Anti-Hustle for Your Health

Passion, goals, and a desire to better yourself are all good things. But the reality is constant hustle can be exhausting, stressful, and downright damaging to your health. Plus, the more we glorify the hustle, the more we feed the beast of busy –  and the more we praise the pursuit of personal goals above all else. We’ve talked before about the downside of multi-tasking, which has seemingly morphed into this grind, attack it, hustle mentality that is all the rage.

The problem with this mentality is that everything begins takes on the harshness of the hustle – not just your work, but your food, your self-care, your hobbies, your relationships. We rush until we wear ourselves down.

What if betterment means listening to your body more, like going for a walk outside at lunch instead of answering emails or returning calls. After all, what you don’t get done today can always happen tomorrow.

As another Monday arrives, remember – the best kind of hard work comes from a healthy, well-rests place. That’s healthy hustle.

Hardwired to Heal

Every cell in your body is hardwired to be healthy.

The human body has self regulating and self healing mechanisms. In fact, it is always working to maintain a state of balanced function. For example, blood pressure, blood sugar and the heart rate are actively kept within a normal range. To put it another way, you are designed to function, heal and re-create from the inside out.

Unfortunately, in America the expectation is that we are supposed to be sick, and that there is always a solution (usually found in a bottle). To top it off – our lifestyle choices are pointing us directly to heart disease, diabetes, cancer, and autoimmune, inflammatory and neurological diseases.

The truth is – you’re simply the culmination of your body’s inability to adapt to the stressors placed upon it on a regular basis. When you come to this realization, it leaves you with 2 choices: remove the stress OR increase your body’s ability to adapt to it.

So, how do we improve our body’s ability to adapt? Well, stressors (aka your life) cause spinal shifts within the inner framework of your body. Which means one way in which we can help is when our body’s self-healing forces become impaired or impeded by this structural imbalance. This leads to an impaired nervous system – which can reduce immune function, concentration, recovery from illness and injury; it could lessen athletic performance and digestive function. It could even alter behavior.

When we look at the nervous system, any structural imbalance that occurs becomes part of your pattern as you get older. This cartilage system, this spine, if it’s shifted, altered or distorted, it’s automatically creating an inhibition or interference in the neurological system. That pattern becomes yours as you get older, and it’s much more difficult to correct or to set right. The goal in our office is to maintain the integrity of your spine and nervous system (the earlier you start – the better). By applying precise and accurate adjustments to your spine – we help your body get back to normal structure, where it heals best.

Instead of focusing on the health lost, deterioration created, energy decrease, immune system suppression and all the negative effects of nerve interference and not fulfilling all your requirements, at True Health Family Chiropractic, we choose to focus on the untapped potential for health and vitality available for your body.

While important, no matter what other steps you add – diet, exercise, meditation – without a proper nerve supply, you can never be at your full potential. If you want to be healthy, you have to have a healthy nervous system.

5 Tips for a Healthy Thanksgiving

healthy thanksgiving

Whether you’re hosting Thanksgiving this year, or simply showing up to eat, the holiday’s can be stressful for the health-minded individual.  The good news: We’ve got 5 excellent tips to keep your holiday the way it should be – filled with family, relaxation and health!

 

1. TURKEY TROT: Start your day off with a brisk fall walk (or run!). Starting your day with exercise is a great way to boost your confidence and keep your health at the forefront of your day (chances are there is a 5K kicking off first thing in the morning in your neighborhood). It’s also important to have some non-food related activities planned (after dinner walk, playing catch, etc.) instead of eating as the sole entertainment.

2. ADD GREENS: Get some color on your plate! Adding delicious, colorful salads and leafy greens to the table before and in addition to turkey time will satisfy your body’s craving for nutrients and prevent over-eating during the main event. Use caution around the junk carbs that your family may push on you – like stuffing, dinner rolls, and pies.

3. SHOW SUPPORT: Support others who are practicing healthy habits during the holidays- don’t sabotage your family or friends by guilting them into over indulging. Be thankful and grateful for what you do have in your life and share with others.

4. DON’T STRESS: No matter how many quality ingredients you put on the table, if you’re weighed down with STRESS during the holidays, you’re not functioning at optimal health! Adjustments help you to better adapt to the stress of the holiday season.

5. DRINK UP: Don’t get too excited – we’re talking about water, it’s important to balance any alcohol intake with water consumption. Plus, staying hydrated is one of the best ways to keep from overeating.

Happy Thanksgiving from True Health Family Chiropractic!

Your Body’s Circuit Panel

Your Body's Circuit Panel

Think of the electrical system in your home. When a power surge stresses the system, a circuit breaker trips to prevent the house from burning down. Now, what if the circuit that was tripped powered the refrigerator? The food inside would start to spoil unless you could get the power turned on before it was too late. As you can see – the problem is not the refrigerator, but the power to the refrigerator.

The tripped circuit breaker OBSTRUCTS the refrigerator’s power source preventing the refrigerator from operating efficiently. In regard to your body, when a structural shift is present, your nervous system is underpowered.

Why is this important? Your nervous system connects to every system in your body. From your muscles and bones, down to your organs like your heart and stomach. It even controls things like your immune system. In many ways, it’s like the electrical system of your house with your brain stem acting as the power source.

When our body has stress beyond our ability to adapt properly (like too many Christmas light strands plugged into a circuit), then the breaker will keep tripping (a recurring shift in the spine and associated secondary conditions).

Make sure your electrical system is working by getting all the necessary structural corrections, at True Health Chiropractic.

It’s Not The Load, It’s The Way You Carry It

posture__health
“It’s not the load that breaks you down, it’s the way you carry it.” – Lena Horne

Our body is an architectural masterpiece – designed to do extraordinary things when functioning optimally. As a Structural Chiropractor, my focus is on the design of your spine. When the spine’s structure matches the blue prints from your DNA, then it is designed to handle the stresses of gravity and a healthy level of activity. However, when the spine loses its proper structure, then those stressors (gravity and activity) can suddenly reveal its weakness. In this post, we’ll focus on the cervical spine (your neck).

Structure Determines Function

The presence of a curve in your neck allows for smoother motion of each of your neck vertebra. It also plays a key role in distributing force throughout the discs of the cervical spine. In essence, a C-shaped curve in the neck can and will prevent early breakdown and degeneration of your spinal joints. As the discs and joints begin to breakdown, it can create the environment for inflammation to build up around the nerves, or even lead to disc protrusions and disc bulges.

When the head shifts forward, it causes the shoulders and thoracic spine to round. When left there over time, the facet joints of the neck stop moving smoothly and lock the head in that forward position. This shifting of the spine can also advance the age of your spine through degeneration. However, when this head forward movement is corrected, the rest of the spine will often shift back into a normal position again and reduce the rounding on its own.

How Do We Correct This?

Postural corrective exercises can be performed to strengthen the upper back and neck. Massage therapy can be performed to address the muscular dysfunction and trigger points resulting from this shift. However, if the shifting of the spine is not addressed – then a correction will often not occur. In our office, we use specific adjustments to correct Structural Shifts allow your body to make Structural Corrections naturally and to the extent that is capable for you.