29. Spiritual Disconnection Explained: How Your Nervous System Impacts Your Connection to God

What happens when you do the brave thing—open up, lean into vulnerability, and show up more honestly… but instead of feeling closer, you feel more disconnected?

In this deeply personal episode, Leanna explores the confusing and often unspoken experience of feeling distant from God, yourself, or others especially in moments when you expected to feel more connected. Through her own story of grief after losing her father, she unpacks how the nervous system, not your faith or effort, may be influencing your ability to feel connection and how your breath can become the bridge back.

In This Episode, We Cover:

• Why vulnerability doesn’t always lead to immediate feelings of connection
• The hidden role your nervous system plays in feeling disconnected
• How grief, trauma, and stress can impact your sense of safety and faith
• The connection between breath, the body, and spiritual connection
• What happens in fight, flight, freeze, and appease states and how they affect you
• A simple, guided practice for diaphragmatic (belly) breathing
• How breathwork supports nervous system regulation and emotional safety
• The “Four N’s” framework: Notice, Name, Nurture, Navigate
• Reframing disconnection: What if nothing is wrong with you?
• The connection between regulate → repair → rise in your healing journey
• How to stay present even when connection feels out of reach

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Connect with me:
Instagram → @aligningwithleanna

Website → leannahunt.com

Disclaimer:
Although I am a licensed Associate Clinical Mental Health Counselor, The NeuroHeir℠ Podcast is not a substitute for therapy, counseling, or medical treatment. The tools and practices I share are for educational and coaching purposes only. Every nervous system is unique, and what we discuss on this podcast should not replace your own individual therapeutic work or professional support.

The focus of this podcast is my coaching work, which centers on education, nervous system practices, and generational healing tools designed to support—not replace—your personal journey with a qualified provider.

If you are struggling with your mental health or experiencing overwhelming emotions, please seek support from a licensed professional in your area. You don’t have to do this work alone.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:59

