Wellness Fatigue: Are We Trying Too Hard to Be Healthy? 

Can Vagus Nerve Exercises Really Help With Anxiety?

Some vagus nerve exercises may help with anxiety, especially slow breathing, but they don't appear to work by simply “resetting” the vagus nerve. The vagus nerve does play a real role in the body's stress response, but many popular claims about directly stimulating it with simple at-home exercises go beyond what research has shown. Why the Vagus Nerve Gets So Much AttentionThe stressful moment may be over, but the body doesn't always get the message right away. The drive home is finished, the difficult meeting is over, or the house is finally quiet. Yet the jaw is still tight, the shoulders are tense, and breathing feels a little shallow. It can be frustrating to know everything is okay while the body still seems to be on alert.That helps explain why the vagus nerve has gotten so much attention. Online videos and wellness posts promise everything from a calmer nervous system to a complete "vagus nerve reset," often through breathing, humming, cold exposure, eye movements, or neck stretches. There is real science linking the vagus nerve to the body's stress response. But there's much less evidence that a simple exercise can reset the nerve or rewire the brain.The better question isn't whether someone can instantly reset the vagus nerve. It's whether these practices can actually help with anxiety. Some, especially slow breathing, may help the body relax and ease anxiety. But there's much less evidence that common at-home exercises work by directly stimulating or "resetting" the vagus nerve.What the Vagus Nerve Actually DoesThe vagus nerve may sound mysterious, but it's a normal part of the body. Also called cranial nerve X, it starts in the brainstem and travels through the neck into the chest and abdomen. Along the way, it connects with the heart, lungs, digestive system, and other organs.The vagus nerve is also an important part of the parasympathetic nervous system, which helps the body rest, digest food, and recover from stress. That's one reason it's sometimes called the body's "relaxation nerve."That description isn't completely wrong, but it doesn't tell the whole story.Most of the nerve's fibers carry information from the body back to the brain. So the vagus nerve isn't simply a line the brain uses to tell the body to relax. It's part of a two-way communication system that helps the brain keep track of what's happening throughout the body.Kevin J. Tracey, MD, president and CEO of the Feinstein Institutes for Medical Research and a professor at the Zucker School of Medicine at Hofstra/Northwell, has spent decades studying how the nervous system communicates with the body's organs. A neurosurgeon and leader in bioelectronic medicine, Tracey has helped uncover how nerve pathways, including those linked to the vagus nerve, play a role in inflammation and immune activity. His work supports a larger point: the vagus is part of a two-way communication system, not simply a nerve that switches the body from stressed to relaxed. That makes the vagus nerve important. But it doesn't make it a button that can be pushed whenever stress appears. Why Anxiety Can Feel So PhysicalAnxiety is often talked about as if it's all about worried thoughts. But anyone who's felt a pounding heart before an important conversation or a tight stomach while waiting for difficult news knows there's a physical side to it, too.Anxiety can change breathing, heart rate, sweating, digestion, muscle tension, and attention. Those physical feelings can then become part of the anxiety itself.A process called interoception helps explain this connection. Interoception is the brain's ability to notice and make sense of signals coming from inside the body. Heartbeat, breathing, hunger, stomach feelings, and temperature are some of the signals the brain uses to keep track of what's happening inside us.Imagine someone sitting in Sacramento traffic after a difficult workday. Their hands tighten around the steering wheel, their breathing gets faster, and their shoulders creep upward. Once traffic clears, the frustration may ease, but those physical changes don't always disappear right away.This doesn't mean anxiety is only a body problem instead of a mental one. That would be another oversimplification. Thoughts, behavior, physical sensations, past experiences, health, and surroundings can all play a part.That mind-body connection has been a long-running focus for Julian F. Thayer, PhD, professor emeritus of psychology at The Ohio State University and an expert in how the mind and body affect each other. His research has helped advance the study of heart-rate variability, or HRV, which measures small changes in the time between heartbeats. Researchers use certain HRV measures to better understand how the nervous system responds to stress and recovery. But HRV isn't a simple test of vagus nerve health, since breathing, fitness, medications, illness, and other factors can affect it. The larger lesson is simple: anxiety has a physical side, and that helps explain why body-based approaches may sometimes help. Where "Vagus Nerve Reset" Claims Get Ahead of the ScienceThis is where the wellness conversation gets tricky.Search for ways to stimulate the vagus nerve, and you'll find a long list of ideas: humming, singing, gargling, cold showers, splashing cold water on the face, rubbing the ears, moving the eyes, stretching the neck, breathing exercises, and certain yoga movements.Some of these practices may feel relaxing. They may change breathing, attention, or muscle tension. But that doesn't mean researchers have shown that each one directly stimulates the vagus nerve.Consider someone who follows an online video, tries a gentle neck movement for 30 seconds, and notices their shoulders loosen and breathing become easier. The change can be real even if the explanation isn't clear. They stopped what they were doing, changed their posture, moved tense muscles, shifted their attention, and perhaps slowed their breathing. Any of those changes could affect how they feel.What hasn't been shown is that the person actually "reset" the vagus nerve.That matters because real science can sometimes be used to support claims that haven't been tested. Research showing that the vagus nerve helps the brain and body communicate doesn't automatically prove that a certain eye movement or stretch can directly change how the nerve works.A calming practice can still be helpful without doing everything the wellness claims say it does. Slow Breathing Has More Evidence Than Most "Vagus Hacks"Among the many practices linked to the vagus nerve, slow breathing stands out because researchers have studied it more closely.Breathing is unusual because it happens automatically, but people can also control it. You don't have to think about every breath, yet you can choose to breathe more slowly or deeply. That gives people a simple way to affect a process that usually happens on its own.Sylvain