Dr. Lorne Brown:

Today on the Conscious Fertility Podcast I have with me Dr. Judy Lovas, and she’s Zooming in for this recording all the way from Sydney, Australia, and I am on the other side over here in Vancouver, BC. So it’s nice that we have technology to bring us together, and I thought it’d be great to have Judy with us today because of her expertise and passion for eliciting the relaxation response. And she’s going to go into detail about this, and I’m curious because how can this benefit not only our mental health, but our physical wellbeing? And so a brief background of Judy is that she has her PhD from the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Sydney, and she has an eclectic background in psychology, tertiary education, massage therapy, research and clinical practice.

She has a keen interest in health and medical science plus her passion for high quality education, which you’re going to hear today, combined to create her art and science of relaxation back in 2010. And she is a dynamic speaker. You can find her on YouTube. And she does present knowledge and passion and humor to schools for students to learn coping skills, for studying and life for health and medical practitioners to apply these right relaxation therapies in their own clinical practice, as well as just the general public who wished to learn simple relaxation skills to improve their own mental health. And she’s just a wealth of knowledge. So I wanted to say Dr. Judy Lovas, welcome to the Conscious Fertility Podcast.

Dr. Judy Lovas:

Thank you, Lorne. It’s wonderful to be with you over the seas and far away.

Dr. Lorne Brown:

It certainly is. And we’re going to talk about a few things. So I want to let our listeners know that at some point we’re going to do some relaxation therapy. And you had asked that for the listeners, two things. One is to think of a place that is relaxing, a place that you love, because that’s going to be important later on when we do this relaxation technique, correct?

Dr. Judy Lovas:

That’s right. So we will do a brief relaxation. It gives people an indication of what the experience of relaxation is, and it will be a brief guided imagery session. So, ideally, listeners, if you could think of a place that you love to go and this place can be real or imaginary, somewhere that is safe and comfortable and enables you to feel good and to relax. And we’ll come back to that after we have a chat.

Dr. Lorne Brown:

Great. So we’re going to have some practical experience. And from the safety perspective, I just want to remind those, anytime you’re doing a form of meditation or guided meditation imagery, make sure you’re in a safe place, not operating a machinery, you’re not in a car, be in a place where you won’t be disturbed and it’s safe for you to do so. And then we’re going to talk about different things because many of the listeners are looking for ways to feel better mentally and physically, and they’re looking for ways to use their mind, their feeling, or elicit relaxation to give them that advantage of physical wellbeing and in our listeners’ cases, help them conceive. And so we’re going to talk about this thing called psycho neuro immunology, which we’ve talked about before in our past episodes. And you’re going to come from an approach more from an evidence-based approach as well, I understand, correct, Judy?

Dr. Judy Lovas:

Definitely. I mean, psychoneuroimmunology, and we can comfortably call it PNI, is an area of health science. So it provides the research and the evidence that supports the efficacy of techniques like deep diaphragmatic breathing and guided imagery. It’s a very broad area of science, but it certainly has provided us with the knowledge and the understanding and the evidence that these very simple ancient approaches demonstrate the mechanisms in the pathways by which they work and are good for us.

Dr. Lorne Brown:

And you mentioned these ancient practices because a lot of them are quite old, and now we’re starting to have science validate that they can impact the body. Can you unpack the word psychoneuroimmunology? And I’ve even heard that they’ve called it PNEI or PNIE, so they’ve added psycho neuro endo immunology. So can you unpack that and maybe also how this is impacting us physically as well, our thoughts and our feelings such as what was the type of breathing? What did you describe it as?

Dr. Judy Lovas:

Oh, I call it, well, it is diaphragmatic breathing, which is… So you’ve asked numerous questions there. Diaphragmatic breathing is a purely mechanical biomechanical perspective on taking a slow deep breath using the lungs as much as possible, or expanding the lungs as much as possible by really working the diaphragm, which is the main muscle involved in slow deep respiration. So one caveat to taking slow breaths is it’s at rest. So it’s not when you’re running upstairs or doing a workout or lifting anything. So when we are at rest, we can learn to take much slower, deeper breaths to oxygenate more cells and a whole cascade of benefits. But let’s go back.

