a more regulated system. And so we stop fighting with the food and we start focusing on the system. So that was just another example.

Yeah, really good. Really interesting. Fascinating. So how do we what are the things that we can do to build deposits? And why you mentioned one of them a walk? And why is it some days? You just wake up in that fog? Why? Why does that have delay?

Yeah. That's a good question. Why do we just wake up in the funk? Without being super scientific? I would have to guess if you if we were to really peel back the layers of the funk. Likely, there was something in the system before we went to sleep that didn't get sort of addressed. Meaning Did you sleep well? Was there a high level of stress or activation the day before? Are there things on your mind that are activating you or bringing you into shutdown? Right? Like, the sort of waking up in a funk is usually attached to something that hasn't sort of been processed all the way through? Now? Whether that's, you know, nutritionally related, or did you have alcohol the night before, which messed with your serotonin and dopamine levels, there's all kinds of things but usually, there's probably a physiological explanation for kind of waking up in a funk.

You know, I've seen it I've actually seen it on. So I use a device. I don't know if it's variable new apps, but it's certainly here in the UK, there's a device called Firstbeat. And it's really interesting because it's an ECG device. And so literally just strapped here so people can't feed it or use it with clients. And what you can see is sort of just measure their heart rate and their heart rate variability all day long and it would show the level of stress that they're under the intensity of that stress and the duration. And what I see is if there is too much activation all day long, now they can't sleep, they don't get any deep rest. So the heart rate just there's there's nervous system activation or night. And they face exactly as you're saying, they just haven't almost rounded off and bookended that day and dealt with it and let it go. So there's not been that pause. And that step change. And so now they're, they're bringing that this sort of an overhang that goes into sleep, which I'm guessing could then filter into the next day. And

that's exactly I love that I love that there's this combination of sort of the maybe more psychology or, I don't know, cognitive part of it. And then there's these amazing tools that show you in the physiology exactly what's going on. I mean, it just I love, I love that connection. Yeah, and I like to think of it like deposits in a bank account. So your nervous system has a certain amount of money in the bank every day, and exactly what you're just talking about. If you wake up in a funk, you might have your starting at a lower amount of money in your bank account. And every single thing that happens throughout the day, every decision we make every you know, every every frustration, every activation, every little thing takes a withdrawal out of our bank every day in the nervous system, when too many people are running on empty in their nervous system, bank account, or even overdraft. I mean, so many people are running on overdraft, what we're talking about is okay, we have to put deposits in your nervous system bank account every day. I mean, it's a non negotiable, every day deposits need to go into the nervous system, bank account. And these can be everything from big things to really, really tiny things, right? So anytime you think about gratitude deposit in your bank, right, because that switches on a certain chemical in your body, little deposit in your bank, going to the gym, deposit in your bank, the type of food you eat, deposit in your bank, for a walk deposit in your bank, rotation deposit in your bank, full pledged deposit in your bank Sonne deposit your bank, right. So all kinds of ways. I mean, you've probably have a list of 100 of them deposits in the bank, and all kinds of ways to make sure that the the nervous system balance of our bank account is increasing as much as it's withdrawing, right. And everybody's deposits are going to be different. Some people had their animals and people talk to one another or some people need alone time. My husband goes and takes pictures is a photographer, you know, like doesn't just does things by himself. I like to visit with friends or yoga, whatever deposits in the bank sing

silly songs. That's what I absolutely get slap on me like that. Yeah, that's all in part two, that actually activates the vagus nerve doesn't mean like humming singing, although that.

Yeah, I mean, there's love there's a lot out there right now on what, you know, activates the vagus nerve, and really honest with you. The amount of research that proves what stimulates the vagus nerve is probably considerably less than what people claims does. But I always say, if you makes you feel better, and it's a deposit in your brain, so I don't really care if it's active, if if it's actually named typically sound if it makes you feel better, you've made a deposit. So do that. If you're humming and singing, and it makes you smile, you have made a deposit in your bank. breath work, you know, even if you're you know, I sometimes my daughter and I'll cuddle up on the couch and watch a movie, it just we like it has it in the bank, right? And

I've seen that, you know, we were talking about monitoring it. So if I read I put the put that device onto and I've measured to see. And if I can have a really stressful day and then snuggle up with my daughter and read yes or something. It was full green. So basically, isn't it? Yeah, exactly.

