Born to Move

Yesterday I had the honor and priviledge of spending some time holding a friends new baby.

What I noticed beyond her soulful blue eyes and her seemingly insatiable curiousity was her tiny body's nearly constant motion. Her movements were not restless. Nor were they relentless. She explored her surroundings and my face. She opened and closed fingers and toes, and flexed and extended hips and knees; delicate practice for when she's holding her head up, creeping and crawling.

When her body registered discomfort to her, such as hunger, diaper wetness or a boring view, she squirmed and her previously soft vocal tonings became distinctly more insistent. Her body spoke and she responded for change!

We were all like this once.

There was a time in the lives of us all when tweaking, adjusting and changing in direct response to discomfort or lack of comfort was reflex, automatic, unconscious. Our bodies were strong, flexible, mobile, agile and stable. We moved as easily on the floor as on our feet. We did not give a single thought to how we were going to get down on the floor to pick up what we dropped - we simply did it.

On the floor, all of our joints must participate. In standing and walking, this is not always the case. As a horrible matter of fact, we can walk around all day long and never truly give movement to the majority of our spine. Does anyone else find this chilling?

Our hips joints can move inadequately and still manage to get us from here to there. Our knees can be offered the tiniest range of motion and we claim it as walking. Feet are stuffed into shoes and toes may be immobilized while the entire foot loses strength and flexibility.

We Were Born To Move

• Why do we have joints if not to move them? 
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• What would happen if we never made a habit of telling our children to sit "still" for longer than the literal eating of a meal (versus "family time")?
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• What if teachers encouraged students to move around quietly as needed, without disrupting others (my son actually spent 2nd and 3rd grades with just such a brilliant, progressive teacher)?
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• My own teacher this semester offered us the same advice I receive every time I attend a Nia Belt Intensive: do what you need to do to take care of you. Get up and move, lie down, roll around, eat, drink, take bathroom breaks according to your body's schedule.

When your body is uncomfortable, what are you thinking about?

When your body is uncomfortable during an "extremely important" meeting, what are you still thinking about? What points did you miss because your foot is numb, or your hip is aching or your knee is screaming?

Does a "body break" have to be a distraction? No and your body is going to feel so much better you may even find that you've retained more than you usually do!

Does everyone in the room have to take a break at once? Ofcourse not. Every body is a little different and it is important to personalize needs. We are not production-line creatures. Speaking to digestion, even if you feed and water us at the same time, the digestions process is still going to vary from person to person, therefore bathroom breaks should vary as well.

POINT

Requiring stillness for any length of time teaches us to ignore the voices of our body. If we listen, we must move. To remain still, we "discipline ourselves" to ignore discomfort and pain.

A little ranting: To what end? To please someone else? To follow the rules? Who makes up such sadistic rules?

Since when did pain become a medal of honor? Oh, yea, the Middle Ages? I'll bet if we dig through more history we can find it earlier than that! Ok, ranting over...

We Were Born To Move

Children move just for the sake of moving. They always have someplace to go, something to do. And yes, their joints are new, their bones undamaged and their bodies are efficient.

As we become adults and the socio-cultural requirements demand stillness, we begin the inevitable journey into "old age". Think I mean 95? Nope, I mean 40.

Take a look around. How many 40-year-olds can get up and down from the floor without complaint? How many are already on their way to joint replacements (without congential conditions)? How many with weight issues so severe that the very idea of moving enough to keep the heart healthy, the joints and muscles moving and digestion efficient is simply too difficult?

Here's our "impossible" delimma:

• We should be healthy
• We should be still
• We should be thin
• We should be able to eat anything we want
• We should work 12 hours a day
• We should stay young
• We should make lots of money
• We need to keep a healthy heart and digestive system
• We should have a life schedule that doesn't allow (read respect) our need for exercise or adequate sleep
• We should have meaningful relationships in our lives
• "Success" decrees that we don't have time to do anything but work
• We should live meaningful lives and do what we love and were built for
• Here is the list of acceptable careers. To choose other paths may deem you socially unacceptable and therefore, unsuccessful, jus' sayin'

So why don't we keep moving?!?

Go ahead, buck the "civilised" system, I dare you.

Oh and let me know how that goes! And I'll do the same for you.