Movement is Medicine… WHY & BASED ON WHAT?
Mind-Body-Spirit connection, we’ve all heard of it, and probably filed it away into one of those holistic boxes that we think sounds like a good idea you may explore when you get a chance. The thing is, those chances, that time, that space in your life, it never comes because you always have other priorities. Let’s see if I can help you see this from a different perspective.
I’m going to break the mold of what you think the mind-body-spirit connection is, as well! It doesn’t always take the same form. For some, yes the meditation, yoga, breath represents that connection well enough, but for others, there may need to be a more practical, logical understanding for this connection to have real value for you to want to invest time in it.
But one thing I can assure you, once you’ve experienced being properly present to your body in a positive way, you cannot deny that you simply feel better!
Understanding the links
The brain depends on stimulation, feedback and nutrition from the rest of the body to function well. Let’s, grossly, call this Input. The input is conveyed via the nervous system, through the spinal cord and to the brain. And the brain responds to this information, sending out instructions to the body.
Think of it as strip lighting, little strips from your fingers and toes, bigger ones from your shoulders and hips, a bundle in the gut, all running into a fatter strand going up the spine into the brain, which lights up like a christmas tree. The strip lights run both ways, some going up and some going down.
And I didn’t use lighting as my imagery by chance either, because l
ighting is powered by electricity, and DUM DUM DUM, so are we!!
In medical investigations they use ECG and EKG tests, so it is evidenced and accepted knowledge that we are bioelectrical beings… but did YOU know that?
Really think about that?
We, you and me, we run on electricity. AND, guess what?! Your electric system developed before your nervous system, when you were just conceived in mum’s tummy!
What makes electricity? Friction!
What creates friction? Movement!!!
Before you had developed a brain or a spinal cord, your mum’s movement was building an electric energy, coupled with nutrition, and you, the little fertilised egg, grew from there. Isn’t that super cool? And is it starting to make sense?
In order for the brain to be able to communicate with the body without impingement or resistance, or for the body to be able to feedback to the brain accurately, so the brain feels safe at all times, that electric strip lighting needs to be conducting current smoothly along the circuits. Being sedentary or stationary for long periods is simply not what we were designed for, we were designed to experience movement to constantly recharge the strip lighting. Keep moving and you’re constantly generating electric energy.
Your Inner Body Rhythms
You know your heart beats, your lungs fill and deflate, your digestive system constantly pumps, your body has inner movement ALL of the time. Isn’t that a clue? Between the reflexive contractions, pumping, processing, occurring without you ever giving it much conscious thought, and how stiff you feel after you’ve been in one position for too long, how can you disagree that movement is indeed medicine?!
Now let’s go back to that mind connection again. Our one identical built-in reflexive fear that each of us are born with, and that is based on our primary directive – survival of self, is the fear of our heads hitting the ground, therefore balance is key. The brain HAS to feel safe. If it doesn’t it will respond with pain and/or mental chaos. This sends the nervous system into a spin and can present in almost any unexpected horrible way. When we understand that inflammation is at the bottom of almost all diseases and pain presentations, and that inflammation is produced through our nociceptive c-fibres (PAIN signals) then we can logically deduce that pain is present as a warning, when the brain feels unsafe.
For example: Your brain detects you are walking differently, perhaps you are wearing new shoes, it is not a recognised pattern of movement and the knee feels a bit unstable. Brain feels unconfident therefore WARNING, send signal to right hip: brace brace: inflammation – stiffening – pain. Does that sort of sound like a familiar story?
Interestingly, this does go both ways. The body can make the brain feel unsafe, and the brain can make the body feel unsafe. You can approach feeling better from either side of the story, but simply understanding that the two are intertwined at the deepest level of dependence will go a far way towards realising the value of moving with intention, consideration, knowledge and respect, and how it boosts being well mentally.