Resetting Your Nervous System: The Key to Moving and Feeling Better

Categories: Blog Feb 06, 2025

Have you ever noticed how a deep breath can calm your mind or how a simple movements can ease tension in your body? That’s because your nervous system controls everything—from movement and posture to stress levels and recovery.

But what if you could “RESET” your nervous system to work more efficiently?

At Original Strength, we teach a concept called Pressing RESET, which involves simple, natural movements, based off of the human developmental sequence, that restore the body's most basic, and foundational functions. It’s like rebooting your body, allowing you to move better, feel better, and perform better—without needing complicated exercises, extreme workouts, and tons of time.  

The idea is simple: when we move in ways that our bodies were designed for (literally since you were a baby) —like breathing deeply, rocking, rolling, and crawling—we signal to the nervous system that we are safe. This downregulates stress, shifting us out of "fight or flight" and into a state where our body can move, heal, and function at its best.

What is ‘fight or flight’, and why should you care about if someone is in it?

“Fight or flight” is our body’s built-in survival response to stress. When we perceive danger—whether it’s real or just the pressures of modern life—our nervous system prepares us to fight, flee, or freeze. It’ great for when we need to run from a bear or escape zombies, but in today’s world, many of us stay stuck in this mode due to chronic stress, suboptimal movement habits, and constant overstimulation. Living in ‘fight or flight’ keeps muscles tense, reduces mobility, increases stress on our system, and drains our energy. We do not want to live in this mode. 

Pressing RESET helps break this cycle.

By using movements that naturally bring balance to the nervous system, we help the body feel safe again. When the nervous system feels safe, muscles relax, mobility improves, our stress response decreases, and strength becomes more reflexive.

Pressing RESET is all about creating the right conditions (optimal stimulus) for movement to happen naturally and effortlessly, and what we think is extra cool about this is that you don't even need to be in a gym or even sweating to benefit.

Quick Nervous System Science Lesson

Your nervous system is your body’s command center—it controls everything from movement and posture to digestion, breathing, and even your mood (hello- hormones!). A healthy nervous system is essential to your everyday and long term living. 

Your nervous system is made up of two primary parts:

• The Central Nervous System (CNS): This includes your brain and spinal cord, which process and send signals throughout your body.
• The Peripheral Nervous System (PNS): This connects your brain and spinal cord to the rest of your body, allowing for movement, sensation, and reflexes.

Within the PNS is the Autonomic Nervous System (ANS), which controls automatic (involuntary) functions like heart rate, digestion, and stress responses. The ANS has two branches:

• Sympathetic Nervous System (SNS) – "Fight or Flight" Mode
• Activates when your body perceives a threat (real or imagined).
• Increases heart rate, tightens muscles, and heightens alertness.
• Useful in emergencies but harmful if constantly living in this activated state.
• Parasympathetic Nervous System (PNS) – "Rest and Digest" Mode
• Helps you recover, heal, and move freely.
• Slows heart rate, relaxes muscles, and improves digestion.
• Where we want to spend most of our time for optimal health and movement.

The PNS also houses the Somatic Nervous System which controls voluntary movements and sensory feedback. 

Why Nervous System Health Is Important to Acknowledge

Most people today are unknowingly stuck in fight or flight mode due to chronic stress, poor movement habits, and overstimulation (think screentime, deadlines, and constant busyness). This keeps your body tense which reduces mobility and can lead to aches and pain, fatigue, and even anxiety.

When your nervous system is regulated—meaning it can shift between these two states appropriately—your body can:

✅ Move more easily and with less pain.
✅ Feel stronger without extra effort.
✅ Recover faster from workouts, injuries, or stress – Yes, this means sleeping better too.
✅ Improve posture and coordination.

 

How Does Pressing RESET Help?

By using simple, natural movements—like breathing deeply, rocking, and rolling—we send signals of safety to the nervous system and shift the body out of fight-or-flight mode. This helps muscles relax, increases mobility, decreases our stress response, and restores effortless and fluid movement. 

Instead of forcing complicated exercises that your body isn’t prepared for, Pressing RESET gently engages your nervous system with movements that signal safety, relaxation, and efficiency.

We like to focus in on these Big 5 RESETs:

• Diaphragmatic Breathing: Calms the nervous system, engages the inner core unit, and improves movement efficiency.
• Head Nods & Rotations: Stimulates the vestibular system, improving balance, posture and coordination.
• Rocking: Restores mobility through total joint integration, and reflexive stability while reducing stiffness.
• Rolling: Enhances spinal health, RESETs movement patterns, and improves coordination and proprioception.
• Crawling: Strengthens the core, integrates the left and right brain, and builds strength and endurance throughout the entire body.

How Does Pressing RESET Fit into Your Life?

Whether you're an athlete looking to perform better, a fitness professional wanting to help clients move pain-free, or someone who simply wants to feel better in daily life, resetting your nervous system can be a game-changer. The best part? The RESETs take just minutes a day, require no equipment, and can be done by anyone, at any fitness or ability level. 

By understanding how movement impacts the brain, and interacts with the nervous system, you’re not just training muscles—you’re upgrading the entire operating system of your body.  

Try Pressing RESET today and see how you feel. You might be surprised at how something so simple can make such a powerful impact! Not sure where to start with RESETs check out the Original Strength Pressing Reset book.  

 

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