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In this episode I am joined by Elaine Hicks, a licensed clinical social worker who's pioneering a unique approach to healing by combining freediving with nervous system therapy.
If you're dealing with chronic pain or autoimmunity, you'll discover practical techniques you can use immediately – no water required! Elaine breaks down polyvagal theory into simple zones that help explain why your body reacts the way it does, and shares specific breath work, ice pack applications, and body awareness practices that can shift your nervous system state within minutes.
Learn why traditional relaxation advice often fails and how finding your body's "safety zones" can be transformative for healing. Plus, find out why blowing bubbles might be your first step toward better health!
For the complete show notes and links visit inspiredliving.show/182
For the complete show notes and links visit inspiredliving.show/182
Creators and Guests
What is Inspired Living with Autoimmunity?
The podcast for high achievers who want to stay sharp, focused and full of energy despite their diagnoses. Those who know there has got to be something better than simply accepting decline.
Hosted by Julie Howton, a National Board Certified Functional Medicine Health Coach who used to suffer from crippling Rheumatoid Arthritis until she learned the tools and strategies to take her power back from autoimmunity.
In this podcast, Julie brings you interviews with thought leaders in the Functional Health and Wellness space. You will get actionable recommendations to Take Your Power Back and catapult your health. No fluff, just concrete, useful steps to improve your health!
We start with how to self-regulate.
We get ice packs.
It's a big part of free diving and
releasing the body has to do with
that MDR the A million GY spots.
So if we add the cold water with the
ice packs on the back of the neck
and on the chest thoracic spine or on
the face, there seems to be effective
enough for this process to start.
Then we learn breath work.
Which is a 5 second inhale, a 2
second pause, and a 10 second exhale.
Exhale is double the inhale, you're
activating your rest and digest.
Now you've got that cold
water feeling on your back.
Your heart rate in two
minutes is going to drop down.
What can that do for pain management?
A lot.
If you are tense, you're not
breathing, And your heart rate's
activated or elevated because you're
scared, you're nervous, here comes a
migraine, I've lost the rest of my day.
If you implement this, even this
kind of practice, it might steer
you off onto a different course.
Welcome back to the inspired
living with autoimmunity podcast.
I'm your host, Julie Michelson.
And today we're joined by Elaine
Hicks, the underwater therapist.
Elaine is a licensed clinical social
worker, certified substance abuse
counselor, and free diving instructor.
She specializes in blending trauma
informed therapy with the transformative
health benefits of free diving, creating
a unique approach to wellness that doesn't
even require stepping into the water.
Elaine is the creator of the HICS Dive
Method, an integrative system that
focuses on self regulation, nervous
system health, and mental resilience.
Through her trauma informed free
diving course and private practice,
Elaine empowers individuals to tap into
their eighth superpower, Interoception
to unlock healing, manage stress,
and connect with their inner calm.
In today's conversation, we discuss
polyvagal theory and how Elaine uses her
experience as a free diving instructor to
empower women to connect with their bodies
and become responsive instead of reactive.
In addition to supporting
healing, these techniques can
greatly improve quality of life.
Elaine, welcome to the podcast.
It's
so good to be here.
I have already, I was like,
okay, we have to hit record.
I have, I'm so excited for
listeners to get to know you.
Um, and I would love for you to share,
because I find what you're doing
to be really unique and pioneering.
Um, how did you get to be
the underwater therapist?
And then we'll get into some of the
goodies that I think are invaluable for
the autoimmune community to learn about.
Thank you.
Um, super stoked to be here.
When I saw your, your podcast, as I was
telling you before, I have so many I
want to listen to and, um, I feel, I feel
pretty lucky to be able to share some of
my stuff with your, with your audience.
So the underwater therapist has
been many years in the making.
Um, my quote unquote day job is I'm a
licensed clinical social worker, which
means I do therapy program evaluation.
Data stuff, tracking outcomes,
kind of the equivalent of a
psychologist, plus a little bit more.
No offense to any psychologists out
there, but we do just as much work.
Plus, um, so in my work as a
social worker and substance use
counseling, I got introduced to free
diving right before COVID happened.
So I was like an extreme aggressive
smorkeler, which is like.
Pretty unsafe.
You're diving down to like maybe 10 feet.
You're trying to get your ears to
pop, but it was just so amazing and
incredible to, to be in, in the waters
of Hawaii are some of the best shore
diving opportunities you could ever.
Um, and during COVID, everything
was shut down here it was
especially challenging because the
only thing we could do is fish.
Go swimming or go diving.
We couldn't, of course,
be with our friends.
And so we went out to a special
beach where we had heard rumors that
there would be big animals like fins.
