Hi friends,
Did you know that placebo treatments have been shown to work just as well as prescription treatments, even if people know they are taking a placebo (an “honest placebo“)?
Did you know that doctors who listen to and touch their patients can help their patients recover faster than doctors who don’t make eye contact and who seem “cold” rather than “warm”?
Did you know that it is possible to train your mind to believe it has received medicine to achieve about a 60-80% effectiveness of the actual drug?
(Quick statistics lesson: just because a study shows statistically significant results doesn’t mean it applies to every person, every time, and every situation. It just means the odds are greater that it might happen.)
It has always made me sad to think that people don’t believe in the mental, emotional, and psychological benefits of yoga unless they have proof that it is true, or when people think exercise is mostly a way to sculpt/shape our muscles and burn calories to lose weight without thinking equally about its emotional, social, and mental health benefits, or acknowledging that an uplift in happiness and mood from exercising can boost our immune system (affective immunology).
The ancient yogis believed that yoga gave its practitioners unique powers including being able to control their heart rate, temperature, and respiration rate, and bringing them closer to self-realization (This all sounds crazy doesn’t it?). I’m betting it did work, but didn’t apply to every practitioner, every time, and every situation.
If it worked once for one person and the effect was real for that person at the time, then it did work.
If our mental attitude toward health has a proven effect, is well known, and has a significantly positive effect, then let’s start now. Pick something to work on, set an intention, and practice it regularly and with dedication. Create habits and patterns that the body recognizes, use your imagination, concentrate on the benefits, imagine that the healing is taking place. Use any tools you have and learn new ones. Do it privately for yourself without expectation, preaching, or evangelizing. Let it go or readjust if it isn’t working. Give it time.
Here are some ways I’ve used movement practices in healing ways in my own life:
– I have used dance to find relief from the deepest grief.
– I have used yoga to regulate my body temperature (yes you read that correctly)
– I have used meditation to reduce deep frown lines in my forehead (Yes I am weird and yes I did this! you should have seen them before!)
– I have used movement and yoga to elevate my energy, mood and well being for days and weeks at a time. I imagine my immune system getting a boost when my mood is elevated…. (maybe it is working? I haven’t been sick in many years.)
There is more but I don’t want to lose anyone here……. 🙂
Did I really “do” all of that? Can I truly make these claims? Am I just making this all up?
Yes, I did all of that and no I’m not making it up.
How do I know? We need a different kind of math for this.
Here’s how I know: because if I hadn’t been doing anything, I am sure what would have happened is….. nothing. There would have been no effect at all. Movement practices need to be compared to what we might otherwise be doing with our time.
I set intentions, practiced regularly, and with dedication. I am not special and I don’t have special powers, I am just like everyone.
I’ve tried many things that haven’t worked at all. It didn’t hurt to try. I kept readjusting. When movement and mindfulness works, it works. When it doesn’t, it is still good!
Our mental attitude about what we are doing affects how our internal ecosystem responds.
What changes everything is to believe that the practice you are doing has benefits, practice regularly and with effort.
It might not work every time and every situation but it wouldn’t hurt to try! One day you’ll try something and it will work.
The side effects are amazing too. 😃
Don’t stop moving friends!
Holly
Everything I’m up to: https://linktr.ee/hollyhalvorson