Dr. Lorne Brown:

Yeah, let’s do the PNI because I wanted to clarify the breathing technique, I just wasn’t sure of your terminology. I love the breath because it’s always with you, it’s free.

Dr. Judy Lovas:

Yes.

Dr. Lorne Brown:

And what a tool to communicate to your nervous system that you are safe to change the whole psychoneuroimmunology of the body. So let’s unpack the PNI or the PNEI word and why this can benefit our physical well being through things like diaphragm breathing and guided imagery and other mind body tools.

Dr. Judy Lovas:

Yep. Well, really, I believe that psychoneuroimmunology, PNI, is the sign of mind-body health. It demonstrates what everybody understands or uses. That term is oh, mind body connections, mind body health, mind body medicines, mind body therapies, psychoneuroimmunology is the science of all of that. So at its simplest form of definition, psycho neuro immunology investigates the interactions and the communications and influences between the nervous system, which you just mentioned, the endocrine or hormonal system. So the endocrine and hormonal system are the same and the immune system. And it goes to show initially at a cellular level, now at a molecular level, even beyond that onto a genetic expression level, how these three systems are inseparable and constantly 24 hours a day influencing each other, talking to each other, directing each other’s activities. And when we look at the nervous system, a big part of the nervous system is the brain.

We’ve got the brain and the spinal cord, and then all the peripheral nerves that stem from the spinal cord to the little finger and little toe. So a large part of the nervous systems that PNI looks at the nervous system, endocrine and immune system connections, the brain is a big part of the nervous system. And so we have cognition in all our thought processes, our mental activity, the endocrine system is hormones, which have huge impact in a variety of ways, but they’re very involved. One of the things that hormones do is that they are involved in our emotional states. And our immune system, again, has many functions and we are still learning about it, but the primary function is to keep us healthy and maintain our wellbeing. So when you say unpack, when you want to unpack PNI, you’re looking at the interactions between our thoughts and our cognition, our emotional state and our health and wellbeing. And conversely, how our health and wellbeing impacts our emotions and our thoughts and mental states.

Dr. Lorne Brown:

So it’s bidirectional or as some people say, top down or bottom up, your thoughts and your feelings have an impact on your physical body.

Dr. Judy Lovas:

Absolutely. Without a doubt. And I’ve been using the term, all the literature talks about bidirectional, but I like multidirectional because it’s coming at us from all directions. Immune cells are talking to different hormones, which are talking to different neuropeptides and neurotransmitters, and in terms of from brain to periphery and periphery to brain, top down, bottom up.

Dr. Lorne Brown:

And I’m going to share some ideas and I want you to bring in the evidence and your understanding from your training and your practice. And so when we talk about that than how everything’s impacting things, when it comes to good health, physical health or wanting to grow your family for fertility, this orchestra of the immune system and of the nervous system and of the hormonal system to have this imbalance in doing what it’s supposed to be doing at the right time in the right amount requires a balanced vital body. And so I always share how we want to lower that resistance. When you have a lot of resistance or in Chinese medicine we call it cheese stagnation, your resources are being pulled away for survival instead of health, creativity, and reproduction. Are you seeing this in the literature then that are thoughts and our feelings, how they’re turned? Because you talked about gene expression turning on and off genes for longevity and how they’re affecting our hormonal system. So is that what you’re seeing then in the literature that our thoughts and our feelings are impacting our physical well being?

Dr. Judy Lovas:

Well, yes. The literature doesn’t speak about it as globally as that most of the time. So these studies that are done are quite specific. So they might look at, for example, a more practical thing rather than our thoughts, they might look at an intervention like diaphragmatic breathing and how that can over time with practice actually change genetic expression of our inflammatory process.

Dr. Lorne Brown:

Oh, I want to just highlight that just for our listeners because you’re talking about DB, the breathing technique, changing gene expression for inflammatory states in the body. And the reason that’s relevant is we talk about chronic systemic inflammation or inflammation causing accelerated biological aging, premature degenerative diseases and possibly premature fertility decline. And so we want to be as biologically young as possible and help regulate inflammation, we’d be part of that. So with a simple tool like breathing, the literature shows that you’re seeing a change in this gene expression which regulates inflammation.