And so I'm out there freaking out because
we're like 200 meters offshore, maybe 300.
We're in the middle of the ocean.
There's no one around us.
And this pot of like 50 dolphins comes.
at us at 100 miles an hour.
And I was terrified.
And then these spearfishers come rolling
by and they're diving down to 40 feet.
And I was like, that has to be me.
I want to do this.
So I took a free diving course as soon
as everything opened in this class.
It's taught me so much about my
strength and my power and how you
can use it differently in the water.
It's not brute force.
You're never going to win
if you're fighting the water
ever, you have to flow into it.
And I saw all at the same time,
the intersection between mental
health, trauma, healing, what
my body was doing in response to
this challenge that I picked and
And how I just, I just thought
to be something very life
changing in controlled settings.
Now, I had no idea how that was
going to unfold, but as a researcher,
uh, as someone who values data
evaluation and checking and making
sure things are evidence based,
I was like, I gotta do this.
So I signed up maybe a month later for an
instructor course that was that December.
Wow.
I took my class in April.
December, I was in Mexico and
Playa del Carmen taking a three
week freediving instructor course.
I was not the typical student you
would see on a course like this.
So, very challenging.
So, from there I started.
Talking about trauma informed freediving
and mental health benefits of freediving.
And then it all, the more I've researched
it and kind of brought things together,
and then putting on polyvagal theory,
just a way of understanding our nervous
system in a different way, it just opened
up so many, like, portals of understanding
is probably the best way I can.
And when I drilled into that,
It came down to like, how aware
are we of our nervous system?
How aware of like our breath rate, our
blink rate, our swallow rate, things
that are easy to get in touch with
that don't throw people into their
body so rapidly that they shut down.
And that can happen when we're sick, when
we've had COVID, we have auto immune,
we have all kinds of things going on.
We want to disconnect from the body.
So by overlaying this polyvagal kind
of theory onto the free dive body.
And the trauma, the traumatized body, the
body and survival, the body and chronic
shutdown or chronic hypervigilance.
So many, it just brought up so many
different avenues of healing for people.
I love that.
And, and, you know, almost everybody
I have interviewed on the podcast,
on the podcast, it gets to their
zone of genius through, you know,
their personal experience, right.
And then we want to take that
and share it, help others.
Um, I want to circle back.
Just give a little foundation for
listeners that we have done episodes
on, um, the vagus nerve and polyvagal
theory, but I want to hear your
perspective and, and share with listeners.
I think that's a great starting point.
And then I want to, you know, kind of
bring in that, that the free diving
body, as you mentioned, and, and.
Relating to, you know, obviously not
all listeners are free divers and
I'll let everybody know right now.
You do not need to free dive to take
advantage of Elaine's wisdom and genius.
So, but let's start with the basics
of polyvagal theory as as you see it.
Um, the way I understand polyvagal and
use it with even the clients I work
with in my private practice is that,
um, it, it breaks down the nervous
system into three kind of zones.
And then you have portals of entry
into the zone so your nervous systems
like this universe inside of you.
And you have portals
to enter this universe.
And so, the three zones, if we
start from the top down, we have
Ventral, which is like you're safe,
getting connected, finding resources.
When I teach about this to substance
use counselors, I call this the Panda
Zone, because it's playful, when
you're safe and engaged, you can, you
can talk to people, you can pay your
bills, you can find your keys, right?
It's like practical stuff.
And so, within that zone, There's
particular mechanisms through your
cranial nerves, your eyes, your ears,
your nose, your mouth, your throat,
how we connect and relate to people.
So it becomes like these zones become
very relatable on a day to day basis.
And then you have your sympathetic,
or I call it the lion's zone because
you can be mobilized for play.
For teamwork, competition, you can be
mobilized for protection, which can look
like fight or flight, or, you know, it
could be wonder, curiosity, and joy.
It doesn't have to be
just anger and disruption.
And that's kind of how
I recategorize that.
Yeah, you're mobilized and you're excited.
Yeah, you're scared and you should be
scared because you're doing something big
and that's going to grow you know, and
then the last would be like mid diaphragm
and down like the dorsal or the dolphins.
This is where we can.
Have a quiet rest and we can
withdraw from all of our day to
day kind of things and have quiet
activities, restorative activities,
or we can withdraw and shut down.
And then, of course, all of these
zones, hang out with each other, and
they make these blended states that
are beautiful, you know, so I think
understanding how each of these,
what the basic function of each one
is and how they're blended together.
Thank you for your time.
Really helps people understand
what's going on with their
bodies in different ways.