And that's, that's what we talked about by building capacity, is that when you're doing that, problem is that people see that as as I was talking about earlier, they see that as a, if I have time, I will do these things rather than those are the top of my priority list and everything else can wait because what you're saying that you can see on these devices, it changes the physiology, and the more capacity the more green, the more the healthier you are in your heart rate variability. That is what gives you the capacity to deal with life circumstances. People who can kind of let things roll off their back and are and are are, you know, we'd saw this statistically or from a research perspective in COVID? Is that they did they continue to do a lot of research on the people who weathered COVID fairly well, whatever you want to define that as but people who seemed less bothered by it had a different lens, a different reaction, a different sort of, yeah, this is, you know, thing is, is bad, and I don't love it, but it's okay. It's all be okay. Right. And the people who had that, not only the people who had that sort of mentality and a lack of fear, not only did they fare better when they got COVID, but many of them didn't get it at all, or if they had it, it was really mild, there was a direct correlation is not causation of how their immune system functioned when they got sick, based on the capacity in their nervous system to begin with, right. And so it has very real ramifications in our lives. We get people with better nervous system capacity gets sick less, there's less illness, there's less sort of mental health issues. I mean, there's all kinds of things that as we build capacity in our system, it has such downstream effects for our sort of health and well being.

Yeah, that's so interesting. I know all the biohackers listening to this, you're gonna be thinking, sometimes my HRV is really low, or do I just have lower HRV? Does it really reflect my capacity? Or can you have a regulated nervous system? Because I know there are people, I think Dr. Peter tear talks about the fact that his was always lower, and you can have people who almost artificially have a, it's not artificial, but they have a higher HRV, just because they tend to have done a lot of endurance work. So it's kind of hard to compare, right? It's almost apples and pears, if someone's got one that's trending into the 30s 40s, and 50s, and another person has over 100, I'm not convinced that that means that the person over 100 has so much more capacity. I'm curious as to what you think. Yeah. Yeah. Isn't it? Interesting Central? So

yeah, and it can't be an end. It's why I let's see, I don't know when to say this. I think it's, I love the tools that allow us to sort of biologically see what's going on inside. I think they're so fun. And and they're amazing, in fact, to be able to show us that insight. The downside to that is exactly what you're talking about is that we can sort of, we can get caught in the numbers in a way that works against us. So for instance, if for whatever reason, your HRV is lower, and it sort of maybe always has been, it's really difficult to tell whether that was an impact of perhaps what happened in early childhood, right. So all of our nervous system gets developed, the moment we come out of the womb, and some people might even say before that based on our arm, the nervous system of our mother, right? Our, our system gets developed. And we didn't even get into things like neuroception and CO regulation today and things like there's a lot more to this, right. But our system gets developed from the moment we come out of the womb. And so you cannot untangle the development of someone's nervous system based on their family history, trauma, you know, what is considered sometimes big two year little T real or perceived trauma, right? And how that develops someone systems. So for instance, I have very, very early significant childhood trauma. And so sure, my HRV may show up some way on a device. But is that because that was I was genetically predisposed to that, is that because of the infant childhood that I experienced, you know, under the age of one, right, like, you can't, we can't make assumptions about that number and then say, Oh, well, that means my capacity is only this, right? That's where it could get in our way is if we look at the number and then make an assumption about that and say, well, it's just who I am or how I am i right. I believe that we all have the ability to build capacity, no matter what our baseline is, by paying attention to these states and using some skills to shift and change it. Even if your baseline is higher or lower. You have the ability to build capacity and change it and I would hate for people to I guess what I'm saying is I would hate for people to to assume that they They are either regulated or dysregulated based on a number versus on their experience of what's happening in their lives, if that makes sense.

And how you fail. I totally agree because I think you can get really hard or hung up on it. And this is where things like orthorexia develop right where you become obsessed with eating healthy. Whereas reality I think that intuitive factor so important. Yeah, amazing. So fascinating talking to you. Where can people find you so much? Or we could spend hours where can people find more about you? Your work I know that you're still helping women with weight loss as well. I think you you have a programme for that that they can find and whole host of other things. Please share I'm sure people want to connect with you Eliza.

Yeah, super easy at Eliza Kingsford on kind of all the things and Eliza kingsford.com Lots of ways to work together I do run a programme for people struggling with weight and body image wanting to change their shape and size and it's based on this nervous system work and then we build up from there. Pretty much all the work I do now is based on this nervous system work. So yeah, Eliza Kingsford calm or Eliza Kingsford on all the all the things.

Amazing. We will link to all of it in the show notes. Thank you so much for coming back. It's been really really, I've loved our conversation. Thank you.

So great. It's good to be with you. Thanks for having me.

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