Dr. Judy Lovas:

Well, it regulates other pathways of genetic expression, but certainly, so a pathway is to do with metabolism, but certainly with inflammatory process and the literature and the science is demonstrating that chronic stress, chronic conditions such as pain or mood disorders like anxiety and depression intimately linked with chronic inflammation, that that’s also bidirectional. And the literature is starting to no longer really focus on which came first, it really is a chicken and the egg. Did the pain come before the inflammation or the inflammation before the pain? That’s no longer deemed so important, but rather determining ways to cut that vicious cycle. And we know there’s not a shadow of doubt anymore that depression and chronic inflammation go hand in hand and it really doesn’t matter which came first. It’s okay, what can we do to interfere in this continuum of inflammation, depression or inflammation, pain, inflammation, anxiety, inflammation, and sleep disorders.

Dr. Lorne Brown:

And all these things that affect our health and our reproduction. So sleep, inflammation. And so the breathing is one way to elicit the relaxation response. And so in the psychoneuroimmunology, in the PNI, so we’ve talked a little bit about the hormonal system gene expression, and you’re seen in the literature, like you said, it’s not global, but you’re seen in the literature where they’re looking at gene expression and specific things. And when I kind of interrupted you, you were talking about the breathing technique of what they had found. What about in the guided imagery? Do they understand the mechanism behind it and what are the benefits of that?

Dr. Judy Lovas:

The mechanism is really interesting. Guided imagery has been used in pain management before there was really adequate research. They just knew clinically it works, okay, and we don’t have the scope in this podcast, but there are very specific ways to use guided imagery for specific chronic conditions. Later we’ll have a look at guided imagery for general relaxation, which is just as important. But the evidence now demonstrates that when… So guided imagery is, I love the expression, the mind’s eye. So when you see something in your imagination, in your mind, our physiological processes are almost the same as if we’re seeing the real thing. And let me use an example. So if somebody has a phobia, and here in Australia, as you mentioned, the first time we spoke, there are lots of poisonous critters. So if somebody has a phobia about red back spiders and they see an actual red back spider, there will be all this autonomic response, a whole cascade of physiological processes as a result of seeing something.

And the research shows us that imagining the red back spider, we respond almost the same, that our heart rate will increase, we will start to sweat, we will start to shake and have sympathetic nervous responses. So instead of taking a negative perspective like talking about red back spiders or red belly snakes or anything else, we’ll think of something positive. And that’s why I’ve asked your listeners to think of a safe, happy, relaxing place because whatever is in our mind’s eye, the physiological response is really almost the same as if it’s actually in front of us.

Dr. Lorne Brown:

And I know in my background with clinical hypnotherapy, we often would use the idea that the subconscious can’t tell the difference from an inner and outer experience. And we know through mirror neurons, for example, if you’re imagining you’re drinking a glass of water or see somebody drinking a glass of water, the neurons fire as if you’re drinking a glass of water. And that’s why I think in sports psychology, they often have the athletes visualize the successful put or the successful basket and they see the improvement.

Dr. Judy Lovas:

Absolutely. There is no way that an athlete on the block at the beginning of a race is going to say to themselves, I am going to lose this race. They see themselves on the podium with the gold medal and beating their personal best. What we think and what we visualize and what happens in our cognition elicits a cascade of physiological processes that’s almost the same as if it’s actually happening. And we can harness that for therapeutic purposes.

Dr. Lorne Brown:

Absolutely. I don’t know who said it, but synapses of that fire together wire together. And so if you’re doing this rehearsal in your brain and as you said, it can’t tell the difference whether it’s happening or not, then really good at the negative, we can think of the red spider whatever spider sneaks.

Dr. Judy Lovas:

Yes.