And then maybe they can change
their physiology, like I mentioned,
breath rate, blink rate, heart rate.
Things you can change right away
through that eighth superpower,
which is how I learned about.
And it's another key part of
Polyvagal is Deterreception.
And then this concept of neuroception,
which explains all these automatic
reactions or responses we have to things
because your nervous system's 24 seven
listening to keep you safe, which is good,
but also can be very annoying, right?
Because so you learn how to
listen and work with it and
create this like partnership.
You could spend your life
reacting instead of respond.
Yes.
And that's really at the heart of
the whole point is that learning
to be in a responsive state
instead of a reactive state.
And as we were chatting before
we hit record, you know,
anytime we're dealing with.
Chronic challenges, but especially
chronic health challenges, chronic pain.
Um, you know, I have so many
people have come to me and been
like, Oh, I'm not stressed.
I'm not.
And I'm like, B. S. You are so out of
touch with what is going on in your body.
And I, I, in a non scientific way
and through just my journey and
experience, think, you know, it is
almost a survival tactic to disconnect.
Um, it doesn't serve us long term, but we
create this pattern of being disconnected
from breath, being disconnected from
feeling, being, you know, not even that,
like you mentioned awareness, not aware.
Of what state we're actually in and for
me, the reason I love, um, just sharing
this understanding of it's chicken or egg.
Right?
Like you can change stress
state with breath with, you
know, and feed each other.
Right?
So you can relax.
Or sometimes you, you know, if you
can't relax, you can do the things to,
to physiologically make that happen.
And, and, um, as somebody who has a
more recent love of being underwater,
I think I certified scuba diving four
years ago, um, thinking I was doing it.
But for my fiance, he's the kind
of guy who I just know, you know,
would never, even if I said, I'm
happy with a book on the beach, you
go scuba diving, he would never go.
So I thought, Oh, I'll
surprise him and I'll certify.
I. Love it more than he does, I think.
Um, and yeah, you're giving
me some clues as to why.
Oh, yes, yes.
It's, and it's this unification
of your, these two zones of your
nervous system, the dolphin and the
panda come together, um, to keep it
easy, like your ventral and dorsal.
They, they form this amazing, the
most powerful autonomic reflex we
have in our entire nervous system.
Then the mammalian diet
response or reflex.
It's so powerful.
It puts you in such so quickly into
your parasympathetic nervous system,
which we call rest and digest.
Yes.
And heal, right?
Like that.
It heals.
It heals.
Yeah.
Long term vagus nerve restoration.
You're choosing to put yourself
in a self regulated state,
which leads to relaxation.
And you mentioned relaxation.
And I think oftentimes if we're dealing
with like long COVID health problems,
Relaxation feels like a far away goal.
And yeah, and I've been talking
about this a lot the last few months.
Um, is, is the goal really
to relax and be passive?
No.
Or do you want to be self regulated
and function despite like Yes.
All these things are happening,
but I want to function and self
regulation really gets us back into our
prefrontal cortex where we can problem
solve, find my keys, make coffee.
Everybody's got their lunch.
I didn't leave any kids
outside on the front step.
Like I have done all my things.
And I can actually behaviorally
respond appropriately as well.
Yeah.
Which is, is different than pushing.
Yes, in survival mode, right?
And so you can heal and function and I'm
so glad you clarified because when I say
relax, I'm thinking physiologically, not
sitting around on the couch, not, you
know, I mean, whatever, do your bliss.
Um, but for most of my clients who
are perfectionist overachievers, their
bliss is not, you know, zoning out.
Um, and, and, you know, it takes
a little time for buy in of this
actually makes you perform better.
This makes you not leave any kids behind
or do any, any of the things we all don't
want to have happen by the end of the day.
Right.
Um, so.
I'm a visual person, so I love the
fact that you, I think you are as
well, just from how you describe it.
You know, your theories, your process.
Um, so we have this basic
understanding of polyvagal theory.
And the importance, um, now pull in
the, the free diving body for me,
because I know this actually just
informs your whole unique approach.
Yeah, so I was mentioning that the typical
free diver I work with is about 40.
She's usually a pair of enterprise
in retrospect, um, she doesn't
have an average Instagram body.
This is a normal woman, right?
Right.
A real woman.
A what?
A real woman.
A real woman.
Someone who, you know, maybe she's
20 pounds over, like she's, but she's
strong and she's capable and she's had
challenges getting into free diving
classes because she doesn't look the part.
And I hate to, you know, like we, I
love my sport, but there's a lot of,
of that in her, in her, in her life.
And
actually humor me for a second, because
we jumped into this conversation.
I'm assuming people know
what free diving is.
