Servicing the vehicle just to drive around the block?

Last year during my time in Alice Springs I got yet another understanding of the so often mentioned “body-mind” connection. I worked there as a body worker with massage and other modalities as well as teaching different yoga classes. In “The Alice” lots of people have work 4WD cars, nearly everyone goes “out bush” and a lot work out bush. So men and women look after their cars knowing that safety in the outback is number one and not something to be neglected. And people service their vehicle to really take it places.

What about the vehicle that carries you around I asked them? Your physical body that is constantly changing and that needs maintenance as well. It is even “a bit more complex” than a 4WD - though often we only take it around the block instead of taking it places.

Now what about the body mind connection? - The easiest example is if we look at the stresses people live with or the workload that is loading up in people’s heads and then typically manifest in pains in their lower back, in their neck and shoulders (carrying too much), or hips. This we quite often know, but what about realising it the other way round? We hurt our back (in Alice Springs let’s say on a rough dirt road track for hours to get to work on a community etc), or twisted an ankle or did somethingg to our neck etc. These physical “ailments” have then an impact on our mind - how we perceive the world and how we interact; the pain (even with painkillers) is restricting our thinking and our way of openly meeting the world, meaning we are stepping more into a reactive way of interacting with people at work and at home then consciously active.

WHY? Because we are not in balance; the physical body and neurological pathways to the brain are not in balance when we experience pain, one hemisphere will be very predominantly active which doesn’t let us see the whole picture and thus we react rather than act when responding to situations we are presented with. Then it is hard to follow the great Zen Master’s advice: “When sitting sit, when walking walk, above all don’t wobble.”

Here is a link to some foundation breathing practice that brings balance - click on the image below.