Dr. Lorne Brown:

That we are laughing because Judy, I was telling Judy that Vancouver in Australia, there’s a lot of similarities like Melbourne and Vancouver has some similarities, a little bit of Sydney, the only difference is all the creatures here, most of them won’t kill you. Where’s everything in Australia? They’re like, don’t touch that, don’t touch that. And so we are talking now about just that we’re so good at bringing up the negative and we’ll know this because we can be thinking about something that’s not happening, but thinking about something that could happen or has happened, it’s not happening now. And you start to sweat, your heart starts to pump, your muscles get tight because your body, which I say the subconscious lives in, the cells in the body don’t know that. And you’re saying, well, we can use that whole mechanism still and start to give it benefit and relaxation and healing. And then the body also thinks that’s what it’s getting and it starts to respond as if it’s getting that or it’s having that experience.

Dr. Judy Lovas:

Absolutely. So if we’re relaxing or we are thinking of something positive, the nerve cells, the neurotransmitters and the neuropeptides, which are very similar, there’s not a lot of difference between them, but those nerve cells and chemical messages of the brain and the nervous system then communicate with hormones. And as we relax, we are decreasing the release of stress hormones and eliciting the release of harming hormones and calming neurotransmitters. And again, it becomes a cascade. So there’s then a whole further release of different cells and physiological processes. Coming back to something as simple as the autonomic nervous system heading back towards equilibrium balance and homeostasis rather than being out of whack with a heightened alarm system or fight or flight or the sympathetic nervous system. We can bring that back down towards a more balanced, I always have the image of a seesaw, we’re never actually at homeostasis.

Dr. Lorne Brown:

That wouldn’t be good actually if we were at homeostasis. When we’re at homeostasis, I think we talked about this before. We’re at homeostasis when we’re dead, right? So there’s always a little-

Dr. Judy Lovas:

That’s what happens.

Dr. Lorne Brown:

There should be movement, so a little bit of movement, but you’re talking about when the swing goes way up and down. So that’s where we don’t feel good either mentally or physically. And so a little bit of up and down on your seesaw, that feels good. Yeah?

Dr. Judy Lovas:

That’s normal. The body, the biochemical wash that we are, is never static. So you are never at homeostasis. To me, health can be indicated by how easily we come back down towards a balanced state. For example, someone living with trauma or PTSD does not come back towards or finds it difficult, they can but may find it very difficult and over a long period of time to come back towards a more balanced state.

Dr. Lorne Brown:

And this is why I wanted to talk with you, Judy, because many of the people I see will share that after a menstrual cycle, so they’re not pregnant or after unsuccessful IVF cycle or after a miscarriage that they get what’s called fertility stress or trauma. And these tools then are able to help them get back into that equilibrium, that place better, and that’s a sign of health because sometimes that can throw them off. And then now they got distress hormones, they got lack of blood flow because of the tension, the gene expression. So this is all about how quickly we can support them by using these techniques, support yourself to get back into that better state of balance.

Dr. Judy Lovas:

Absolutely. And I think it’s very important to highlight. See, I no longer say to stress, but I say to highlight that something… So relaxation skills are exactly that, but they are a practical skill and we don’t become proficient at a skill unless we practice regularly. So I really want to emphasize that if you have the opportunities to learn how to take slow deep breaths, diaphragmatic breathing or guided imagery or any relaxation, it requires not so much the duration but the frequency. So don’t try and take slow deep breaths for half an hour. And clinically this is really important. You can make a difference by two, three, four, five minutes if you practice every day or twice a day. It’s not the duration of the relaxation, it’s the regularity. And that way you develop the proficiency and then you are in a position that when you are distressed and we all get distressed, when you have started menstruating, when you are not pregnant, you can then say, I know I’m comfortable with using those slow breaths or using my imagination to calm myself down.

Dr. Lorne Brown:

And I want to highlight the frequency, how often you do it a day versus how long you do it. And I’ve found that in so many of the conscious hacks that I use in my practice, frequently doing it throughout the day seems to be more impactful than if you did four 20 minute sessions in a day is better than a 100 minute session. And that a hundred minutes is more than the 80-minute total. So if you do four 20 minute practices, that’s 80 minutes total for the day. But those four times at 20 minutes each is so much more impactful than just once at 100 minutes.

Dr. Judy Lovas:

Correct. But I bring it down because not everybody has 80 minutes in a day.

Dr. Lorne Brown:

I made up a number. I could have said five minutes.