So can
we
go back for a second?
So, okay.
So you have snorkeling where you wear your
mask and your shorty cute little shorty
fins and you have a snorkel in your mouth.
Um, your mask is usually one of those big
gnarly ones that cover like most of your
face and your mouth spread, you know,
open for you to struggle free diving.
We used a low volume mask.
These are two, there's no tanks.
You use long fins and
usually a weight belt.
And so we dive deeper on a breath
hold with full lungs beyond 10 feet.
So here your average typical dive is going
to be 33 feet at the max for most people.
I mean, there's some recreational
freedivers who like to go deeper, but
at one of our favorite spots here,
Electric Beach, the max is going to
be 15, 20 feet, really, maybe 30.
And that's where all the cool stuff is.
So, freediving lets you interact
with nature on a different level.
Snorkeling is very surface,
so freediving is going down.
And then there's several
disciplines within freediving.
So we have recreational and then there's
competition, but we even have training.
You can do different kinds
of training in the pool.
There's pool free diving.
Um, there's competitions for the pool.
There's competitions in the water.
You guys have all heard of maybe
Alexey Molchanov or at least seen like
things in the, in the news about this.
There's a documentary on Netflix,
which only shows competition
side, but it's kind of worse.
But there's this whole other beautiful
recreational world of your average people
just going out there and killing it.
Not killing it.
That's a better way to say it.
They're out there, like, just diving their
hearts out and having such a great time.
Yeah.
Thank you for that.
I just, um, and I do think just from
the things I've read and what I've
seen that most of us, if we have some,
images in our mind of freediving.
It is more of that kind
of competition level.
I'm going to say kind of
crazy, like really pushing the
limits really, really intense.
Um, and so thank you for, for sharing,
but you know, there's a whole range
and you're, you're talking about
the, what I would call sensible.
Enjoyable recreational scuba diving.
Practical.
Yeah.
Well, you know, and it's
the same with scuba diving.
The beautiful, like really most of
what you want to see is not that deep.
You know, I mean, the deeper you go, the
darker it is, you know, with different
exceptions of what kind of diving you do,
but, um, so I love that you, you clarify
like, Hey, there's like this sweet spot.
And, and in the classes I teach,
you have to do your skills.
There's a series of skills you
have to do, but it's all at 10
meters or 33 feet in freedom units.
So, um, everything is
free diving is in meters.
So 10 meters is where your skills
are blackout rescue mask removal.
You have to learn how to rescue yourself.
Yeah.
Which is, is, you know, not
accidental in how you are using
this work, even out of the water.
Yes.
Absolutely.
So what we, we, the way polyvagal really
works is if you look at neuroception,
that unconscious listening of the
nervous system to keep you safe,
remember this is running 24 seven.
And then you have interoception,
which is your ability.
To sense and then regulate your,
your, your internal body states, like
changing your heart rate, changing your
breath rate, changing your blink rate.
And then from there, you can
go, Oh, are my shoulders really
tense and up high by my ears?
You know, are my butt cheeks clenched?
And for those people who that
you work with that role in
their life, I'm not stressed.
I asked my clients the same thing, but
I go, wait a minute, how are you holding
the steering wheel while you were driving?
Sure.
Do you have claw marks right
here from clenching the wheel?
Tell me about what's
going on with your jaw.
What about the frowns and the forehead?
So like we carry tension
all throughout the body.
And when we're in class, there's a part
that we do, it's a static breath hold in
shallow water, which means you're laying
on your belly, you've got your mask on,
your snorkel, you're holding a float.
I'm right there.
It's like three feet of water, right?
And you, you hold your breath and
you do this interoceptive body scan
where you find all the tension.
And I even, I'm looking in a, with
permission, I'm just tapping on
the different parts that I see.
And then you see people releasing
and releasing and releasing all of
these tension points and they're
just floating so effortlessly.
And then they do their, there's a breathe
up process, and then I tell them when
it's time to hold their breath, they take
their snorkel out, I start the timer.
Most people are doing a minute and a
half to two minutes with no previous
kind of breath holding experience.
And it's so empowering, especially
for these women, because they're
like, of course I can do this.
And then all of the ladies that are
the people I've been able to train over
the last couple years, they're the like
strongest freedivers in our community.
They're safe as well.
It's very strong because they're The
whole session is building on foundational
skills, but at the same time, what are you
learning about yourself, your capability,
you know, you can swim to 10 meters
and most of them have gone on to 20.
Yeah, no problems.
Wow.
