Any doctor will tell you that exercise is essential for moving through stress and depression because it signals the brain to release feel-good hormones and that it has profound benefits for physical health in both the long and short term. A longitudinal study on physical activity and longevity found that even ten minutes of brisk walking daily is associated with a longer life expectancy. Though our bodies perform autonomic movement processes, it’s important for us to move consciously, as well. This is what makes it so obvious when things are not moving-even if we don’t yet know what to do about it. We seem to have a deep unconscious knowing that life is supposed to move. Our brain feels as though it’s in a loop sometimes because it actually is-we’ve found a well-trodden neural pathway and dug in deep. We can also easily find ourselves stuck psychologically, often due to trauma. Sometimes women’s menstrual cycles become irregular or even stop completely during the years when they would otherwise be capable of reproduction. Consider an athlete going through a period of her life when she’s unable to move because of an injury. But there are many ways for our body to slow down or perhaps even stop completely. Her arms were uncrossed by then, but her hands gripped each other in her lap. The effect was undeniable: a tightness came over her, moving through her face, her posture, her fingers, her voice. I watched her body respond to her emotional state. As we discussed her grief, she became increasingly nervous. Something about her response felt stuck, like her bowel. She seemed to see grief as a reaction, not an experience-as something that happens, not something we do. Something about her answer seemed too simplistic. She looked anywhere but directly into my eyes. Her eyes flitted toward the ceiling as she said it, then back toward the floor. Eventually, Theresa admitted that she had lost five close friends and family members in the past year. When I asked why, she reluctantly explained that she had lost someone close to her…and someone else. So though Theresa didn’t particularly want to talk about the rest of her life, I kept trying to get some details about what was going on for her.įinally, she admitted that she had been feeling sad lately. Our thoughts and emotions can affect our digestion, too, as they create and release tension around the organs that affect their functioning. Our digestion is also symbolic of how we take in the world and how we let it move through us. Do you see a pattern here? Our bodies work because they were built to move. Exercise is important because it increases blood flow to the muscles in and around our gut, helping them do their job. Our diet is crucial because the more whole foods we eat, the more fiber we take in, which helps stimulate our bowels to move food and nutrients through and out of the body. Then water helps what’s left to move out. Water is important because it helps break down the food we eat, enabling the body to absorb nutrients. Diet, exercise, and hydration are great places to start when it comes to issues affecting digestion. The trouble was that from my perspective, those questions had everything to do with the topic at hand. She gave me a look that made it clear that she didn’t appreciate my deviating from the topic at hand. “My dreams? What would my dreams have to do with it?” Theresa asked, leaning back in her chair and crossing her arms, gripping her upper arms lightly in frustration. “Is your sleeping self trying to tell you anything?” She paused and looked at me after each question I asked, tightening her lips slightly as if trying to understand my angle before reluctantly offering an answer. As she spoke, I noticed that she seemed increasingly closed off to my questions. Since nothing seemed off, I then moved on to more holistic questions about her life in a general sense: her emotions, her social support, what brought her days joy and meaning. We then talked about her water intake and how often she exercised. She had altered it significantly to address her constipation, but it hadn’t made much of a difference. We started by discussing her diet, which wasn’t amazing but wasn’t terrible, either.
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