Welcome to the Nerve Air Podcast, the show for cycle breakers, parents, young adults, and helping professionals ready to understand their nervous system through a generational lens, heal what isn't theirs to carry, and consciously choose what comes next. Hi, I'm your host, Leanne Hunts, an associate clinical mental health counselor and certified performance coach. Each week you'll get stories, science, and somatic practices plus my signature for and framework. Notice, name, nurture, and navigate to help you honor resilience, break silence, and build deeper connection with yourself and those you love, all while shaping a legacy of safety, freedom, and possibility. Welcome back to the NeuroAir podcast. In the last couple weeks, we've talked more about vulnerability and we've talked about courage and what it looks like to maybe share a little more, to stay in the moment instead of shutting down, and to let yourself be seen even in those small ways. And if you've been practicing that, if you've been leaning into that, you might have noticed something in yourself, something that doesn't always get talked about. Because we tend to think if I'm more open, if I'm more honest, and if I'm more vulnerable, I should feel more connected to myself, to others, or maybe even to God. Maybe I should feel more at peace and more grounded. But sometimes you do the brave thing, and instead of feeling closer, you feel a little bit more exposed, maybe even more raw or disconnected. And again, not just from people, but maybe even from God too. And that can feel really confusing. Because you might start to wonder, am I doing something wrong? Why does this feel harder instead of better? And why does God feel far away right now when I'm trying to show up more honestly? And what I want to explore today is this what if it's not that God has left us or is further away? What if something else is happening in your body? Because this is something I've had to wrestle with myself. And this is something I've lived in a really personal way the last year and a half. When my dad died in January of 2025, there were parts of my grief that I pretty much expected, like that immense sadness and even the shock and those emotional waves that come out of nowhere. But there was another layer that I did not expect. There was this intense feeling of unsettledness after he died. And I remember having these thoughts that I didn't say out loud, really, I think maybe just to my husband. I remember asking to myself, was he okay? Was he at peace when he died? Was he scared? And then underneath that, a few questions that I really couldn't shake, especially for those first few weeks after he died. I wondered if my dad died alone. And what if God wasn't there when he died? Because again, my dad died during surgery, and I didn't know what that did, especially for the state of consciousness when he died under anesthesia. He was in surgery because the surgeons were trying to clean up some of the tumors from his melanomic cancer that had taken over his body. But there were these moments after he died that I had this felt sense that he was afraid. And I didn't really know where that was coming from, but it felt real in my body and it would wake me up almost every night for those first few weeks. And that didn't just bring up grief. It shook something deeper. It shook my own sense of safety and my sense of understanding of what I believed happened after we died, or what I wanted to believe, and my sense of connection to God. And for a while, I started to feel further away from Him too. And not in a way that I could really explain, but it was just in what I felt in my body. And maybe even more honestly, it was what I couldn't feel. Like something that used to feel steady and close felt really far away, more quiet and hard to access. And I remember thinking, why does this feel so hard right now? Why can't I feel connection, especially when I need it most? And maybe you can relate to that too, that in some of your most darkest and trying moments is when you felt the most alone and the most isolated. And recently in my somatic certification, I'm in, my trainer was talking about something that really has stayed with me the last few weeks. We were actually talking about the body during surgery, how even when someone is under anesthesia, the body can still register stress, can still experience activation, and can still experience fear. And how there is somatic work that can help process those experiences after surgery. And when I heard that, something really clicked for me because, again, as you know, I've said my dad died serious surgery. And it wasn't that this was the first time something made sense in my training with my trainer a few weeks ago. It was that it connected dots I hadn't already been able to explore because I have already had moments this past year and a half where again, I have felt close to God, moments where I felt connection with my dad in a different way that felt more peaceful and not scary. But this concept in my training really helped me understand maybe why it had felt so hard before, and maybe even why my dad, if this is what happened, experienced fear when he was under anesthesia. And it led me to this question: what if it wasn't that God wasn't there? What if it was that his body was in a state of activation and mind too experiencing the grief? And even deeper. What if it wasn't that God pulled away from me and my grief or from my dad? But what if it was had to do with my nervous system? And that is what made it hard for me to feel connected, and possibly for my dad before he passed away. And this is where something has been landing so deeply for me is the breath, our breath. Because if you go all the way back to the very beginning of time, breath is how life starts, at least from the sense of what I believe in Christianity with Adam and Eve. And in the Bible, in Genesis 2, 7, it says, Then the Lord God formed man and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life. And another verse in the Bible I really like is Job 33, 4, where it says, The Spirit of God has made me. The breath of the Almighty gives me life. So breath isn't just something our body does, it's something we were given. It's life itself, its connection itself. And I've been sitting with this idea that what if the breath isn't just how we stay alive, but what if it's one of the ways we stay connected? Because when we look at the nervous system, we know this. When we are anxious, when we are experiencing intense periods of overwhelm, when we are in fight or flight