And just give us a little bit of a Guess
of a reference point of a tense person who
hasn't done the body scanning and they're
really, you know, the, the difference
of when somebody filled with tension
tries to hold their breath, like how
long do you know, I guess, on average,
maybe 30 seconds, because When you're
tense and shriveled up, think about this
right now with, when you've had pain, um,
and how are you shrinking and compressing
your, your thoracic, your, your, your
stomach and your, your sides and your
shoulders, when you're compressing and
holding yourself in really tight, because
maybe you're bracing yourself for bad news
from the doctor or something, perhaps,
you know, you can't expand your lungs.
And then oftentimes, Um, People
who are that tense are not
breathing into their diaphragm.
They're shallow breathing
up in their chest.
So maybe they're even hyperventilating.
We're not breathing properly and so
much can be solved by getting into
the correct breathing patterns.
Which feels weird.
It feels really like It is
not threatening for people.
Physiologically, you would think, Oh,
but immediately it should be relaxing.
It is not.
It's foreign.
I
literally was just talking to one of the
employees at the clinic, a new employee
at the clinic yesterday about breath and
breathing and I gave her the example of
a particular client I had worked with
probably four years ago, maybe five.
Um, who.
Was so Just lived in stress zone
probably forever But for a really
really really long time that when
she started to do her breath work.
She would have panic reactions
like the second or she would get
any little bit of That relaxation
release that change she would get a
stress response And she was awesome.
I was like, give me a week.
Just let's just keep, you
know, you keep playing with it.
And sure enough, you know, it flipped
and she never looked back, but it was,
it was such a foreign feeling to her.
Um, so I love that you highlighted
that because it is, it can be real.
And I think you use the example
of like bracing for bad news.
And so many with chronic pain,
chronic illness are just.
Braced period, they're braced for the
pain that's going to happen when they,
you know, move a limb or whatever, um,
and, or, you know, braced because they're
expecting not to have the energy to get
through the, all the things, so this isn't
just an acute situation kind of thing.
This is really for, for
that day to day, um.
Which is, which is amazing.
So how, how, because as much as I
wanted to talk to you, if we were
only going to talk about people who
could come to Hawaii and learn to
free dive with you, this wasn't going
to be very helpful for listeners.
How do you take, you know, this, this
beautiful melding of these worlds and
How do you help people on dry land?
I'm glad you asked that, because
that's my favorite thing to do.
So, I help people map
out their nervous system.
So, remember I talked about Polyvagal.
I've created some worksheets that ask
questions based on each of the zones.
We rate them on a scale of 1 to 5.
We find those, kind of, anything that's
like, at the higher end or lower end of
the spectrum, Then I'm, I know those are
places we need to start looking at, you
know, and it's, these are like emotional
questions, physiological questions.
I also use a tool from Polyvagal
folks, it's called the Neuroception
of Psychological Safety, and
it hones in on the physiology.
So we can, this mapping process takes out
a lot of the stigmatizing kind of things.
This is like things we all experience.
So I really, I love how it's
very neutralizing in that.
So then we map the system, we find
those hot spots or cold spots, and
then we bring awareness to those areas.
We just recognize them as
slowly as we need to go.
But once you learn how to bring
in awareness, we can start
doing it with the right person.
You know, the support, you
need the support to do this.
I believe it's important.
Um, like I said before, I'm not
going to throw someone into their
entire body so they feel pain.
Right.
We want to find those pockets of
safety and strength in the body.
So my client, she's like,
I have the best quads.
They're so strong.
And I was like, okay,
well, there's your safety.
Like, that's amazing.
You can stabilize yourself and you
can go there and find reassurance.
Okay.
If you're strong there.
Okay.
Surely you're strong somewhere else.
So then we start with how do,
how, how to self-regulate.
We get ice packs.
It's a big part of free diving and
releasing the body has to do with
that MDR the A million GY spots.
So if we add the cold water, quote
unquote, with the ice packs on the
back of the neck and on the, on the
chest thoracic spine or on the face.
I caution people to do it on the
face because it's pretty intense,
you want to build up to it.
So thoracic spine, so mid back, the
ice pack there seems to be effective
enough for this process to start.
Then we learn breath work.
We learn how, and it's based on an
individual of course, but I do a 5 10
breathing, which is a 5 second inhale, a
2 second pause, and a 10 second exhale.
Exhale is double the inhale
because on the exhale, you're
activating your rest and digest.
Now you've got that cold
water feeling on your back.
Your heart rate in two
minutes is going to drop down.
And every time I've tested this,
I worked out at 120 heartbeats.
Did the necessary two minute cool
up, lay down on the ice pack, did
my breath work, and it dropped back
down into the 60s within two minutes.
What can that do for pain management?
A lot.
