Author: hyftechnologies

Balance and coordination exist when the body is used for what it is designed for. Exercises such as walking, swimming, yoga, Pilates, bicycling, martial arts, and bodybuilding all help to improve muscle coordination. Activities such as working at a desk, reading, and watching television do the opposite for the body. Without realizing it, most people have extreme stress in their muscles. This muscular tension contributes to muscle tightness, restricted movement, and joint pain. This occurs simply because they sit for many hours every day and do not perform regular exercises that will work to keep all of the muscles in their body in balance.

Strong muscles keep your body upright and allow you to move. Good muscle strength and balance are critical to maintain proper posture and minimize muscle tension. Your muscles function much like the wires that hold up a tall radio or television antenna. If the wires are equally strong on all sides, the antenna will stand up straight. If one of the wires becomes weak or breaks, the antenna will either lean to the side or collapse. The same is true with your body. If the muscles on all sides of your spine are balanced and strong, your body will stand up straight and strong. Unfortunately, most people don’t have balanced and strong muscles – due, once again, to lack of exercise and to misalignments of the spine.

Muscles are very efficient at getting stronger or weaker in response to the demands placed on them. Since most of us sit at a desk, drive a car, and sit on the sofa at home, many of our muscles are not challenged. Consequently, they become weak. At the same time, the muscles that are constantly used throughout the day become strong. This imbalance of muscle strength contributes to poor posture and chronic muscle tension. Left unchecked, muscle imbalances tend to get worse, not better, because of a phenomenon called “reciprocal inhibition.”

Reciprocal inhibition literally means “shutting down the opposite.” For all of the muscles that move your body in one direction, there are opposing muscles that move the body in the opposite direction. In order to keep these muscles from working against each other, when the body contracts one muscle group, it forces the opposing group to relax – it shuts down the opposite muscles. When consistently only one set of muscles is used, the opposing group, from being continuously shut-down, is liable to atrophy.

This phenomenon is especially important to people who work at a desk, because all day long the same muscles in the upper back and chest area of the body are used. This means that all day long the body is essentially shutting down the opposite muscles in the middle back. Over time, the muscles in the middle back become very weak because they are not being worked like the muscles in the front. This contributes to poor posture and chronic muscle spasms and pain. The easiest way to correct this imbalance is to do specific exercises which will increase the strength of the back muscles, along with manual therapy and chiropractic care. Once the muscles in your middle back are strong, the tightness and poor posture simply disappear.

The goal of progressive muscle relaxation is to reduce the tension in your muscles. First, find a quiet place where you’ll be free from interruption. Loosen tight clothing and remove your glasses or contacts if you’d like. Tense each muscle group for at least five seconds and then relax for at least 30 seconds. Repeat before moving to the next muscle group.

• Your face. Squint your eyes tightly, wrinkle your nose and mouth, Clench your teeth, and pull back the corners of your mouth toward your ears, feeling the tension in the center of your face. Relax. Repeat.
• Neck. Gently touch your chin to your chest. Feel the pull in the back of your neck as it spreads into your head. Relax. Repeat.
• Shoulders. Pull your shoulders up toward your ears, feeling the tension in your shoulders, head, neck and upper back. Relax. Repeat.
• Upper arms. Pull your arms back and press your elbows in toward the sides of your body. Try not to tense your lower arms. Feel the tension in your arms, shoulders and into your back. Relax. Repeat.
• Hands and forearms. Make a tight fist and pull up your wrists. Feel the tension in your hands, knuckles and lower arms. Relax. Repeat.
• Chest, shoulders and upper back. Pull your shoulders back as if you’re trying to make your shoulder blades touch. Relax. Repeat.
• Stomach. Pull your stomach in toward your spine, tightening your abdominal muscles. Relax. Repeat.
• Upper legs. Squeeze your knees together and lift your legs up off the chair or from wherever you’re relaxing. Feel the tension in your thighs. Relax. Repeat.
• Lower legs. Raise your feet toward the ceiling while flexing them toward your body. Feel the tension in your calves. Relax. Repeat.
• Feet. Turn your feet inward and curl your toes up and out. Relax. Repeat.

Perform progressive muscle relaxation at least once or twice each day to get the maximum benefit. Each session should last about ten minutes.

Another way of relaxing your muscles is through massage. Massage is a system of pressing and kneading different soft tissues in the body (muscles, tendons, and ligaments). Massage offers a variety of health benefits: pain relief, relaxation, improved muscle tone, stimulation of circulatory and lymphatic systems, and more efficient elimination of waste throughout the body. Although a single massage will reduce fatigue, relax you, and provide mild stress relief, the effects of massage are cumulative. A course of massage treatments will allow you to reap the most benefits. Ultimately, massage can rejuvenate you physically, mentally, and spiritually. Massage rates can vary between $50 and $125 per hour, depending on the massage therapist and the location where you receive your massage. For example, you will pay more for someone to travel to your home to provide massage therapy. Fortunately, many chiropractic centers offer massage therapy as part of their services.

