#1 - Wandering around Vagus - February 2023

Evolutionary story + map of the vagus + order of flow from one state to another

Welcome to Day 1 of Wandering around Vagus, a paid monthly subscription series exploring the Vagus Nerve + Polyvagal Theory.

I’m Tina Foster of Foster & Flourish, the creator and guide of Wandering around Vagus. We begin today, Sunday, February 5, 2023.

We launch our year of monthly posts with the evolutionary story of the vagus nerve and how this evolution continues to shape our reality today.

By the end of this 10 minute audio you’ll have a better sense of:

• how the vagus nerve evolved over 100’s of millions of years from our reptilian beginnings to our current mammalian form.

• how this evolution is reflected in the nerve’s physical design and in our everyday movements from one state to another.

• the areas of your body where each state operates and how these areas are currently feeling.

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Evolution of the vagus nerve

(Need an intro to the vagus nerve? It’s here.)

The full vagus nerve developed later in our animal evolution. For this reason, mammals are the only animals that have a full vagus nerve.

500 million years ago, during our reptilian phase of evolution, our limited “eat and sleep” existence was maintained solely from what is now the dorsal system, which controls our “rest and digest” functions.

Then around 400 million years ago, the sympathetic system came into being as life required a more sophisticated system of activation and mobilization offering protection from new kinds of threat, and new ways to find food and seek shelter.

This sympathetic development sustained us for another 200 million years before the development of the ventral system in response to our need for more complex communication and ways of engaging with ourselves and one another.

Below (L) is a map of our current human autonomic nervous system and the organs it operates. On (R) is a map of the full vagus nerve from a 1543 print by Andreas Vesalius.

Comparing these maps, we get a more detailed idea of how comprehensively the vagus nerve functions within the body, including feelings, emotions and behaviors associated with each organ system.