If you are tense, you're not breathing,
And your heart rate's activated or
elevated because you're scared, you're
nervous, oh my god, here comes a migraine,
great, I've lost the rest of my day.
If you implement this, even this
kind of practice, as soon as you can,
especially if you're at home and you
sense the thing coming, whatever your
thing happens to be, and you do this
practice, who knows, it might steer
you off onto a different course.
And even if it reduces.
The time lost by two hours.
That's huge.
Right?
Right.
Or your pain scale goes
down from an eight to a six.
That's still a lot of reduction.
So we do breath work, the ice packs,
and we're bringing in that awareness
and we're finding the tension
points and we're releasing them.
I love it.
And, and the breath is so
powerful when we learn how to use
it properly and intentionally.
Um, I, I just recently was, was talking
to a client who does, he, he does a
lot of fun biohacking kind of stuff.
Um, but I pointed out that
he was kind of missing.
Like really, really big piece,
um, he would cold plunge and then,
you know, not warm himself up.
He would cold plunge and wrap into, you
know, and I was like, the whole point
is the regulation, you know, and he had
part of it down, but I, the power in
using your breath to warm yourself back
up, like, is you're missing the gold
if you're, you know, just, you know,
torturing yourself in cold water and he
was actually breathing through that part.
Um, but he had never really learned like
the whole method of, and I'm not telling
people run out and, you know, take, take a
little bit of a lane and a little of that.
I'm just saying,
right, right.
You can, I mean, when I did
my Wim Hof training, I did it
in winter outside in Colorado.
And I was like, Oh, this was dumb.
It was great.
It was great.
Um, and it, and it really, it's
that believing, you know, it's,
it's that same moment, right?
That your women who, once they find
their, their attention and release it,
can all of a sudden stay underwater, you
know, and never knew they could do that.
And then it's like,
Ooh, what else can I do?
Right?
Then you, it's like, just.
This beautiful, beautiful spiral.
Um, and, and so I love, I just want
to highlight things that I think are
really, I mean, everything you said
was important, but, um, finding that
zone of safety is important, right?
You're not re traumatizing people.
You're not, you know, there,
there is a way to heal that
doesn't have to be painful.
Um, and I wanted to ask, cause
I had, I had the like thought.
As you were talking about it, you
mentioned when, when you were talking
about, um, hot spots and cold spots.
And I think most people can, and
I shouldn't, I shouldn't assume,
but you know, I think most of us
think we know what a hot spot is.
What would you say a cold spot is?
Anywhere you're really disconnected from.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Uh, and, and I think that's real
personalized, but I would say.
If you're someone who's had to spend
a lot of time resting, laying down,
I'm thinking your, your glutes, your
hamstrings, your legs, your feet,
what's going on with them guys?
Yeah.
You know, is, is there something that
you could do, whether it's ankle rolls,
bringing your feet up and flexing them?
Can you squeeze?
And I teach this in all my
classes, squeeze and release the
glutes, squeeze and release them.
Bring awareness and like, awaken them.
Yeah.
If it doesn't cause you pain, right?
And this is all based on, this is why it's
so personalized, but I wanted to circle
back to the breathing and say, we never,
ever, never use Wim Hof in the water.
We never do hyperventilation in the water.
Every freediving agency has a standard
protocol for the relaxation or
breathe phase, which is two minutes.
So, we're not just willy nilly
doing all these weird breathing
things and holding our breath.
It's two minutes of tidal
breathing and a big final breath
and then holding your breath.
But I just wanted to make sure
that if someone decides to try.
And I'm glad you
said that because I think people have
a misconception of Wim Hof breathing
and Wim Hof method and being trained
in the Wim Hof method, you don't do
that breathing in the water either.
So, you do it to prepare
and then you're good.
And then you use breath,
different breath to warm back up.
So I love that you, that you
highlighted that because honestly,
proper Wim Hof, you're not
hyperventilating in the water either.
So,
right.
But you know, we get excited
when we hear new podcasts and
we're trying to go try that.
It's going to help me with my pain.
And yes, free diving can help you with
pain management because of the MDR,
because you're in a relaxed state.
But not
just.
It's just like, you know,
equipment and jumping water.
This is not what we're talking about.
Yes.
Take
a class.
Take at least some intro or like a
try free diving or, uh, you know,
snorkeling classes or just go in the
pool and relax, but, um, and relaxing.
I mean like laying on your back,
just on your back and float if you can.
Uh, cause that takes all
the weight off your body.
Um, but yeah, I just wanted to.
But that
I thank you.
Yeah, absolutely.
And I mean, you know, I everything
I when I hear something and I'm
like, Oh, I want to try that.
