Welcome to another epsode of the Pain Free Living podcast with your co-hosts Clare Elsby (therapy coach) and Bob Allen (osteopath).
In this episode Clare is flying solo to talk to you about one of the most powerful skills anyone can learn: how to regulate your own nervous system so you can handle any stress, uncertainty, and emotions with more ease.
Clare breaks down the autonomic nervous system in a way that’s simple, human, and instantly relatable. You’ll hear how the sympathetic system (your fight-or-flight-freeze response) and the parasympathetic system (your rest-digest-and-repair mode) constantly work like two elastic bands, balancing tension along your “Window of Tolerance”.
When that window is wide, life’s challenges feel manageable. When it narrows, even small triggers can feel overwhelming, and that’s when anxiety, overthinking, and catastrophising creep in. Clare explains why this window naturally shifts throughout the day, how uncertainty fuels stress, and why awareness is always the first step in emotional regulation.
You’ll learn how to sense your own early warning signs, which might be the flutter in your chest, the tension in your neck, and the feeling of being “on edge”. She covers what these physical cues mean for your mind and, most importantly, you’ll hear how to bring yourself back into balance using three simple tools you can use anywhere, anytime.
Clare shares client stories, real-world examples, and practical lived experience from her coaching therapy sessions to help you understand what psychological flexibility looks like in everyday life. Whether you’re considering therapy, navigating chronic stress, or simply want better emotional resilience, this episode gives you a clear starting point and a toolkit you can rely on.
No jargon. No judgement. Just grounded, compassionate guidance to help you stay within your window of tolerance, and show you how to widen it over time.
5 Key Takeaways
Your sympathetic and parasympathetic systems act like two elastic bands — and your “window of tolerance” sits between them.
Stress, uncertainty, and daily pressures narrow that window, making you more sensitive to triggers.
Awareness of your body’s early signs is the foundation of emotional regulation.
Clare’s top three tools: physiological sigh breathing, grounding through the five senses, and tapping.
Consistent practice widens your window, builds resilience, and supports better emotional health.
🔗Helpful links
More on tapping https://www.thetappingsolution.com/eft-tapping/
Grounding using your 5 senses https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WQg7seUGDUc
Breathing to reduce your stress https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kSZKIupBUuc
Find out more about us and stay connected
😎 Bob’s story: https://bit.ly/BobsOsteoStory
🤩 Clare’s coaching: https://www.clareelsby.com/
📰 Pain Free Living newsletter: https://bit.ly/PFL_newsletter_signup
Please note: This podcast provides general information for educational purposes only. It is not medical advice and should not replace professional assessment, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek qualified healthcare advice if you have pain, new or worsening symptoms, or any concerns about your health before starting exercise or self-care routines.
Transcripts
Speaker A:
Hi there, it's Clare Elsby, one of the hosts of the Pain Free Living podcast with Bob Allen. Bob and I have been discussing what topics would be good for the podcast.
And one of the things that he's talked about from a physical therapy aspect is the autonomic nervous system. And he used lots of very long words and explained how it all worked in terms of our bodies.
I would like to talk about how it actually affects our mind and how it actually regulates our emotions. So I won't get as technical as Bob, but let's start. Let's get on with it. So what is the autonomic nervous system? The ans.
That basically is how we regulate our emotions. And it is managed by the vagus nerve. So the vagus nerve runs from the back of our. If we can feel it. Really?
Well, we can't feel it, but we can imagine it from the back of our neck, if you like, and runs all the way through our bodies and effectively goes into the gut. And I understand that that is actually where our gut instinct comes from. So I quite like that. So what is the autonomic nervous system?
So it's made up of two parts. It's the sympathetic and the parasympathetic.
So if we are triggered with our sympathetic nervous system, this would be, at an extreme, our fight or flight response. If it's our parasympathetic nervous system, then that would be our rest and digest response. So that's the calmer one of the two.
And we all know what it's like when we're starting to feel a little bit anxious. We can feel it in different places. Some of us feel it in our chest and things start to flutter.
Some of us feel it in the back of our neck and in our shoulders and it's just where things are starting to get a little bit too much. And if we think of it as like a long line, so two arrows. So we've got our sympathetic pointing upwards and our parasympathetic going down.