longer, our breath gets shallow. It gets faster. Our chest often gets tight because, again, the body is preparing to fight or fly away. And then when we're in freeze mode, the breath gets restricted. It's barely noticeable. And when that happens, for all of those states, the emotional and logical parts of the brain disconnect. The amygdala, that emotional center takes over and that prefrontal cortex goes offline. And in those states, connection feels hard. Clarity feels hard. Even faith can feel hard to access, not because it's not there, but because our system isn't in a place to receive it. But when we slow the breath, even slightly, we send a signal to the body of safety. We send signals that remind us we can soften in the body and that we can come back to ourselves. And slowly the brain begins to reintegrate. The body settles even more, and connection becomes more accessible to ourselves, to our own inner wisdom, to others, and even to God. And I was reminded of this in such a real way in the breath work session I just held for the NeuroAir membership. It was our first experiential lab, and it was so powerful. I got to watch these amazing people slow down, connect to their breath, and feel things that they haven't in a really long time. I watched their bodies release things they didn't even realize they were holding. And it was such a powerful reminder to me that the breath is something we all have. We use it all day, every day, even when we aren't aware of it. And yet so many of us are disconnected from our breath. And what if that disconnection from our breath is part of what's affecting our ability to actually feel close to God? Because if we're disconnected from our body, we're going to struggle to feel connection, not just spiritually, but relationally, emotionally, internally. So when you're in fight or flight, your breath again is fast. It's shallow. It feels very urgent in the body. And on the flip side of that, when we're in states of freeze, our breath is restricted. It can feel very far away. And in the state of appeasement or people pleasing, sometimes our breath is very controlled and we're trying to manage everything so intensely. So in all of these nervous system states, your body is doing what it learned to do, which again is to protect you. And I want to pause here for a moment because this isn't just something to understand. This is something you can actually experience right now with me. Because when we talk about the breath, it can sound simple, but for a lot of us, it doesn't feel natural, especially if your system is used to being in survival. You might notice that your breath feels shallow a lot, that it actually stays up here in your upper chest, or you forget to breathe fully at all. So I want to show you a really simple way to come back to your breath and begin to bring your body back into safety. This is called diaphragmatic breathing or belly breathing. And I have mentioned it several times before on the podcast, but I want to take a minute to focus on it here again with you right now. So if you're in a place where you can, I want you just to gently place one hand on your chest and the other on your belly and just notice which hand is moving more right now. No judgment, just awareness. And now I want you to take an intentional, slow inhale through your nose. And instead of lifting your shoulders or that upper chest up by your throat, I want you to see if you can allow the breath to drop down so your belly gently expands at the same time as you take that inhaled breath. And then exhale slowly out your nose or your mouth, even a little longer than you inhaled. Let's try that again. Again, I want you to inhale slowly through the nose and feel that hand on your lower belly expand at the same time, which can feel so counterintuitive because most of us, as we're inhaling, we're like taking breath up in through the chest, but we want to actually expand the belly outward. And if this feels really hard, especially if you're sitting up, you're driving in a car, you're wearing tight pants or jeans, it can be really helpful to lay down on the ground and to just allow yourself to relax. And I promise you will feel that lower belly expand more as you're laying down with your hand on it. So let's try that again. If you can lay down, awesome. If not just where you're sitting, inhale slowly through the nose and let the belly expand at the same time. And then just take that longer, slower, exhale intentionally out your nose or your mouth. And as you do this, something really important is happening in your body. That slower, deeper breath is activating your diaphragm, which helps send a signal through the vagus nerve to your brain again that you are safe. And when that happens, your nervous system begins to shift out of that fight or flight and into that parasympathetic state, which is that nervous system state of rest and digest. And this is where it connects to everything we've been talking about, because when your system can start to settle, the emotional part of your brain and logical part of your brain can begin to come back online together. This is where you can think more clearly, you can feel more safety and connection, you guys, becomes more accessible. So, in a really real way, every time you slow your breath and bring awareness to it, you're not just calming your body, you're creating the conditions for connection. Those conditions for connection with yourself, with others, and maybe even with God. And right here, this can be a full four ends moment where first you can notice. And maybe as you get intentional with your breath, before you do that and practice that diaphragmatic breathing, maybe it's just noticing my breath is shallow. Maybe it's I'm feeling anxious or I feel numb. And as you notice that, then name it. Maybe it's a part of me feels really overwhelmed right now, or a part of me doesn't feel safe. Just name that. And even if you can say that out loud, and that third step is nurture. How do you offer just a little bit of self-support here? Again, this is where you bring your intentional awareness to your breath and practice that diaphragmatic breathing with a hand on your chest and a hand on your belly, with those slower, longer inhales and the even longer, slower exhales. And again, you're not trying to make everything go away. You're just trying to be in your body. And then that last step is navigate. And we navigate by staying with our breath, by staying in our body and staying in the moment just a little longer. And maybe this is the moment where something