BodyMind healing – with Brain Gym

The connections between mind and body are far more ancient and profound than many people realize. If we manipulate the body, we change the brain. Most of us know that smiling creates a happier mood – this one works through the effect on the heart and on the brain, through the smile muscles and specifically through the vagus nervous sytem.  Okay, whatever. Smile, and you will feel happier. 

 

The connections between weird body parts and the brain are less well known. Take the tendons of the calf. Okay, where I am going with this is to Brain Gym, the amazing Educational Kinesiology techniques developed by Paul and Gail Dennison, Californian educators, more than a decade ago. Back to the tendons. It seems that our ancient bodies naturally shorten the tendons of the feet and lower legs in the presence of danger. This is called the tendon-guard reflex. If you study physiology, you may know about this, but the application by the Dennisons is unique and so interesting. 

If you manipulate the tendons, you see, gently stretching them, you alleviate the brain’s perception of danger. It’s a kind of biofeedback mechanism, if you like. When you flex the tendons, you also relax the stress response and, here comes the interesting part, integrate the front and hind brain, releasing the creative parts of the mind. What you get is not only improved posture, or flexibility, but instantaneous effects in the brain that are immediately usable. Strange but true. 

What you end up with is more creative writing ability, more expressive speech and language, increased ability to communicate and respond, better attention span, and improved social behavior.  While you may not see all of this immediately, you will see improved expression and language, pretty quickly. And you can use this to improve your own creativity of expression. I said this was weird.

 

Before I leave this post, I need to explain how to do it. This is what you do, from the Brain Gym technique: sitting with one ankle over the other knee, put the fingertips on each end of the calf tendon, of the calf muscle, and gently find any taught spots, kneading them until they melt and soften. While holding these spots, apart, slowly and methodically point and flex the foot, extending it up and down. Repeat with the other calf and foot. 

Go on, try it. Especially if you are trying to write something creative or preparing a presentation. Your whole brain is activated and the job becomes much more fluid, much easier. As I said, this stuff is weird.

This is Brain Gym for creative writing ability and expressive speech and language skills, and called the Footflex.  

Go look up Brain Gym and see what your body can do for your mind!