Laborde, PhD, of the German Sport University Cologne, studies how breathing, stress, and heart-rate variability, or HRV, are connected. In a large 2022 review, Laborde and his colleagues looked at 223 studies of slow breathing. They found changes in HRV linked to the body's rest-and-recovery system during slow breathing, right afterward, and with regular practice. The findings don't show that breathing "resets" the vagus nerve. But they do show that slowing the breath can affect body processes linked to calming and recovery.That difference matters. The studies used different breathing rates, session lengths, and methods, so the research doesn't point to one perfect breathing technique for everyone.Someone lying awake after a stressful day can simply notice whether slower, comfortable breathing helps the body settle. There's no need to force a big response or turn breathing into another task that has to be done perfectly.This also fits with broader research on relaxation. The National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health has reviewed studies on breathing exercises, meditation, muscle relaxation, guided imagery, and similar practices. Some may help with stress and anxiety, although results vary and no single approach works for everyone.The goal doesn't have to be instant calm. Even a small shift can matter. Medical Vagus Stimulation Is Something Very DifferentPart of the confusion around vagus nerve exercises comes from the fact that doctors and researchers really can stimulate the vagus nerve. But they do it very differently.Implanted vagus nerve stimulation, or VNS, uses a medical device to send controlled electrical signals to the nerve. The FDA has approved VNS as an added treatment for certain forms of epilepsy that don't respond well to medication. It's also approved for some adults with long-term or recurring depression who are having a major depressive episode and haven't responded well to four or more treatments. This isn't the same as taking a deep breath or stretching the neck.Researchers are also studying ways to stimulate the vagus nerve without an implanted device. One approach uses mild electrical signals on certain areas of the outer ear that are thought to connect with a branch of the vagus nerve. Researchers call this transcutaneous auricular vagus nerve stimulation, or taVNS. Early studies of taVNS have shown some encouraging results, including improvements in anxiety symptoms. But the evidence isn't strong enough yet to consider it an established anxiety treatment. Studies also differ in how the stimulation is given, how long treatment lasts, and how results are measured. More consistent research is still needed.This difference matters when online claims use medical VNS research to support an at-home exercise. Electrical stimulation aimed at a nerve pathway under controlled conditions isn't the same as doing a movement that happens to feel calming. Evidence for one can't simply be used as proof for the other. The Better Goal May Be Regulation, Not a ResetThe idea of a "reset" is appealing because it sounds simple: do the right exercise, switch off the stress response, and get back to normal.But the nervous system rarely works that neatly.Stress itself isn't a sign that something is wrong. The body is supposed to become more alert and ready when something needs our attention. The more useful question is what happens afterward. Can the body settle again once the stressful moment has passed?That's where regulation becomes more useful than the idea of a reset. Regulation doesn't mean staying relaxed all day. It means the body can become more alert when needed and then settle again instead of staying on high alert.For a Sacramento resident juggling work, family responsibilities, traffic, poor sleep, money worries, and constant phone and computer demands, that can make self-care feel more realistic. A stressful commute or difficult conversation may speed up the heart, tighten muscles, and make someone more alert. Those reactions don't necessarily mean something has gone wrong. They're normal ways the body responds to pressure.Recovery can be quiet and easy to miss. Breathing may slow. Muscles may begin to relax. The sense of urgency may ease. The body may no longer feel as ready to react. These small changes can be signs that the body is settling after a period of stress.Recovery doesn't have to arrive as a sudden wave of calm. It may happen gradually, supported by things like movement, meditation, regular sleep, time outdoors, slow breathing, or simply stepping away from constant stimulation.The important part is the body's ability to adjust: becoming alert when something needs attention and then gradually settling once the demand has passed.It's different when anxiety becomes hard to recover from or starts interfering with sleep, work, relationships, daily activities, or quality of life. At that point, relaxation practices shouldn't have to do all the work. A mental health or medical professional can help with problems that breathing exercises or other nervous-system practices aren't designed to solve.Letting go of the reset mindset can also take some pressure out of self-care. A tight shoulder after a demanding day or a restless evening doesn't automatically mean something in the nervous system needs to be fixed.A more lasting approach is often much simpler. It means noticing how the body responds to stress, giving it time to recover, and making helpful practices part of everyday life instead of using them as another test of whether the body is working the way it should.Editorial TransparencySacramento Living Well looks at holistic wellness with a focus on what’s practical, what the evidence shows, and what readers can realistically expect. This article examines vagus nerve exercises because they connect mental well-being with body-based self-care and have become a popular wellness topic. The goal isn’t to promote or dismiss these practices, but to help readers separate what science supports from claims that may go beyond the evidence. How This Article Was ResearchedThis article was based on peer-reviewed research about the vagus nerve, heart-rate variability, slow breathing, and medical forms of vagus nerve stimulation. Research and guidance from trusted medical and scientific sources, including the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and the National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health, were also reviewed. Research from Kevin Tracey, MD, Julian Thayer, PhD, and Sylvain Laborde, PhD, helped separate what scientists already know about the vagus nerve from newer research and claims about at-home vagus nerve exercises.  Ready to explore approaches that support physical, emotional, and energetic balance? Visit Holistic Healing, then dive deeper into wellness and community stories on Sacramento Living Well.---Published by the Sacramento Living Well Editorial Team — a DSA Digital Media publication celebrating integrative care and mindful living.