Movement - A Foundational Principle of Health

If you're not moving, you're not living.

The entire universe is constantly moving.

If you're not moving you're not breathing, your heart is not pumping, you're not digesting ! Movement is critical. When you move you activate your muscles, the muscles consequently massage and move the internal organs and this drives your pumps in your body (biological oscillators) which in turn moves the fluids within your body and generates energy. This aids the function of the internal organs which allows you to move blood around the body and move your food through your body allowing you to eventually remove and excrete the waste (bowel movement). If you're constipated, essentially you're keeping the toxic waste within your body and this is a key indicator of lack of movement and ill-health.

There are two common types of movement;

working-in,

which brings energy into the body and activates the parasympathetic nervous system,

and working-out,

which expends the body's resources and energy supplies, thus stimulating the sympathetic nervous system. The trick is to work out which type of movement is most essential for you. If you're too yang, you need to do less exercise and more working-in (i.e. lower intensity exercise and placing more emphasis on the Yin principles of health like nutrition, hydration and sleep/rest) ! Let me clarify what I mean by that. When I say 'less exercise' I mean that in order for your body to find balance again you need to do exercise with less intensity like yoga, tai chi, stretching and core work.

Exercise done at a lower intensity has the ability to actually draw energy into the body especially when done with correct breathing. This in turn will allow your body to reduce levels of the catabolic hormone cortisol, giving your adrenals a rest and reducing sympathetic nervous system activation (thus increasing parasympathetic activation).

Why is this important ?

Because; if your body is activating your sympathetic nervous system (fight or flight) for too long, your body, your nervous system and your hormones will become out of balance and thus your body's ability to build and repair will be seriously diminshed causing your body to further break itself down in search of the vital nutrients required to function and you'll find your metabolism and thyroid slows down and you tend to store more fat !

Train, don't drain !