Morning Routine for Nervous System Regulation: 6 Steps to Start Your Day Calm + Grounded

If you’re waking up already anxious, overstimulated, or exhausted, I promise - it’s not because you’re broken. It’s likely your nervous system is dysregulated. The way you start your morning is either helping or hurting your baseline anxiety levels.

As a yoga teacher and nervous system healing advocate, I’ve learned that how you start your day determines how your body and mind will respond to stress. Here’s my go-to morning routine for nervous system regulation. This routine supports calm, clarity, and regulation, even if you’ve had zero sleep or woke up anxious.

Now, lets get into our Morning Routine for Nervous System Regulation

☀️ 1. Don’t Reach for Your Phone

Checking your phone first thing spikes cortisol and floods your brain with stress. Give yourself at least 5 minutes of silence, journaling, prayer, or intentional breath before engaging with the world. Personally, I take about an hour of "no phone" time when I wake up. Emails, texts, work, and social media can wait.

🧘🏽‍♀️ 2. Legs-Up-the-Wall Pose (Viparita Karani)

This gentle inversion shifts you from fight-or-flight into rest-and-digest. Lay flat, put your legs up a wall or couch, and breathe deeply for 2–5 minutes. I always feel so relaxed and grounded after doing this. This pose is also great to do before bed.

Legs-up-the wall-pose, great for grounding and nervous system regulation

🫁 3. Nervous System Breathwork: 4-7-8 or Humming

Breathing activates the vagus nerve and slows down stress signals.Try inhaling for 4, holding for 7, exhaling for 8 - or humming gently on the exhale to calm your body even more. Do this for 2-5 minutes. Breathwork is something that I do often throughout the day to help me relax my nervous system.

✍🏽 4. Write down your intention for the day

Set an intention for the day. This allows you to decide what kind of energy you want to focus on throughout the day. I use an app called InsightTimer and I write my daily intentions on the app. I have a widget on the home-screen of my phone so I can see the intention throughout the day.

🏃🏽‍♀️ 5. Move Your Body (Gently)

Even 5–10 minutes of movement tells your nervous system you’re safe. Try cat-cow, twists, or a short flow like this one I made:

Gentle Flow

☕ 6. Drink Warm Tea

This one might sound too simple, but warm tea is actually therapeutic.

• The warmth soothes your digestive system

• Holding the mug signals “safety” to your brain

• Herbs like chamomile, lemon balm, and lavender help calm your nerves

  
  

This tiny ritual also creates mindful slowness, which is exactly what your system needs in the morning. Bonus if you sip in silence or while journaling. I like to have green tea in the mornings with piano music playing in the background.

🌿 Final Thoughts:

You don’t need a perfect morning, just one that creates inner safety. These steps can take 15 minutes or less, and they set the tone for how your nervous system moves through the rest of your day.

✨ Want deeper support? Grab my eGuide, The Peace Portal: A 5-Page Nervous Reset Guide. It’s full of self-paced tools to help you regulate and reconnect with yourself. ☁️ You can CLICK HERE to grab your copy of The Peace Portal

And don’t forget to subscribe on YouTube for calming flows + mindful moments, weekly!