Dr. Judy Lovas:

But with breathing, if you were to take slow breaths for let’s say four minutes a day and did it virtually every day, it does make a difference. And so with clients, I entrap them. If I can say that, in the nicest possible way by saying, can you devote four minutes a day to your health? And no one dared say no. So people are not going to spend 30, 50, 60 minutes a day. We are time poor, but four minutes a day. And then I also negotiate as to when in the day you are going to devote yourself to it.

Dr. Lorne Brown:

And do you have a time that you would usually recommend?

Dr. Judy Lovas:

Yes, I do. And when you hop into bed, I mean even if you are a shift worker, and so it’s not nighttime, but whenever, most people do go to bed in a 24-hour cycle. And so when you hop into bed and I teach people what position to be in, which isn’t difficult and how to take slow breaths, and the feedback that I’ve got is I’ve had feedback consistently over years, fell asleep quickly for the first time in years. People who wake up at three o’clock in the morning, I got back to sleep, that has never happened for years. People in pain say while I was doing the breathing, I was not aware of my pain. This is, as you said, it’s free, it’s portable, it is evidence-based. And really why isn’t it being used in every hospital, in every medical center? That’s my aim.

Dr. Lorne Brown:

Yeah, that’s another podcast. Why isn’t it? We can speculate why isn’t it? But oftentimes things that are simple are dismissed as well, and this is so simple. The women and the men I see, they’re very motivated. So it’s easy for me, there’s not a lot of negotiations. I usually say first thing in the morning and at bed and before each meal and that. So that’s doing it at least four times a day, right? Or five times a day. It’s interesting, after about 20 to 30 days consecutively doing this, many people report that their hands and feet warm up where they used to have cold hands.

Dr. Judy Lovas:

Yes.

Dr. Lorne Brown:

Makes sense to us, right? Because if you’re in that sympathetic stress, blood is diverted from reproduction, digestion and your extremities to go to your heart, your lungs and your major muscles to fight or flight. And if you’re gauging that parasympathetic nervous system, then the blood flow is circulating more and you start to get those warm hands and feet because anatomically, it’s similar. The blood flow to the ovaries and blood flow to the hands and feet are that sympathetic parasympathetic process.

Dr. Judy Lovas:

Yeah, I know that I can feel quite warm after sitting quietly and practicing taking slow breaths. So the benefits are enormous. And you said 20 to 30 days. I say usually you can start to feel a difference after two weeks, but of course there’s that individuality as well. But also, when I teach a course over three weeks, four weeks or longer, people will invariably say, oh, the second practice was easier than the first and the fourth practice was easier than the second. Or I got into a relaxed state so much quicker and I was able to stay concentrated in that relaxed state. So it’s simply a practical skill. It’s like riding a bike, putting in a catheter, whatever your skill is, if you practice it regularly, it becomes easier.

Dr. Lorne Brown:

That’s right. It’s like saying, the longer you do it, the easier it becomes and the easier it becomes, the longer you’ll do it.

Dr. Judy Lovas:

You do it. Oh, I like that one. Yeah.

Dr. Lorne Brown:

So practice. So I think what I’m hearing is the key or the benefit is not in the knowledge, the benefit is in the application of the knowledge. So it’s one thing to know that it’s beneficial, without the practice, you’re not going to get the benefit.

Dr. Judy Lovas:

Absolutely.

Dr. Lorne Brown:

Is there a difference between what you teach and train people in this relaxation therapy and just me sitting on the couch and relaxing? Is there a difference to that?

Dr. Judy Lovas:

Well, yeah, the answer to that is yes and no. So what’s the difference between relaxation and relaxation therapy? If you come home from a hard day’s work and you sit on the couch and you think, oh, I can’t wait, I’m going to read that great novel that I’m really enjoying. You sit on the couch and the novel is in your hands and you haven’t switched off and you are still ruminating and thinking over and over again about what happened at work today or what needs to be done for tomorrow, you are not relaxing. If you can concentrate on the book and stay focused on the story and whatever it is that you are reading or listening to music or playing an instrument or going for a walk, if you can apply yourself to that form of relaxation that you enjoy, you will relax.

