People come to Anima for different reasons, but the changes they describe are consistent. Here is what the work can offer, and why — grounded in what's actually known about the nervous system, not in wishful language.
A calmer, more flexible nervous system
The most fundamental shift. Slow, regulated breath and body-based practice load the parasympathetic "rest and digest" system through the vagus nerve, moving you out of chronic fight-or-flight or shutdown. Over time the system becomes more flexible — better able to move between activation and rest rather than getting stuck. A 2023 Stanford randomised controlled trial found just five minutes a day of breathwork improved mood and lowered physiological arousal more than mindfulness meditation (Balban et al., 2023). Heart rate variability, a marker of this flexibility, tends to improve with consistent practice.
Relief from held emotion
Held emotion carries a physical charge. When the system down-regulates and feels safe, that charge can finally discharge — often as tears, heat, trembling or simple release — frequently without needing to revisit the story behind it. People consistently describe feeling lighter, clearer and less weighed down afterward.
Recovery from stress and trauma
This is where the evidence is strongest. Trauma keeps the nervous system locked in survival states; body-based work helps it complete and discharge what was stuck. A 2017 randomised controlled trial of Somatic Experiencing — built on exactly this principle — found large reductions in PTSD symptom severity and meaningful improvements in depression (Brom et al., 2017). The broader insight, that trauma is held physiologically and reached most directly through the body, is the through-line of van der Kolk's work.
Reconnection — to yourself and others
Chronic stress and trauma blunt interoception, your ability to feel your own internal state, and crowd out the nervous system's capacity for trust and closeness. As the system regulates, both come back: a clearer sense of what you feel and need, and a greater capacity for genuine connection. In polyvagal terms, safety brings the social-engagement system back online.
Clarity, focus and perspective
As effortful, top-down control quietens, many people access states of unusual clarity and spaciousness — and report seeing long-standing patterns or decisions with fresh perspective afterward. Neuroimaging of experienced meditators shows measurable changes in brain regions tied to attention, emotional reactivity and self-referential thinking, consistent with these reports.
A steadier baseline over time
The deepest benefit isn't any single session — it's the trait that forms through repetition. A nervous system given the same regulating experience again and again gradually rewires toward it (ordinary neuroplasticity). What begins as a temporary state becomes, with practice, simply how you are: steadier, more present, less easily thrown.
An honest word on what this is
These benefits are real and, where stated, evidence-informed. But this work supports wellbeing and nervous-system regulation — it is not a treatment or cure for any medical or psychiatric condition, and not a substitute for therapy or medical care. Its effects vary from person to person, and it isn't suitable for everyone. The most reliable results come from consistency and integration, not intensity.
Sources: Balban et al., Cell Reports Medicine (2023); Brom et al., Journal of Traumatic Stress (2017); van der Kolk, The Body Keeps the Score (2014); Porges, Polyvagal Theory: A Science of Safety (2022); neuroimaging studies of meditation; heart rate variability literature.