Stens is pleased to introduce a new program and innovative technologies to reduce stress. This hands-on interactive 1-day session will introduce you to several inexpensive biofeedback devices that focus on respiration and heart rate variability. This is a new approach to stress relief based on learning to change your body's heart rhythm patterns creating homeostasis in the body.

Practical applications and examples from practitioners in clinics, hospitals, and private practice will be reviewed, including chronic pain, anxiety, depression, anger, and other conditions. Significant stress reduction benefits have been achieved by people with ADD/ADHD, anger, anxiety, asthma, auto-immune disorders, chronic pain, depression, digestive disorders, drug and alcohol abuse, heart problems, hypertension, respiratory problems, and sleeplessness.

What is Heart Rate Variability?

Heart rate variability (HRV) refers to the beat-to-beat alterations in heart rate. Under resting conditions, the ECG of healthy individuals exhibits periodic variation in R-R intervals. This rhythmic phenomenon, known as respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA), fluctuates with the phase of respiration -- cardio-acceleration during inspiration, and cardio-deceleration during expiration. RSA is predominantly mediated by respiratory gating of parasymphathetic efferent activity to the heart:  vagal efferent traffic to the sinus node occurs primarily in phase with expiration and is absent or attenuated during inspiration.

Simply stated, your heart speeds up and slows down in a wave-like manner. Heart-rate variability is a measure of how deeply and how steadily those waves fluctuate.  It is a measurement of the “beat-to-beat” intervals. 

In a healthy heart, the HRV pattern will present “peaks and valleys” that are deep and steady.    Medical research shows that there are correlations between a healthy deep and steady HRV pattern and vagus-nerve activity (your body’s physiological relaxation response) which is called “coherence”. 

According to the HeartMath Institution,    “Ordered and harmonious heart rhythms are an indicator of your “coherence level”. High coherence is a state associated with positive emotional attitudes which send signals to the brain that reduce stress, improve brain function, hormonal balance, immune response, coordination and reaction times.”

Please read below brief descriptions on the "Easy Tools" that will be highlighted in our 1-Day workshop:

emWave

emWave Personal Stress Reliever provides a handheld, portable and convenient way to reduce stress, balance emotions and increase performance anytime, anywhere. This scientifically validated, handheld stress reliever was carefully developed by Doc Childre, founder of the Institute of HeartMath

The emWave is based on hard science and incorporates the same patented HRV measurement and coherence scoring process found in the Freeze-Framer® Interactive Learning System, HeartMath's award winning PC based product that is being used by ten's of thousands of people in over 50 countries.

Here's why it works. emWave shows the effects of stress on your body by measuring the subtle changes in your heart rhythms. This type of measurement is known as heart rate variability analysis or HRV. The analysis of HRV is recognized as a powerful, non-invasive measure that reflects heart-brain interactions and autonomic nervous system dynamics, which are particularly sensitive to changes in emotional state.

Using colorful LED displays, audio feedback, the emWave breathing pacer and an instructional stress relief technique on how to generate positive emotions will improve your coherence level - sharpening your ability to reduce stress and increase vitality, mental clarity and emotional balance.

The emWave Personal Stress Reliever also comes with the Coherence Coach™ CD, an entertaining stress relief software application that teaches HeartMath's Quick Coherence technique for stress relief and increasing performance. Step-by-step, through narration, animations and music, the Coherence Coach gives you the stress relief training to increase coherence levels while using your emWave.

emWave PC System

HeartMath research has shown that emotions are reflected in our heart rhythm patterns. The analysis of Heart Rate Variability (HRV), or heart rhythms, is recognized as a powerful, non-invasive measure that reflects heart-brain interactions and autonomic nervous system dynamics, which are particularly sensitive to changes in the emotional state. New clinical research identifies HRV as a key indicator of preventable stress and shows correlation with a broad range of related health problems.

Using emWave's fingertip or ear pulse sensor that plugs into the USB Port on your computer you can watch in real time how thoughts and emotions affect your heart and autonomic nervous system. With the Freeze-Framer you can objectively monitor your heart rhythms and confirm when you have achieved autonomic nervous system balance. It's like a mirror of your emotional state, and this real-time feedback enables you to more effectively manage your levels of stress and negative emotions.