So it’s all about the focus. And when you said PNI versus PNIE, and it’s the same as I actually have a list somewhere, psycho neuro, biological therapies, what’s in the name, whether you call it mindfulness meditation, diaphragmatic breathing, taichui, guided imagery, being in the here and now, being aware, all of them depend on focus.

Dr. Lorne Brown:

I was just going to wait for you because that’s what it sounds like you’re describing, that key sense of focus.

Dr. Judy Lovas:

So we know what it’s like, we’ve all done it. You pick up the novel to relax, but you are still thinking about work. And so you read over the same lines over and over and over again. So you’re not relaxing because you’re not focused and look at things like a mantra. The whole purpose of a mantra is to be focused on one thing, looking at a flame, prayer. They all rely on being effective. They all rely on singular focus where you eliminate the chit-chat, the distractions. If you’ve ever seen someone do the taichui sequence or routine, they’re focused on what they are doing. They’re not thinking about what I am going to cook for dinner tonight.

Dr. Lorne Brown:

And focus is a skill too that’s going to take practice and that’s what you’re practicing the breathing technique or the guided imagery. And I’ll let our listeners know, because we’re going to go into a relaxation therapy technique in a moment. But Judy has a website called the Art and Science of Relaxation, and that’s actually the website’s name, the artandscienceofrelaxation.com, where she offers courses on how to do this well for both public and practitioners. So I do encourage our listeners to check out her website and we’ll have that in the show notes. So focus, this is about, again, it’s about practice. We talked earlier about rehearsal. As you imagine it in your brain, as you imagine it, your body’s responding as if it’s happening. And you had shared that as people do it, it gets easier. I mean there’s always days, we all have the days where they’re not easier, but in general, you use the idea of riding a bike, you just start to become a habit and it becomes easier to do.

Dr. Judy Lovas:

And it becomes easier. And I think what’s really important to identify is that once you’ve practiced so that it is easier, you can then call upon these simple techniques when you need them the most. If you are confronted with a belligerent worker or boss or whatever, you can then comfortably take a couple of slow breaths and deal with this person calmly because you’ve already gained that proficiency and expertise in taking the slow breaths.

Dr. Lorne Brown:

And I have one more just the intellectual side of it before we get into the practice side of it. And we got to do the practice side because as we shared earlier, that’s the benefit. Knowing is not going to change anything, it’s the actual practice. But I was just wondering, I don’t know if we really touched on it in detail, but the evidence that supports this relaxation therapy for certain chronic conditions, what have you seen in the literature and what have you seen in your practice of these techniques that have responded well to it?

Dr. Judy Lovas:

In my practice, I’ve seen people respond well for… So I classify chronic conditions as pain, and there’s a whole host of different pains, pain, mood disorders, there’s a whole range of different anxieties and depression, sleep disorders, trauma and inflammatory conditions. So if you were to look at any chronic condition, I would imagine or I think I believe that they’d fall under one of those. Clinically, we know it works. It works immediately. I’ve had people who’ve never taken slow deep breaths and they’ve said, oh my goodness, I was not aware of my pain nearly as much in that short session then. And then over time, it works. The literature is increasing except… I mean there was something like 40 years of research that looked at different stressors and how they affected our immunity and our health and wellbeing. So whether it was in a virus or bacteria, grief, so psychological or physical stressors decreased our immunity.

And once we understood without a shadow of doubt that stress is immunosuppressant the research, then there was a logical progression towards, okay, we know stress de depresses depletes our immunity, what then does relaxation do? And the evidence is strong, it can decrease pain, it can improve sleep disorders, it can and does decrease anxiety, it can alleviate depression. So I would never say it cures or eliminates, but it gives people… In psychological terms, we know that having control is good for our mental health. I don’t know about Vancouver, but Sydney traffic can be horrendous. And when you’re stuck in Sydney traffic and you can’t move left, right, front or back, you have no control. And it’s incredibly frustrating. Now, that’s a tiny example. If there’s an aspect of your life over which you have very little control, it’s not good for us. And we are offering our patients and clients control by teaching simple skills like diaphragmatic breathing and guided imagery. So that’s another way that it’s beneficial.

