When you get a new smartphone or computer, you assume that once you’ve connected to the internet and updated any older programming, your device is ready to use—out of the box, as they say.
A smartphone comes pre-programmed to do all sorts of amazing things. It’s a calculator, a flashlight, a camera, a to-do list, a calendar, a weather service, an address book, and, oh yeah, a phone.
We expect it to just work.
And when something isn’t working as it should, the device usually lets us know through notifications of some kind. For the most part, though, we take the “inner workings” for granted. We don’t think about them unless we’re notified that something is wrong—or we notice that the phone isn’t functioning the way it should.
There are people working toward a future where technology can be implanted into our bodies: a microchip that could eventually serve as a replacement for the smartphone, putting all of that technology directly inside us.
The irony is that we already have something remarkably similar. It’s in us already. Most of us came into this world, out of the box, so to speak.
Our bodies and minds grow and develop without us having to read a manual or watch a YouTube video explaining how to grow and repair cells, how to digest food, or how to turn that food into energy.
We already have an operating system. And we already have all kinds of apps installed.
That operating system, along with those apps, has been evolving for as long as our species has been on this planet. It contains incredibly sophisticated systems for regulating, adapting, sensing, responding, repairing, connecting, and surviving.
We don’t have to consciously tell our hearts to beat or our lungs to breathe. We don’t have to remember how to heal a cut or instruct our bodies to mount an immune response.
The programming is already there.So what happens to our health?
For many people, decline doesn’t begin the moment symptoms appear. Symptoms are more like notifications—signals that something has already been happening beneath the surface.
Often, the disconnection comes first. At some point, many of us learn to disconnect from ourselves in order to survive. We disconnect from our bodies, our sensations, our emotions, our instincts, and from the tools we already have within us that help us reconnect.
And sometimes, we stay disconnected.
This is where I think of biohacking in its most basic form—not as expensive technology or complicated gadgets, but as learning to work with the technology we were born with.
Our breath, our focus, our energy, our will, our imagination, sound, movement, and awareness.
These are some of the tools we can use to reestablish a connection with the automated programs we’ve inherited from generations before us. This is one of the central features of NeuroSpinal Optimization.
The goal isn’t simply to help someone come out of survival mode so they can heal and recover. It’s also to help them recognize when they’ve become disconnected—and learn how to reconnect.
To connect more deeply with themselves. As people learn to connect more deeply, they often begin to notice conversations that have been happening inside them all along.
They notice that they aren’t breathing. Or that they’re breathing so shallowly that it almost feels like they aren’t breathing at all. They notice that they’re clenching their muscles. They notice their posture, their thoughts, their energy.
At first, these signals can be subtle. Or sometimes they can be obvious.
It might feel like an intrusive thought, except it isn’t a thought. It’s a bodily sensation. An awareness. A signal coming from somewhere inside. And with practice, something changes.
Those sensations and awarenesses become easier to recognize. Instead of feeling intrusive, they begin to run quietly in the background—like the notifications and processes happening inside your phone that you don’t have to consciously monitor.
You simply know they’re there and can benefit from the information that is being shared with you Being more connected to yourself and your body means being able to tune into your own inner workings whenever you need to—even when you’re dealing with stress, difficult circumstances, or challenging thoughts.
Connection creates a sense of home, a sense of safety, a sense of consistency.
It’s like having someone in your life who is dependable and always there for you.Except this time, it’s you. It’s your own operating system and your own built-in apps. The systems that have been working for you all along.
And as you become more familiar with them, you can begin to trust the information they’re giving you.
When you’re more connected with yourself and your body, you can experience less fear, less anxiety, less worry, and less tension. You can have greater access to your internal resources, more capacity to respond rather than react, and more freedom to create and express what matters to you.
The technology you need to begin that journey may not be something you need to buy, download, or implant. It’s already in you.
At The Happy Spine, we don’t just consider your spine. We consider your whole inner world—and how well you’re connected to it.