SINGING FOR HEALTH

"Singing...promotes a vagal mediated calm physiological state... [and] provides an opportunity to to exercise the entire integrated social engagement system."

Stephen Porges, Ph.D.*

Singing has been shown to help with many health challenges, because it's a great way to gently explore and exercise the heart and lungs while calming and resetting the nervous system.

Singing means breathing deeply, connecting to the core muscles, and vibrating. Regardless of how good you think you sound, each of these things can regulate and help with:

anxiety* and stress*
lung health*
chronic pain*
Long Covid*
pelvic floor weakness/tightness*

But how?

A few things…

Breathing muscles are like any other: if you exercise them, they become stronger.
Life events, such as illness, can leave the body’s autonomic nervous system in a state of partial and continual “fight-or-flight’ mode. The deep, slow, and relaxed breaths learned through breathing exercises, and reinforced through singing, help rebalance the body into the opposite state of “rest-and-digest”.
Breathing and singing stimulate the vagus nerve, in turn regulating the autonomic nervous system, which in turn regulates respiration.* In other words, healthy breathing leads to more healthy breathing, and poor breathing leads to more poor breathing.
On a chemical level, humming is an excellent way to create nitric oxide, a molecule that is necessary for delivering oxygen into cells. Further, carbon dioxide is required to attract oxygen to cells.* In other words, breathing more and quickly won’t necessarily increase the amount of oxygen in your cells, whereas slow, measured breaths will.
Singing releases endorphins!*

TESTIMONIALS

More holistic than I was expecting. It was helpful in calming my nerves and breathing more naturally. Helped me get out of my head and into my body. I can breath through things that come up in my day that would have previously set me back.

Long Covid Survivor

M.O.

I have thoroughly enjoyed and would highly recommend. I struggle with anxiety and the breathing exercises and body awareness have had a very calming effect on my state of well being. I find myself using the exercise for
breathing and body posture spontaneously and if I wake during the night I can easily return to sleep.

Long Covid Survivor

K.L.

I feel like I’ve been able to re-establish a relationship with my breath. Breathing is still a challenge but it’s getting easier!

Long Covid Survivor

A.P.

I can breathe! Holy Crap!

Long Covid Survivor

T.W.

*Footnotes

Quote: The Pocket Guide to the Polyvagal Theory, Stephen W. Porges, W.W. Norton and Company, 2017, p26

Anxiety: https://www.cell.com/cell-reports-medicine/fulltext/S2666-3791(22)00474-8 _returnURL=https%3A%2F%2Flinkinghub.elsevier.com%2Fretrieve%2Fpii%2FS2666379122004748%3Fshowall%3Dtrue

Stress: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC5455070/