begins to shift, where your system softens just enough that you can feel a little more present, a little more open. And maybe this is where connection becomes possible again for you. Maybe this is where you find yourself ready to pray, actually, or to sit in stillness and meditate or to read something in your scriptures that felt far away, or maybe to write in your journal. Because your body finally feels safe enough to receive it. And this is where courage comes back in. Because maybe courage here doesn't look like feeling deeply connected. Maybe it just looks like staying. And it's not having a perfect prayer. It's not feeling something so profound and life-changing, but it's just one breath and one honest moment at a time. Even something as simple as God, I don't feel you right now, and then not leaving because again, that breath might be the very thing that brings you back to your body, to yourself and to God. And maybe that sounds simple, but this is where the work really begins with more of these small moments of self-connection first. Because what I've come to believe through my own grief, through my own healing, and through understanding my own nervous system is this it wasn't that God left me. And I want to believe he didn't leave my dad either, especially in that most painful state. It was that my body didn't feel safe enough to experience connection. And I believe that could have been happening for my dad too, especially because he may have been afraid to die. He may have been afraid to face the gravity of the cancer. And when he passed away, it was actually his third surgery in less than a week. And I wasn't there, but I can only imagine what he was experiencing before they put him under again. And so just a reminder for my own life and for all of us that our breath can really be a bridge back to our higher power, to spirituality. And something I'm remembering now, it was so profound years ago, almost probably eight or nine years ago, when I went to pelvic floor therapy for the first time, to the most amazing pelvic floor therapist, Megan, who happens to be a Christian as well. And when I first went to work with her to work through my pelvic floor muscles and tightness I had been experiencing after having kids, she was the first one to let me know. She was like, Liana, you are denying your body breath. You are denying your body breath of where it needs to go. And all of that is contributing towards all these other symptoms, even increased anxiety and other things I was dealing with. I was spending so much time breathing in this upper range up by the top of my chest and my throat. And I was denying my body breath down into that diaphragm, that deep belly area, which is where the breath needs to go to remind us that we can be safe. So, again, our breath can be a bridge back to so many things. And I want to gently offer you an invitation here. What would it look like to not give up on God, even in the moments you don't feel Him? And maybe just as important, what would it look like to not give up on yourself either? Because this work, this kind of connection, you guys, it isn't linear. It's not something you either have or you don't have. It's something you move in and out of depending on your state of your nervous system, depending on what you're holding on to. And this is where something I have talked about before comes back in. Regulate, repair, and rise. And I want to connect this to what we've talked about today so it feels clear. First, regulate. This is what we practice today. Coming back to your breath, coming back to your body, helping your system feel safe enough to soften. And then repair. This is what happens when you begin to shift the story. When instead of believing God left me, God's far away, you gently begin to consider what if I just couldn't feel connection in that state? That is repair. It's not forcing a new belief, but it is allowing a new possibility. And then rise. This is what grows over time. Our capacity increases, our connection increases, and there's more ability to stay present even in those hard moments, especially those grieving moments. And you might notice how the four ends fit right into this: the notice, name, nurture, and navigate that cycle. That is how we regulate. That's how we begin to repair, and that's how we slowly rise. And in all of this, it isn't about rushing. It isn't about forcing any type of connection. You don't have to prove anything. But maybe this season is about staying, staying with your breath, staying with your body, staying in the conversation, even, and maybe especially you guys, when it feels quiet and you feel so alone. Because not giving up on God or on yourself might be one of the most powerful forms of courage there is. So, my friends, if you're in a season where you don't feel connected, I want you to hear this. You're not doing anything wrong. You're not too far gone and you're not alone. Maybe you just start with your breath because the same breath that was given to you as life might also be the thing that brings you back into connection one inhale at a time. And next week we're gonna be at episode 30. I can't believe it already. We're going to talk about something just as important because as you begin to come back to yourself, I'm hoping that you start to notice, and maybe you already are, that you didn't just inherit the parts that made this hard. You have also inherited strength. You have inherited resilience and so many other beautiful traits. And we're going to talk about how to carry that forward. So make it a beautiful week. Thank you guys for being here. Thank you for taking time with me today. Thank you for huh. I feel this sense of space, even though I'm recording this weeks before you're going to listen. It's just such a powerful place that I can share and be real and open and practice my own vulnerability with all those of you that are listening. So until next time, bye guys. Thanks for joining me on the NeuroAir Podcast. This work is about honoring resilience in yourself and also those who came before you, all while finding freedom from what was never yours to carry. With the help of stories, science, somatic tools, and the four ends, notice, name, nurture, and navigate, you have a path toward deeper connection with yourself, your loved ones, and the legacy you want to pass on. If today's episode spoke to you, share it with someone who is ready to step into this work too. And follow the show so you never miss an episode. Remember, you may not have chosen what you inherited, but you can choose what comes next.