Relaxed breathing, also called diaphragmatic breathing, can help you relieve stress. Have you ever noticed how you breathe when you’re stressed? Stress typically causes rapid, shallow breathing. This kind of breathing sustains other aspects of the stress response, such as rapid heart rate and perspiration. If you can get control of your breathing, the spiraling effects of acute stress will automatically become less intense. Relaxed breathing, also called diaphragmatic breathing, can help you relieve stress.
Practice this basic technique twice daily, and whenever you feel tense. Follow these steps:

• Inhale. With your mouth closed and your shoulders relaxed, inhale as slowly and deeply as you can to the count of six. As you do that, push your stomach out. Allow the air to fill your diaphragm.
• Hold. Keep the air in your lungs as you slowly count to four.
• Exhale. Release the air through your mouth as you slowly count to six.
• Repeat. Complete the inhale-hold-exhale cycle three to five times.

To find your mantra you can go to a peaceful place, sit in a comfortable position, and focus on a word or phrase that you find relaxing. Autogenic means something that comes from within you. During this type of relaxation, you repeat words or suggestions in your mind to help you relax and reduce the tension in your muscles. Find a peaceful place where you’ll be free of interruptions. Then follow these steps:

• Choose a focus word, phrase, or image you find relaxing. Examples of words or phrases include “peace,” or “I am peaceful.” This is called a mantra.
• Sit quietly in a comfortable position.
• Close your eyes.
• Relax your muscles, starting at your head, working down your body to your feet.
• Breathe slowly and naturally, focusing on your word, phrase, or image.
• Continue for 10 to 20 minutes. If your mind wanders, that’s okay. Gently return your focus to your breathing and the word, phrase, or image you selected.
• After time is up, sit quietly for a few minutes with your eyes closed. Open your eyes and sit in silence for a few more minutes.

To rest your mind and take a visual journey to a peaceful place, consider listening to soothing sounds.

If you have about ten minutes and a quiet room, you can take a mental vacation almost anytime with soothing sounds. Consider music such as relaxation CDs or internet radio stations to help you unwind. To rest your mind and take a visual journey to a peaceful place, consider the following:

Spoken word. These CDs use spoken suggestions to guide your meditation, educate you on stress reduction or take you on an imaginary visual journey to a peaceful place.

Soothing music or nature sounds. Music has the power to affect your thoughts and feelings. Soft, soothing music can help you relax and lower your stress level.

Your relationship with your self is the most important relationship because as they say wherever you go there you are. Wellness begins with “being” well first and then is about “doing” things to be well. If you do not address who you are being than just doing things will not make you well. A simple way to remember this is that we refer to ourselves as human beings, not human doings.

Dr. Sue Morter, a wellness expert and one of the developers of Morter Health Systems, teaches about self esteem and healthy thinking in an extremely effective and practical manner. She explains how the body is the caboose of our self. It is who we are, how we are thinking and the story we have about our life that impacts our physical health and well-being. Her inspirational high-energy seminars begin by asking the simple question “Are you living well?” “Yes, I AM” the audience proclaims in an effort to understand that living well begins with making the self-declaration that I choose to be well. Her powerful message is communicated beautifully through simple stories that explain insightful metaphors for attaining things that are important for us to have in our lives. For example, if you were going to a party that you knew would not have the food or drink you wanted what would you do she asks? Just “bring it” the audience responds. That too, is what you do to begin the process of “being” well you bring it forward in your awareness.

If the idea of our thinking affecting our health seems far fetched, there is a really simple way to illustrate how this is true. If you opened your hand and then closed it into a fist you would be illustrating exactly the same concept of how your mind or your thinking causes your body to move and to function. Perhaps you may think that is too simple, so imagine if someone showed up on your door step and told you that you had just won the Discover Wellness, How Staying Healthy Can Make You Rich sweepstakes grand prize of $100 million dollars, do you think then your breathing would change? Might your heart rate change at least a little bit? How about your blood pressure? That’s because your awareness or consciousness affects your physical body and it works both for you and against you. Most people don’t realize this cause and effect relationship and therefore reverse it by determining what they should think based on how they feel. I AM so sick and tired of all this, people exclaim. I AM in pain, I AM angry and so on. It is completely up to us to determine what we choose to be and choose to feel and those choices are at the cause of how our body responds.

