Maybe you’ve heard me use the term before in regards to your health. Maybe you’ve never heard of it before. I’d like to write to you today about it because it’s the single most important predictor of your overall health: physical, emotional and mental.
How many times in your life have you known something to be true because you felt it in your heart and body regardless of what your mind was telling you? I’m not talking about the times when you went looking for that chocolate cake in the fridge late at night because your body or mind were telling you eat it:).
I’m talking about messages from the heart that are rooted in a deeper connection, beyond your mind or ego.
The heart and the brain are constantly communicating 24/7. Based on many factors, the brain will signal the heart to pump faster or slower and to do this, it uses the sympathetic (fight/flight) or parasympathetic (recover/heal) nervous systems respectively.
The heart also has its own nervous system, one that can function independently from the brain’s input. In fact, the heart can send messages to the brain, over-ruling the brain at certain times. For example, your mind is telling you: “Eat the chocolate cake” and your heart says: “be better:)”
Whether or not this nervous system in the heart is working well or not can be measured by a technology called heart-rate variability. It’s the technology that we use at the Happy Spine to determine whether someone is in survival mode or whether the person has a high rate of coherence.
Coherence is an optimal state in which heart, mind and emotions are operating in sync and balanced – beyond mere relaxation. It is the prime enabler of behaviour change – unmanaged stress is the prime disabler.
Being in “coherence” helps us build resilience capacity and energy reserves. When we’re in coherence, our response times improve, the brain works better, more efficiently and we can sustain our attention for longer periods of time. It is a state in which our heart beat and breathing synchronize.
Coherence is order, structure, harmony, alignment across systems. Every whole has a relationship to a bigger whole. Like the gears in a vintage watch, Improving coherence in one system will cause a shift in other systems towards coherence.
Cardiac coherence involves the blood pressure system, the respiratory system and the central nervous system (brain and spinal cord). It strengthens our self-regulatory capacity (resilience).
Improving physiological coherence is an effective way to improve self-regulatory capacity and it is one of the main goals of NeuroSpinal Optimization.
When we’re not in coherence, we tend to have problems self-regulating – our emotions, attitudes and behaviours.
These unregulated emotions, attitudes and behaviours are the internal stress in our lives and unchecked, they can create the conditions for disease and degeneration.
If you’re interested in finding out more about coherence and how you can improve your level of coherence (and overall health), join me on Thursday, September 12th from 6 p.m. to 7 p.m. for this complimentary workshop.