In that vein, it would be good to do everything we can to maximize brain health and reduce what can cause chronic inflammation in the brain.

In nature, free play is what taught our brains how to fully expand, but in our modern unnatural lives our brains are over saturated with cheap "entertainment" and under stimulated with real experiences.

Use It or Lose It.

The brain feeds off stimulation. You need to constantly keep it alive or else you will die. There is a reason death numbers spike once men retire from their careers and no longer have that constant flow of work into the mind. This doesn't have to mean doing sudoku puzzles every morning but constantly challenging your mind to adapt will encourage neural plasticity. Here are some good things to do in that vein:

• Learn different languages (thinking method)
• Learn to type correctly (typing club)
• Learn to juggle (with your hands) 5-10 minutes
• Every day chores with different hands (toothbrushing. flossing, getting dressed, etc)
• Cross-train on your rest days (ping pong, tennis, basketball, etc)
• Go out and be social. Spark conversation with strangers. Learn how to talk to anyone. Hold eye contact. Smile and have fun. Laugh. Don't take yourself too seriously.
• And of course, meditation, breathwork, sungazing, and grounding.

What to Avoid

• Porn
• Stimulants like coffee, chocolate, and energy drinks
• Sugar
• Artificial Light
• nnEMF (yes this includes airpods)
• Processed foods
• Supplements (including fish oil pills)
• People who bring negativity, limiting beliefs, and misery into your life.

Autonomic Nervous System

The ANS is an involuntary part of the nervous system that can get out of whack with our modern unnatural living. Many people spend far too much time in their sympathetic system (fight or flight) because of artificial light, mouth breathing, nnEMF, constant dopamine hits from social media, and processed foods to name a few.

We as athletes already get far enough sympathetic activation with the constant training that we need to maximize our parasympathetic activation (rest & digest) as possible.

A major part of the parasympathetic system is the Vagus nerve which helps lower the

stress response and calm the aNS.

Now it is my understanding that anyone with muscle dominance and inability to relax their muscles (low fascia fitness) will have a much harder time tapping into their parasympathetic system, will recover much slower, and have a harder time dealing with stress. All of the Entangled Athletics training will help optimize your central nervous system.

Vagus Nerve

The internal network your brain uses to keep you vital.

Your nervous system is made up of over 100 billion nerve cells.

The vagus nerve is one of the longest branches that these nerves use to communicate.

It’s made up of two parts

Left Right

Each of these branch off to innervate various parts of your body.

Your vagus nerve works is a bidirectional superhighway.

This allows your brain to communicate with your body.

And vice versa

80-90% of your vagus nerve’s function is to convey sensory information.

The rest controls the autopilot functions that keep you alive.

The vagus nerve is named after the Latin word Vaga.

Which means to wander.

It meanders down your body up until your gut and controls all your involuntary actions.

Your sensor & regulator.

Your Vagus nerve is responsible for your:

Taste
Fertility
Speech
Orgasm
Hearing
Breathing
Digestion
Heartbeat
Circulation
Gut Health
Swallowing
Blood pressure
Bladder movement

The ancients called it the frontal spinal column.

Hindu and Buddhists would call it the chakra system.

The rudimentary function of what we call our vagus nerve today was revered & appreciated for millennia.

The mind body connection reached public consciousness once again in 1872.

Your vagus nerve controls your parasympathetic nervous system.

The rest & digest mode of your body.

You need it healthy to tap into higher cognition & creativity.

So you can think straight & make good decisions.

When your vagus nerve isn’t healthy.

Your body gets stuck on your sympathetic nervous system.

The fight or flight mode of your body.

This switches on primal instincts like fear.

Which wears your health down over time.

See below on same ways to stimulate the Vagus Nerve.

Vagus Nerve Stimulation promotes neural plasticity. Vagal tone increasing parasympathetic activation. It turns on and amplifies neurogenesis, helping our brains sprout new brain cells.

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Stimulating the Vagus Nerve

• Foot Massage from the opposite gender (physical touch)
• Water Gargling (You can do 30 seconds x3 each morning)
• Manual massage of the carotid area (side of neck below the ear)
• Water submersion (even dunking the head in a bucket of ice water will help)
• Full Body Sunlight & Sungazing
• Home waterfall fountain
  ("Falling water brings the Lenard effect to your environment to help improve negative ions into the air and air cavities you breath improving the balance of NO/oxygen for breathing." - Dr. Jack Kruse)
  - Now understand another reason why nature is so calming...
• Meditation (Exhale longer than you inhale. Trying humming OM afterwards). 15-20 minutes of humming every morning. Long inhale through the nose. Massage behind the jaw before you start.
• Log barefoot grounded walks in Nature
• Avoid sunglasses at all time the sun is out. If you wear contacts remove them and go back to glasses. When outdoors take your glasses off. When indoors, under the influence of artificial light, make sure you are blocking blue frequencies 400- 465 nm with blue tech lenses or some equivalent. You should also cover up your skin indoors.
• Proper Nasal Breathing (1 minute of deep belly breathing before any meals)
• Sleep on your right side. Since the vagus nerve drops down the right side of your body. Sleeping on it switches on your parasympathetic nervous system and can potentially provide better sleep.

Further Reading:
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/water-exercise-rx-jack-kruse
Dr. John Bergman
John Constas

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