Dr. Lorne Brown:

And I will add from previous episodes, many of the guests and experts have shared that it’s not necessarily the stressor, it’s your perception of the stress. That’s really what’s causing us to call it cheese stagnation in Chinese medicine, or resistance or whatever you want to call it. In the conscious world, my understanding is when you have resistance or cheese stagnation, you don’t have the flow and receptivity. And it makes so much sense from a Chinese medicine perspective because they say when you have cheese stagnation, cheese does not flow freely and disease grows or develops. And when you have free flow, then there’s no pain and health. And they talk a lot about how it’s our emotions out of balance or intense that affect our body. So this has been understood from the Chinese medicine perspective for eons. And now we have modern science validating this because that’s what we like to do.

We want to understand it from a scientific perspective. And so it is wonderful that we’re learning this. And as you shared, here’s another tool. There’s the breathing, we’re about to do guided imagery, which can take you out of that resistance chief stagnation state and bring you back into a state of calmness. Another expert that I had interviewed, a physician, a medical doctor had shared, we were talking about different tools and basically, I think Judy, you’ll resonate with this. He said if whatever that intervention does engages the parasympathetic nervous system, it’s a good thing. Because if you can engage the parasympathetic, then the body, now I’m adding to it, you’re freeing up resources for healing, right?

Dr. Judy Lovas:

Absolutely.

Dr. Lorne Brown:

That’s the key here.

Dr. Judy Lovas:

You started talking about perception. Our perception is individual. So I love public speaking, the majority of people. And in fact, many, many years ago there was a study done where people fear public speaking more than death, which I find incredible but true. So I like public speaking, other people would have an immediate sympathetic response to the idea of public speaking. It’s all about perception. So, yes, again, gaining some proficiency in simple relaxation skills can actually alter maybe over time and perhaps slightly alter our perception of things.

Dr. Lorne Brown:

Yeah. I like that. So you change, so now how you perceive the world changes.

Dr. Judy Lovas:

Yes, yes.

Dr. Lorne Brown:

So we’re about to go into a guiding imagery tech tool session with you. And I’m just going to summarize this part of, for our listener’s perspective, whether you’re trying to grow your family, wanting to grow your family, or just wanting better health, or you just want to feel better, who doesn’t want to feel better? This is the benefit because PNI, your thoughts, your feelings have an effect on your hormonal system and on your immune system. And if you really think about it from a fertility perspective, we need the immune system to be healthy and imbalance. We need balanced hormones to optimize our fertility. So theoretically it makes sense how this could benefit us. When we’re perceiving stress, blood gets averted from reproduction, digestion, and when we’re feeling safe in this relaxed state, then the blood can go back to our digestion and reproduction. So it sounds like it’s in the right direction. So I think it’s perfect for our listeners or anybody-

Dr. Judy Lovas:

Anybody.

Dr. Lorne Brown:

Hearing this tool. So please lead us in this guided imagery. We’re all here.

Dr. Judy Lovas:

Wonderful. Thanks, Lorne. It’ll be a brief session, but it gives you an example of the experience of relaxation. So to begin with, turn your phones off, close your doors, make sure that nobody’s going to interrupt as much as possible. If you are seated, then bring your buttocks back in the chair so that your spine is as straight as possible, feet planted on the floor or footrest. And if you are lying down on your back, again, positioning your spine as straight as you comfortably can, and maybe a support under your knees that is good for your lower back and softens the abdominal musculature. And then we asked you to think of a place that is relaxing, that you really enjoy being there, and certainly that is safe and it can be real or imaginary. So my imaginary relaxed place is on a fluffy white cumulus cloud.

And once you’ve got that place in mind, then if you’re comfortable, certainly close your eyes. And let’s begin by simply bringing your awareness of as I mentioned before, your focus to yourself and to you. And it’s not very often that people encourage you to take time out for yourself. So a few seconds simply to bring yourself back to you, say hello. And maybe from a bird’s eye perspective, be aware of your position. Now you are seated. And allow yourself to focus on what I’m saying, perfectly normal for other thoughts to come into our mind. Allow them to drift away, come back to you. And when you are ready in your own time, begin to think of your favorite place.

