A method includes controlling a cardiac pacing rate of an implantable medical device (IMD) to control a heart rate of a patient and determining that the patient is in a resting state. The method further includes modifying the pacing rate of the IMD for N cardiac cycles in response to determining that the patient is in the resting state. N is an integer greater than 1. Modifying the pacing rate includes incrementally increasing the pacing rate for a first portion of the N cardiac cycles, and incrementally decreasing the pacing rate for a second portion of the N cardiac cycles.