I do what you recommended you find.
Um, and, and I think it's important to
have your expert that feels right to you.
And, and you don't do these things alone.
I am not advocating anybody.
Try any.
Never.
Never.
That is the number one rule of freediving.
It's more, never go alone.
Yeah, absolutely.
And, and.
So to circle back onto land,
because right now I'm looking out my
windows and we're covered in snow.
And I want to know if listeners are
in a similar, excuse me, locale,
you work with people on land.
I do.
I do.
Uh, and like I said, it goes
back to like bringing awareness
and mapping the nervous system.
I do some education,
like I explain the zones.
I explain the blended states and the,
you know, what each area is responsible
for and how they kind of work together.
And then from there, we learn
how to work with the vagus nerve.
We learn how to work with
these different zones.
We learn how to work with our cranial
nerves because those are key for not
only, and this is where the magic happens
for me, those cranial nerves are not
only responsible for our ability to
talk, communicate, find support, you
know, they're also responsible for every
single freediving function that we have.
Equalization.
I pointed to the ears, but also the point
to the throat because we use our throat
muscles to equalize our ears as well.
And you've been scuba diving, you've,
you've kind of had those sensations, you
know, and then if you have tension in
your trigeminal, if you have TMJ or if
you have migraines, tension in your jaw.
Is going to be a place that
we're going to go try to release.
So this mapping system really gets
pretty, it can get pretty the deep,
no pun intended into this, like,
really allergy, really, um, this
deep dive into your body in this.
The information you get back is so
layered and beautiful and you there's
always something you can work with.
So everything I do starts on land.
And then if someone wants to try
this out in the water, there's
different levels to this as well.
We can sit by the ocean and talk about it.
We can put our toes in.
We can float in two or
three feet of water.
I've had people floating who
said they would never float.
Ever.
Had them floating.
We can start there.
You know, and then.
We can build on that.
We can also help people with breath
holding because the other part of
activating the MDR is the breath hold.
Okay.
So when you bring the heart rate
down, we do the breath work and then
we hold our breath and that gives
you so much control and power within
your body because now you can sit and
deliberately experience distress, right?
And build up a tolerance to it.
And, um, there was a fascinating study
that came out about how people with
panic disorder, generalized anxiety
disorder, are improper breathers and
they're responding to their natural
fire alarm, the CO2, which tells you,
Hey, it's like, like breathe, please.
Something is wrong, which is
what we respond to underwater.
Our CO2, when you hold your breath,
your CO2 starts building up.
And in freediving, we learn
how to, it's still built up,
but we're not responding to it.
We're choosing not to respond.
We're finishing our, our dive.
We come back up with grace,
with calm, with presence.
We come to the surface, we do our
recovery breathing, which is very
important after a breath hold.
And then you can go, hold on,
I'm okay.
So each time you do that, you
add two seconds, three seconds,
four seconds, that's mastery.
That's mastery.
So yeah.
And for those that haven't already
connected those dots, you know,
that mastery helps you regulate
and respond instead of react like
that's what gives you that space.
Yes.
To, you know, just take that
half a beat and not be just,
you
know, really not in the driver's
seat of your day for sure.
Yeah.
And this is when we tell the
neuroception, okay, I've got it from here.
I know I'm safe.
I have my safety diver.
My friend is right there.
Literally, the surface is in four feet.
I'm fine.
I can hold my breath for another
few seconds and honestly, in an
emergency situation, human beings
can hold their breath for up to four
minutes without up to four minutes.
Like it's going to depend.
But, uh, without, without brain
damage, usually, and this is why
also you should never snorkel or
dive with your snorkel in your mouth.
Anytime you're going under the water,
unless you're scuba diving, you take
your, your contraption out of your
mouth because if you do hit your head
or blackout, you've got a funnel of
death bringing oxygen to your lungs.
If you blackout without that in your
mouth, we have all these natural
protective mechanisms that will kind of
shut everything down and protect you.
Um, so just remember that you can
hold your breath for 30 seconds.
You're not going to have brain damage.
Yeah.
No matter, no matter
what signals you're receiving,
you know, it's a practice.
It is a practice.
And then that's where the beauty of
how we can put this on pain management.
How can we put this on dealing with
these unfortunate long term circumstances
when we have like autoimmune conditions
sort of on COVID is if you can put off
the sensation for a couple of seconds
and you keep building upon that.
I just, it's so empowering.
You can opt in or opt out of the response.
Absolutely.
And that takes practice.
Yeah, it does take practice.
And again, find a guide, find a lane,
find whatever resonates with you.
Um, we're not made to, to journey alone.