And always as other thoughts come to mind, allow them to slip away and come back through this wonderful place that enables you to feel calm, happy. In your own time, bring your awareness to the sites around you. What do you see here in this wonderful place? All awareness of what you see. Focus on the colors. Be aware of the shapes, images. Look at what is here that makes it your favorite, calm, happy place. Be aware of the colors all around you, look around. What makes this place so very special? Calm. Look at the sites around you. And if thoughts come to mind, bring yourself back. Look at the colors, the hues, shadows, contours. What do you see in your favorite calm place? Look around, observe, notice the visual detail front.

Ah, notice the colors, shapes, shadows, what you’ve seen, look around and observe the sights that surround you. In your own time, your own pace, begin to notice the sound that surrounds you in your favorite place. Listen, do you hear when you are healing to the sound that surrounds you that makes this your favorite place. Notice the sounds around you. Notice the sounds of your favorite place. Hear your favorite sounds. Silence. Sensation of your favorite space, what do you feel? Temperature, it’s below your feet and imagine how you feel in your favorite place. In your right pace. Wrap yourself in this sense of relaxation and wrapped in this sense and then bring yourself to this room with your eyes closed, enveloped in the same sense of calm, be aware of yourself in your chair.

Wiggle your toes when you are ready, wiggle your fingers. With your eyes closed, be aware of yourself in your room. And when you are ready, gently rub your hands together. Generate some warmth in your hands and place them over your eyes, and take your time to open your eyes. It’s no rush. Slowly, slowly coming back to the real world. And if you can have a drink of water, slowly taking your time and from where to go, I think that was about nine minutes.

Dr. Lorne Brown:

And what a nice mind massage. That’s what that’s like.

Dr. Judy Lovas:

Ah, that’s nice. I’m going to use that. That’s it. Well, I’d say a mind, body, massage.

Dr. Lorne Brown:

Sure.

Dr. Judy Lovas:

It doesn’t take long, it’s a few minutes. I think for the listeners, and this is the technical term, a gazillion different apps that they can choose from, right? Many of them are free. I know that while many people like what I do, I may not resonate with everyone, well, I wouldn’t resonate with every single person. So I think it’s really important to find a guided imagery app that suits you and run with it.

Dr. Lorne Brown:

Agreed. How as we’re wrapping up here, because we’re going to let people know how to learn more about you and find you, I’m curious, or what do you offer for the person that would say, I can’t imagine, I don’t have a good imagination or I can’t find a happy place. Do you get that? And what’s your offer for them?

Dr. Judy Lovas:

Absolutely. I mean, not everybody can see in their mind’s eye. So I would go back to diaphragmatic breathing first and foremost. And then there are other techniques, progressive muscle relaxation. But to me, and I’ve actually had interesting debates with other practitioners, guided imagery is the foundation. So it’s step one, and I build everything from there. So if somebody doesn’t have much of an imagination or a mind’s eye, let’s go back to guided diaphragmatic breathing.

Dr. Lorne Brown:

So Judy, how do people find you? Whether LinkedIn or Instagram, Facebook and your website. Again, if you could share that, and we’ll put some of these into the show notes as well.

Dr. Judy Lovas:

Thank you. So my website is artandscienceofrelaxation.com. And yes, on the courses, some of the courses are listed in the professional development tab. I am on LinkedIn, Judy Lovas, Dr. Judy Lovas. I’m not up to speed with any other social media at the moment. I find that’s good enough. I like the professional aspect of LinkedIn, but Instagram, I will get to one of these days.

Dr. Lorne Brown:

Your website is a great resource. So I encourage our listeners to check that out. And we’ll put the other stuff into the show notes as well. And Judy, thank you for guiding us through relaxation techniques. Thank you for doing that. And talking a little bit about the PNI and how it can benefit our physical and our mental wellbeing, it’s something that I think most people are wanting. They want to feel happy, they want to feel better, they want to feel calm. And so it’s nice to know that these tools are easily accessible. So thank you very much.

Dr. Judy Lovas:

Absolute pleasure. Thanks very much, Lorne.