You will learn how to intentionally shift to a positive emotional state and will be able to see the changes in your heart rhythms immediately on your computer screen. These shifts in your heart rhythms create a favorable cascade of neural, hormonal and biochemical events that benefit the entire body and mind. Blood pressure drops. Stress hormones plummet. The immune system pumps up. Anti-aging hormones increase. You gain clarity, calmness and control. The effects are both immediate and long lasting.

Healing Rhythms by Wild Divine

The Journey to the Wild Divine now offers their newest edition, Healing Rhythms, the first whole-body wellness program to bring together three of the most prominent leaders in the field of health and wellness – doctors Deepak Chopra, M.D., Dean Ornish, M.D. and Andrew Weil, M.D. Together with Healing Rhythms’ beautifully interactive 15-Step Biofeedback Training Program, you will learn the tools to help build a happy mind and a healthy body.

Healing Rhythms is set up in fifteen progressive sessions, each with a specific focus—such as reducing physiological tension, cultivating gratitude, or boosting energy. Each session contains three modes: a learning program, several guided exercises with master teachers, and an appropriate game-like challenge from the original Wild Divine: The Passage. Healing Rhythms gives you two ways to use these sessions.

Journey to the Wild Divine:  The Passage

The Journey to Wild Divine is a unique program for mind & body that links biofeedback hardware with your computer to create an enlightening experience of wellness.

Wearing three finger sensors that track your body's heart rate variability and skin conductance, you move through enchanting and mystical landscapes using the power of your thoughts, feelings, breath and awareness, and the measurements are fed back to you through biofeedback "events" on your computer screen.

By increasing, decreasing or synchronizing body rhythms, you'll quickly learn to master the "events" and progress ... Build stairways with your breath, open doors with meditation, master Zen Archery with deep concentration and juggle energy spheres with your laughter. Not just a game, this is a tool to balance mind & body that can be used again and again.

RESPeRATE

RESPeRATE's patented technology interactively guides you through therapeutic breathing exercises that have been clinically proven to reduce high blood pressure. RESPeRATE enables you to “effortlessly” slow your breathing from the normal range of 14 to 16 breaths per minute to the “therapeutic zone” of under 10 breaths per minute with prolonged exhalation.

Physiologically, RESPeRATE’s unique therapeutic breathing exercises result in significant and sustained reductions in blood pressure by reducing your body’s sympathetic neural activity and relaxing the muscles surrounding small blood vessels, allowing blood to flow more freely. RESPeRATE’s patented method of interactively synchronizing the inhale-exhale tones with your constantly changing breathing pattern is key to maximizing the effectiveness of the therapy as it allows you to “effortlessly” reach the therapeutic breathing zone.

Since everyone’s breathing rate and pattern change constantly, RESPeRATE’s patented technology automatically customizes the breathing exercises to the user’s breathing rate and pattern at the beginning and throughout the exercise. During each exercise, RESPeRATE constantly monitors and analyzes the user’s breathing rate and pattern to create a personalized melody composed of two distinct tones – one tone for inhalation, one for exhalation. As users listen to the melody and synchronize their breathing with these tones, RESPeRATE gradually prolongs the exhalation tone, thereby guiding the users to the slower therapeutic breathing zone.

While breathing returns to normal after each session, the beneficial effects on the blood pressure accumulate. Within 8 weeks of use (15 minutes at least 3-4 times per week), a significant and sustained reduction in blood pressure can be achieved.

Stress Eraser

The StressEraser is an award-winning, portable medical device that relaxes the body and calms the mind in 15 minutes. The StressEraser can be used to quiet the mind before sleeping, rapidly relieve intense stress, and even to stay calm during highly stressful situations.

From beat to beat, your heart rate reflects the activity of your stimulating and pacifying nerves. The StressEraser displays these tiny changes as a wave. By watching your wave characteristics in real-time, you learn to adjust your breathing and mental focus. This decreases the activity of the stimulating nerves (thereby decreasing stress) and increases the activity of the pacifying nerves (thereby increasing relaxation).

The StressEraser is the recipient of Frost & Sullivan’s 2006 Award for Technology Innovation of the Year. It is also featured in The Best of Gadget Lab in WIRED Magazine’s June 2006 issue (9 out of 10 rating). First customer shipments began in October 2005. The StressEraser is classified by the FDA as a Class II 510(k) exempt medical device.