Based on this understanding of how health and wellness come from within, who else can we expect to manifest it for us in our lives? she asks. It is our personal responsibility to become self aware or as Dr. Sue once again so simply puts it, “We must be present to win.” We must live in the present in a state of gratitude and appreciation for our lives and circumstances in it. Our relationship with our self is our responsibility and the basis of intentional living. By having a positive relationship with yourself, you can manifest innate wellness.

We function a lot like computers: Garbage in produces garbage out, while great stuff in produces great stuff out. We talk to ourselves far more than we talk to others. In fact, most experts agree that about 80 percent of all conversations we have are with ourselves. All too often, we talk to ourselves with anger, fear, belittlement, and negativity. “I knew there wouldn’t be any parking,” or “I knew that they were going to be mad at me,” or “I am always depressed this time of year,” or even “I just can’t seem to do anything right,” are examples of the kind of negative inner talk we play over and over again in our minds. We acknowledge our ability to manifest our inner thinking and yet the majority of our inner thinking is negative and demeaning.

This raises a very important point. If we are powerful enough to manifest our negative thoughts, why can’t we also manifest our positive thoughts? The answer is that we can. In order to create positive thoughts instead of negative ones, we must decide in advance to be proactive and to discipline ourselves to take out the old mental program of negativity and immediately replace it with the new mental program of being positive and kind. I have found the best way to do this is through the use of affirmations.

Affirmations are positive self-talk designed to help you create the life of your dreams. Using affirmations on a daily basis is a simple step you can take to get what you want out of life and to reduce stress, fear, and depression. Making positive, affirmative statements to yourself will change your self-image, raise your self-esteem, and create an attitude of expectancy.

Here are some of the keys that allow you to maximize the power of your daily affirmations:

• Affirmations should be written down. This allows you to crystallize your thoughts and gives you a reference to refer back to daily.
• Affirmations should be in the first person and in the current time frame. They should always contain the word “I” and be in the “now” time frame, as they are the truth, told in advance. Remember the rule, “to become, act as if.”
• Affirmations are best done in the morning to start your day or in the evening before going to sleep. This helps to program your subconscious mind with positive thoughts.
• Affirmations can be either memorized or read, and need to be said aloud with emotion. This is what is necessary to open the trap door between your educated and innate mind.

Let me share some possible affirmations with you to get you thinking properly about creating your own. Remember that you can and should create affirmations for all parts of your life. Affirm professionally, spiritually, financially, and in all other areas.

For example: “I am happy, I am healthy, and I am wise. My potential is unlimited and I am growing every day. I am a magnet that attracts all the good of the universe to me daily. I am committed to constant and never-ending personal improvement, and I take massive action steps to create the future, as I want it to be. I will do whatever it takes to become the winner I know I am.”

Another example could be: “My beliefs create my reality! I choose robust health, abundant wealth, constant happiness and eternal love. I attract and positively influence the lives of people in my community. I think big thoughts, relish small pleasures and handle setbacks gracefully. I give thanks for the opportunity to serve humanity and I willingly accept the rewards being sent to me by an abundant universe. I am deeply grateful for all I create and receive. My life is now in total balance and I am a master!”

Relationships are important for good emotional health. Numerous studies have shown that people who have close friends and intimate relationships are healthier, happier, and live longer. In fact, the simple act of petting a dog, holding a child, or seeing someone you love causes a decrease in stress hormones in the blood, decreases blood pressure, and calms the mind. So, if you want to be healthy, stay connected to others.

As the author Dr. Tedd Koren says “Emotional health is also dependent on being connected – to yourself and others. The more connected you are to yourself the more you can connect with others and the more fulfilling your connections (relationships). The more relationships in your life the more happiness, joy, hope, optimism and vitality you will have; the healthier and longer you will live and the quicker you will recover from physical and emotional traumas and illness.”

Many allergic and asthmatic reactions are caused by hypersensitivity of the immune system and chiropractic care can help. Allergies are often treated with chiropractic care. Many allergic and asthmatic reactions are caused by hypersensitivity of the immune system and/or respiratory system. Researchers have found that the immune and respiratory systems depend on normal communication from the brain and spinal cord to control and coordinate their functions properly.

Therefore, if your neck is misaligned, it could cause an imbalance in your nervous system function. This upper cervical spinal joint irritation could possibly produce or exaggerate asthmatic and allergic symptoms. For example; many asthma and allergy sufferers experienced traumas such as head injuries, auto accidents, or falls which could have injured their upper cervical spines. The good news is that we can perform an upper cervical examination to determine if chiropractic care can reduce your allergic and asthmatic reactions. Schedule an appointment today!