And so, you know, for any of these,
it's, it's all retraining, right?
It took years for our nervous
system to get where it is.
And so finding a professional to help
you learn to shift it is, is really key.
Really,
really key.
Well, I love what you're doing.
I am so excited about it
because I can see for me.
You know, my kind of long history
and, and it, it just feels like
I'm always looking for shortcuts
back to that like biohacker brain.
Right.
And yes, I just said it's a practice.
It is a practice.
Um, but my whole purpose
in life is to empower.
People to take charge of
their wellness and improve it.
And, and that's what you're doing,
is you're, you're allowing people to
actually feel the power they have.
And that's what keeps us going, right?
That's where it's the, the
more and more and more.
Well, what else can I, what has my
body been telling me all these years
that I just wasn't, wasn't tapped into?
Um, so yeah.
And I, I do wanna throw
one more thing in there.
Yes.
That a lot of the times the people
I'm working with have positive
benefits in the first session, some
of this stuff works right away.
Yes, you need to practice breath work, but
here's what makes free diving so amazing
as a healing modality is you are playing
and when you're playing, you're in that
like neuro biochemical opposite of trauma.
So, and then in psychology, especially
positive psychology, if we are playing,
we are more likely to make a change.
If you're playing, you feel safe.
If you're safe, you can change
your nervous system state.
I love
it.
And for so many, play is something
that is not a big enough presence
in their life at whatever point, if
they're listening to this podcast.
So, um, I love that you, I
love that you brought that up.
It's that healing power of play
and joy while Learning to, to
change physiology is amazing.
Yes.
And you can go, because all of
these should be free cost effect.
Like I hate to make people spend money,
you know, especially in our economy.
If you can get a thing of bubbles and blow
bubbles, you can practice your breathing
five to 10, you do, or, you know, four to
eight, you're blowing through the bubbles,
making those bubbles with your exhale.
This is great for kids.
To teach them how to read.
I did it with a room full of social work
students at five o'clock in the afternoon.
And when we got back into class,
they all started falling asleep
because they were finally relaxed.
Relaxed.
Physiologically.
And I was like, well, I think
this backfired a little bit,
but it was a good lesson.
I'll do this at the
end of class next time.
I know.
But we wouldn't have had the
sunlight to reflect off the bubbles
because it was a multi kind of,
yeah,
then you can do photography and savor
and blah blah so I can have a good time.
We can incorporate play in tiny piece.
I love that.
I think you just answered the
question I was going to ask you.
But I'm going to ask anyway, in
case you want to throw a different
one out or just highlight what you
just said, which is what is one step
listeners can take starting today.
I think that's a beautiful one step.
It's one that nobody's
ever given us before.
Um, it makes me want to go
run out and get bubbles.
It's so much fun.
It really is.
You can't be angry and blow bubbles.
No.
Yeah.
So I would say that.
And then the other step is get
an ice pack, put it on your
back, lay on it for five minutes
and see, track your heart rate.
See what happens.
Track your tension.
See what happens.
Do you fall asleep?
If you fall asleep, then
there's your answer.
And I actually land an ice
pack every night before bed for
about 20 minutes on my mid back.
Because if you've had trauma and
you're in chronic pain, your body's
going to keep up this low state
of hypervigilance to protect you.
So what's the answer to that?
Rest and digest.
That's what the MDR is
going to do for you.
I love it.
It's beautiful.
So amazing.
Well, Elaine, I so appreciate your
time, your wisdom, your just creative
approach to helping people not only
heal and, but just that empowerment
that can lead to, can lead to
healing, but it can lead to dreams.
being achieved and created and
just all kinds of wonderful things.
So I'm really, really grateful for
people that are listening on the go and
not going to look at the show notes.
Where's the best place to find you
on Instagram?
I'm the underwater therapist.
The only one, the underwear
therapist, , or my website,
the underwear therapist.com.
Uh, and I am on Facebook as
well, but I think the most up
to date and fun practical stuff
is gonna be on on Instagram.
I shared videos and different
techniques and um, plus.
You also can get the benefit of free
diving without touching the water by
watching some videos and practicing
your breath work while watching them.
So amazing.
And more tips for healing on land.
Yes.
Great.
Yeah.
Yes.
And of course, if anybody wants to
come learn how to dive, I would love
to be your guide on that journey.
It's so much fun.
Fantastic.
Hawaii.
Here we come.
Elaine.
Thank you so very much.
Thank you too.
This has been really awesome
for everyone listening.
Remember you can get the transcripts and
show notes by visiting inspired living.
show.
I hope you had a great time and
enjoyed this episode as much as I did.
I'll see you next week.