Getting well similar to remodeling old home
Editor’s note: This is the fourth part of a series on achieving better health.
Getting well is like remodeling an old house. You see great potential and know there will be some work involved, and as you start tearing down old walls, you find new issues. As you heal, you become more aware. At first, that can be a curse. You start feeling things you never felt before. Those tight shoulders weren’t a problem when you had 24/7 back pain. But now that your back pain is gone, you feel the tension in your neck and shoulders.
Learning new behaviors
Possibly the biggest enhancer is education, be it increased self-awareness or understanding diet. Without behavior change, you will recreate the problem. If you continue to walk around holding your shoulders up, you will continue to have shoulder and neck pain.
Chan-ces are your shoulders going up along with other tension producing behaviors were unconscious stress responses. Recognizing your stress responses allow you to unlearn them.
Learning to breathe is THE stress reducer. You can’t get tense if your breathing is relaxed. But, I guarantee what you think is a relaxed breath isn’t. I have never seen anyone, including Olympic runners I’ve rolfed, who were breathing full, natural breaths.
The quickest way to unlearn your habitual stress response is to take a mindfulness-based stress reduction course. While in Scottsdale, Ariz., my business partner Paul and I had the largest company in the country teaching MBSR. We were amazed at how learning how to breathe a natural breath changed people’s lives. Paul continues to lead classes through www.stressbeaters.com. You can contact him about his proven online course — which insurance companies are now reimbursing.
Reducing stress can mean learning how to walk in a way that doesn’t reinjure you (my site has a free ebook on walking naturally – www.align.org). It also might mean adapting your furniture to fit you rather than the opposite.
Two keys to rebuilding
To get well, you need good sleep. Your body will not fully regenerate without good sleep. You can cheat for a while, but the debt will come due.
More coffee in the morning is not giving more vital energy. It’s revving up your nervous and endocrine systems much like stress does. It’s not giving you the vital energy your body requires to rebuild.
Removing the unnecessary stimulations — whether it’s overuse of caffeine or staying up late to watch a movie — allows your body have restful sleep so that it can rebuild.
You also need the proper macro and micro nutrients to rebuild. You wouldn’t remodel your house with mediocre material, so why would you attempt to rebuild your body with less than a good diet and good supplementation?
Next week we will explore the simplest and most powerful way to use diet to get well.
Owen Marcus, MA, is a certified advanced rolfer and the author of “Power of Rolfing”. He can be reached online at www.align.org or www.sandpointwellnesscouncil.com, and by phone at 208-265-8440.