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Moving the body circulates energy. If you move in a rhythm (walking, running, dancing, practicing yoga asana), you give the wind element purpose and direction. Wind is the only one of the five elements that moves, and when it moves erratically, it can be destructive. Think about how it feels outside in a windstorm, and you might notice that anxiety feels a lot like a windstorm inside. Wind can also be used to generate power, and moving in a rhythm transforms the wind inside your system to be generative rather than destructive. If you have pain, stress, anxiety, or other signs that your nervous system is out of balance, move your body, and notice the effect it has on your mind and spirit. Choose movements that enhance your vitality rather than deplete you, and that you can do while still maintaining a steady, rhythmic breath.

Moving the body circulates energy. If you move in a rhythm (walking, running, dancing, practicing yoga asana), you give the wind element purpose and direction. Wind is the only one of the five elements that moves, and when it moves erratically, it can be destructive. Think about how it feels outside in a windstorm, and you might notice that anxiety feels a lot like a windstorm inside. Wind can also be used to generate power, and moving in a rhythm transforms the wind inside your system to be generative rather than destructive. If you have pain, stress, anxiety, or other signs that your nervous system is out of balance, move your body, and notice the effect it has on your mind and spirit. Choose movements that enhance your vitality rather than deplete you, and that you can do while still maintaining a steady, rhythmic breath.

The nervous system likes predictability. If you eat your meals at roughly the same times each day, the nervous system will start to trust that you will always take care of it and give it the energy that it needs. Grazing, skipping meals, or eating irregularly puts the nervous system into scarcity mode. That stress can affect hormone circulation, and can lead to overeating when you finally get a chance to eat. It also leads to behaviors that mask the symptoms, again like using caffeine and sugar to provide false energy.

We have a choice to make as individuals and as a society. Do we keep up the same unrelenting pace season after season and year after year until we burn out? Do we ignore all the warning signs of imbalance and disconnection, paying attention only when the alarm gets too loud to ignore?

Or do we choose a different path?

Chanting and singing are both rhythmic, and rhythm is naturally soothing to the nervous system (scroll down in this grid to read my recent post on rhythm). Sound is also associated with the space element, so rhythmic and peaceful or joyous sounds are balancing to vata dosha (wind + space constitution). Anything we do to balance vata will balance the nervous system, and chanting and singing have the added benefit of charging the heart and throat chakras so that we are able to speak our truth. Finally, chanting and singing slow down the breath, and the slower you breathe, the healthier you are. It doesn't matter what your voice sounds like.

Find ways to incorporate song into your day, whether it is in the car, the shower, on your daily walk, or as part of your spiritual practice. I typically incorporate mantra into my yoga classes. Come practice with me and let's chant together!

Belonging starts within, so it is important to take time to connect with ourselves every day. That could be through many of the other suggestions in this grid, like meditation or breathwork. It could be through journaling, working with a therapist, or doing something creative. Get off line and connect with yourself! When you are more centered in yourself, you naturally make choices that sustain your life force, like going outside to connect with your nature, and making time for joy and connection with the people you love. Start by fostering a deep relationship with yourself and watch how that root structure blooms into a garden of connection with other beings.

Being in nature boosts sattva (balance and harmony). Take time every day to go outside and immerse yourself in nature to remind yourself that you are part of, not separate from, the natural world. Feel the sun on your face. Listen to the birds sing. Take in a beautiful view. Most importantly, take a break from technology and give your senses a break. Save the music, podcast, and conversation for another time so you can just be in nature without distraction. As an added benefit, take screen breaks throughout the day and look out the window.

Pain can often affect sleep, and lack of sleep can increase pain. Sleep is essential for the body to process and remove waste products, to boost the immune system, and to heal. It is also the time when we consolidate information and memories, so sleep is essential for learning. Make sleep a priority and develop a bedtime routine that supports sleep:

Self-care gets a bad wrap these days. I think it is because it's become something we do when we’ve reached the end of the line. At that point, a bubble bath, a hike, or a pedicure seems like putting a bandaid on a gushing wound. Rather than wait until we are at our breaking point, what if we could think about self-care as a preventative practice? Why wait until we are reaching burnout to prioritize our health and wellness?

I want to reclaim self-care by thinking of wellness as a daily practice. When we can build an infrastructure for our lives, we will have support to sustain us and hold us up through difficult times. If we ignore our health and all of the warning signs of imbalance and wait until it is an emergency before we try to take care of ourselves, it won’t really work, which is why that massage we get once a year when we’ve hit our limit doesn’t magically make us feel any less burned out.

Everything in our lives is governed by rhythm. Our hearts beat in a rhythm. We breathe in a rhythm. Even our nervous system has a rhythm. We are also guided by the rhythm of the sun and the moon which create day and night and seasons. Aligning with the rhythm of our lives with the rhythms of nature supports balance and gives the nervous system a sense of safety.

Do you ever notice it is harder to breathe when you are anxious? When the nervous system is on high alert, the breath usually becomes short and shallow. When the alarm is high, we often start to breathe through our mouths. You can shift from sympathetic nervous system mode to parasympathetic nervous system mode by breathing.

When we are grounded, we have more capacity to weather storms in our life without being knocked over. Here are some simple strategies to promote grounding:

Persistent pain that lasts after the tissue has healed means the nervous system needs to heal. Balance your life; balance your nervous system.

Pain is your nervous system’s response to the perception of threat. The first step to reducing pain is understanding it. Explaining pain reduces the perception of threat, which reduces pain. As pain comes down, function improves. The next step is to figure out your triggers, and build up your toolbox to help you manage those triggers. As you balance your life, you will start to balance your pain.

Food is Medicine Part 2: Ama

All of Life is a Fire Ceremony

In ancient yogic texts, the first word of a text is the most important word. The first word of the Rig Veda, one of the oldest spiritual texts in the world, is agni, which means fire, and the first chapter is devoted to rituals to honor the god of fire. My teachers frequently say, “All of life is a fire ceremony,” and Ayurvedic practices center around tending to the digestive fire. This is because without fire, we would not be able to transform the food we eat into the energy we need to sustain our lives. Keeping the digestive fire strong is key to maintaining health and to recovering from illness and injury. In fact, almost every disorder or disease begins in the gastrointestinal tract and can be treated, in full or in part, by tending the digestive fire and using food as medicine.

Ayurveda is an elemental science and provides elegant guidance in finding balance. Each element has specific qualities (e.g. heavy or light, cold or hot, dry or oily), called gunas. Understanding the gunas can help us identify early signs of imbalance by recognizing when a particular quality is too high or too low. We find balance by applying this law of the universe: Like facilities like and opposites bring balance. By developing practicing self-awareness without judgement, we can sense what we need to stay balanced and develop the discernment needed to make choices that will be balancing, nourishing, and supportive.

The sensory organs are the gateway to the nervous system. They connect our outer and inner worlds by sending information about our interaction with our environment to our brain, which then perceives and interprets that information. When the sensory channels are clear, we can perceive things clearly, which helps us to make choices that are nourishing and balancing.