Throughout life you may experience reactive impulses to different situations. These impulses, or reactions, may seem out of your control. You may feel unable to stop them from happening, and most of the time they do not align with the person you want to become.
Fear not, you are not the only person that experiences these reactions and impulses. Every human is faced with these, sometimes on a daily basis. These reactions and impulses are learned responses that your body uses to keep you alive.
Simply put, they are survival mechanisms you have learned throughout your life that are stored within the mind and body; these are commonly referred to as our brains auto pilot mode. Though these are aspects of your being that are outside your conscious control, that doesn’t mean you can never change them. If your body could learn dysregulated ways of coping, it could also learn healthy routes to recovering.
These learned behaviors that place us on auto pilot are programmed neuropathways in your brain, yet the good thing is that you have the power (thanks to neuroplasticity) to reroute these pathways to more desirable outcomes.
This article will dive into everything you need to know to begin your journey to healing the mind-body connection along with helpful places to begin.
The Science
Thanks to epigenetics, we know that our genes are not fixed. Thanks to neuroplasticity, we know that the brain can form new pathways. Thanks to the conscious mind, we know the power of our thoughts to affect change. And thanks to polyvagal theory, we know that our nervous system affects all other systems of our body. And thanks to our breath we can get in control of our autonomic nervous system (the control system that acts largely unconsciously and regulates bodily functions).
We can unlearn and relearn behaviors throughout our life, even if we’ve endured significant trauma in our past. We can harness the power of our bodies to heal our minds and the power of our minds to heal our bodies.
By strengthening the connection between our mind and our body, specifically our nervous system, helps us return our body’s balance and promotes healing from within.
Through focusing on their healing, we can see incredible results. That means continuing to meet body composition goals with our bodies growing into their healthiest, strongest self while improving mental health, feeling motivated, and determined.
By being dedicated to your well-being, you can utilize epigenetics, neuroplasticity, the conscious mind and polyvagal theory easily to begin to heal your mind and body. Yet, this comes with a dedication to investing in your mental and physical health daily, healing doesn’t take place overnight!
Your conscious, persistent effort will prove to you that no matter how broken, out of control, tired, or hopeless you may feel, change is possible and achievable for you if you know where to start.
How do we strengthen the mind-body connection to begin transforming our lives? Let’s dive into the simple ways to begin.
The Healing
Healing from the Root
Plowing forward and living life purely based on your unconscious reactions leads to a downward spiral. Stopping and slowing down leads to understanding and learning about yourself as a human.This why phase one of the Wellpower Method focuses on the mind, self assurance and shifting mindset.
Healing starts with learning how to tap into the needs of our body and reconnecting with our intuitive self. It begins with the act of witnessing your thoughts reacting and stopping and thinking about where that reaction is coming from and whether you wish to identify with it.
Listening to your body’s responses leads you to discover how to rebalance the nervous system.
Even though our nervous system reactions are automatic, there are ways to improve your responses and manage conditioned responses to stress. Once we utilize these ways we slowly help our bodies return to calmer states where we are better able to live clearer and in more control.
The path to healing our nervous system and being conscious of our reactions begins with activating the parts of our autonomic system that are within our control, such as our breath.
The vagus nerve is a bidirectional communication pathway that carries information from your body to your brain and from your brain to your body. The brain-to-body conversation is how we heal from the root, aka the top-down approach. By recirculating your brain you guide your body on a path toward healing.
Mind-Body Connection
The brain-body, mind-body, total-self (however you wish to call it) approach is the best way that anyone can begin on their healing journey.
We can consciously choose specific activities that actively decrease our psychological stress, slow the sympathetic responses in our nervous system, and even strengthen our musculoskeletal and cardiovascular systems. In addition to these, when we activate, challenge, and tone our vagus nerve (pathway that carries information from your body to your brain and vice versa) in a safe and controlled environment, we build tolerance and learn how to live with discomfort, which is key to building resilience, the ability to recover quickly from hardship and trauma.
As you begin to work on strengthening your vagus nerve, it may be helpful to know that you will undoubtedly experience uncomfortable internal pushback. This is because as humans we love being within our comfort zone which places us on autopilot. So when we try to break learned behaviors our bodies naturally push back and encourage us to resort back to what we are comfortable with. It is important that we recognize this, have grace with ourselves, but also push forward through the discomfort.
Best Practices
Beginning this healing journey may seem intimidating, but once you begin and find yourself in a routine, you will find success is easily attainable with the right mental attitude.
Some of the most effective, practical ways we can harness the healing power of our bodies to regain balance and build resilience begin with strengthening the mind-body connection and promoting healthy vagal tone.
Below find the best practice I recommend in the Wellpower Method, linked to ways to begin;
No Better Time Than Now
If you’re ready to start the path towards healing your mind-body connection you’re ready to begin the Wellpower Method where you work one-on-one with Gabrielle McGrath, a registered nutrition dietitian who focuses primarily on holistic healing.
The Wellpower Method helps you regain control over your mind and body while promoting a healthy lifestyle that is practical to your current day to day routine.
There’s no better time to start than now, find out more here.