And a bit like an elastic band and they're both sort of fairly taut. So we've got these two lines, vertical lines. And then if we can also think about to horizontal lines.
So going across the middle and cutting across the middle of our elastic bands. This is what I would actually call our window of tolerance.
So when we are feeling quite stressed, so we're going towards our fight or flight response and that's starting to feel triggered. What that really means is that our middle bit, horizontal lines are quite narrow.
Whereas if we can keep our horizontal lines wider, it means that it's less likely that our sympathetic nervous system will be triggered.
So emotional regulation is very much by trying to keep that window of tolerance as wide as possible, so that we're less likely to go into these two extremes.
So for some people, this is a real challenge, and especially when you sort of feel that you're on the edge, it's a feeling of constant stress, chronic stress or anxiety. Then actually, you might need to go and see your GP or a clinical therapist about how to actually manage these responses.
But generally, for most of us, the first step in anything like this is to become aware of our bodies and aware of where we think we are in our window.
And if we can almost imagine this window, and our window will move during the day, it'll move from time of day, it'll move depending on what is going on for us, what stresses are put on us, what our expectations are, what. And if we think about stress itself and anxiety, in reality, that is actually a fear of uncertainty and we don't know what's going to happen.
So we start to overthink what might happen. So if we can increase our window of tolerance, make that wider, then we will be less likely to feel anxious, we will be able to cope more.
And actually, that is what we're aiming for in someone who is psychologically flexible.
In other words, you can manage your emotions, you can help regulate by being very aware of what your triggers are, where your window is in relation to what's going on for you, and knowing that, actually, I'm starting to feel a little bit anxious, I'm starting to feel you can then regulate and there are tools and tricks that you can use to actually bring yourself back into that window. So a big one, or a main one would be breathwork. And one of the fastest ways you can do this is called the psychotical breath.
So this is where you breathe in and then once you get to the top of that, this is through your nose. Once you get to the top of that, you have another little breath through your nose and then you take a very long breath out.
And if you do that four or five times, that will start to stimulate your vagus nerve, which will start to stimulate your. Your parasympathetic nerve, which will actually start to calm you down.
And I've spoken to three people this week who've used it in anxious situations. One was going for a blood test where in the past they've fainted and it's just been a nightmare and they've just been so worried about it.
And they've gone into the blood test, they've told the nurse nursing practitioner that, you know, this is a really anxious situation for them. And while they've been doing it, they've been doing this psychological breath and it all was fine.
So doing that, that is a really simple technique that you can use. Another one is grinding technique. So this is about knowing where you are in the moment, it's bringing you back.
So rather than overthinking, rather than your mind wandering to all the disaster situations that could possibly happen, catastrophizing, it actually brings you back to where you are. So a really good technique, and it's called a grinding technique, is where we take advantage of the five senses.
And it's a really good idea to actually name the senses as you do them. So think of something that you can see and name it, take a sniff, see what you can smell and name it.
Taste something, see what's in your mouth, feel it and name it. Touch something and what is it? What are you touching? And then what can you hear and name it.
And by doing that, you're bringing yourself back into the present and you're getting away from the catastrophizing and the overthinking and the anxiety that's going on in your mind. Another thing you could do is tapping.
So tapping is something that you've always got with you, and there are various techniques that you can use, but this tapping action on various points is known to calm your vagus nerve and bring you back into your window of tolerance.
So just as a reminder then, to bring you back into your window of tolerance, my top three tips would be, first one is breathing, and the psychological breath would be the first one. Second one is grounding. So think of your five senses. And the third one would be tapping. Again, all those things bring you back into the.
Into where you are in the moment. And this is all part of mindfulness.
So again, it is about bringing you back so that you're aware of your body rather than letting your mind get taken away with overthinking and catastrophizing.
And by doing that, then you're reducing the anxiety that you're feeling and that starts to help you emotionally regulate and that loosens off those elastic bands I was talking about earlier, your parasympathetic and your sympathetic nervous system. I hope that's been helpful and I look forward to seeing you on the next one. I really hope that was helpful.
It's just a little snippet, mostly from the clients that I see and the information that I try and pass on. These are all tools that you can have in your psychological toolbox.
And it's something that Bob and I are passionate about at the Pain Free Living podcast.
