Guest Blog - Ashley Ahrens - Why its important to move
Why it’s so important to get up and move throughout the day! Hint: it has to do with Fascia Ashtanga Yoga
First, let's get this out of the way: the movement I speak of does not have to be full-blown sweaty high impact exercise! Some people love this, but I am not in that group of people and for the better half of my life I totally avoided exercise because I just thought “well if I’m not giving 100% then what’s the point?”
I am guilty of being a perfectionist, and giving up on ideas/projects before even trying because of the fear of failure - I’m sure many of you can relate. I have been working hard to change my natural way of thinking from one of fear of failure to being open-minded and trying things without expectations of outcomes. I’m talking about the Growth vs Fixed mindset (a highly recommended book - Mindset by Dr. Carol S Dweck - explores this topic in detail!!). This mentality approach applies to most areas of my life, but in this article, I am specifically referring to movement and exercise (and for the sake of my point today, Yoga will be classified within this. - Yoga Asana and Vinyasa of course). Honestly, during my teens and 20s, I would only try exercise if I was ‘really going for it’ otherwise I viewed it as a waste of time.
I'm 37 now and still catch myself sometimes with this mentality in the back of my mind. ‘Well if you aren’t going to do the entire Primary Series and half of Intermediate, then you may as well just lay on the couch. I’m a learner through experience, and through repeated experience have come to find that yes,
it is completely fine to just do a little bit rather than do nothing, and no, that doesn’t make me a failing Yoga practitioner or unworthy teacher. Doing some sun salutations and calling it a day is totally acceptable on those days when you just can’t even. Keep in mind there is a fine line between self-punishment and total lethargy.
Can we move by being honest with ourselves with what we truly need in that moment? Picking our mind out of a rut or self-punishing way of thinking? Or pushing too hard - also a product of the mind and our desires of physical outcomes - and potentially hurting our body? Somewhere in between that is where we want to get to when we think about what kind of movement we need to incorporate into our day.
Our bodies are meant to move. It’s important for the physiology and well-being of our mind and every single anatomical system in our body. We are designed to move and it brings us better health and more resilience.
Specifically, the flow of blood through our arteries and veins functions better through movement. The muscles of our legs, especially the calves, are needed to pump blood back to the heart against gravity. If this action is impaired then we can easily develop deep vein thrombosis (blood clots in the legs) which can lead to other complications if the clots move around our cardiovascular system and become lodged anywhere (for example in the arteries of our lungs).
Movement allows us to breathe - an unconscious action that can be voluntary, the capacity to alter our physical and mental state relies on our ability to breathe deeply (take a deep breath to calm down).
Our nervous system runs through a network of fascia in our body, and they both allow communication across the entire body and brain so everything functions well together.
Fascia is the connective tissue that encapsulates our muscles, binding them to our skin and to our bones, holds our organs, nerves, blood vessels and parts of the immune system, allowing them to COMMUNICATE through ONE CONTINUOUS structure.
It was previously thought (only a couple of decades ago!!) that the fascia was not that functional, that it was just there to hold things in place. Recently the importance of fascia has come into place, and while we do not know a ton about it, what we do know is that it allows us to move effectively, allows our body systems to communicate across it (is involved in the transport of electrical signals from the nervous system through to muscle tissue),
and that it is also an EMOTIONAL centre, holding memories that your mind probably cannot easily retrieve.
I will never forget the first time I learned about fascia: I was taking an Animal Zoology course at University and we had to dissect a cat as part of our laboratory section. The first thing we did (I’m so sorry to kitty lovers out there - I am too, it was a valuable learning experience though!) was cut the skin off. We used a scalpel to separate the skin layer from the muscles underneath - and no exaggeration - the stuff there looked like white cotton candy. This was the fascia!
Now every time you wake up in the morning and stretch - that feeling of tingling and space that you create across your body, and nice sensation in your mind - that is your fascia!! Think of it as dense cotton candy starting to be pulled apart. When areas of our body have not been moved over time (the insides too, around our organs etc!!) we accumulate density in our fascia, to the point where it can become completely rigid and unmovable.
Guess what? You can - with patience and over time - start to open up your body to allow greater effectiveness of communication across all body systems.
Your body and mind are powerful and always want to move you to a state of healing - what we have to do is listen to our bodies and allow that to occur.
We need to try to get out of our thinking minds to do this, as we tend to give our thinking minds such precedence over our actions. Can we just surrender and let the intelligence of our body go to work, that intelligence we’ve inherited from thousands and thousands of years of gathering that instinctual information from our ancestors?
Healing and comfort is our natural state, and balanced movement and rest is our natural state.
MOVEMENT is key for our body. Our digestive tract works more efficiently when it is able to move well, pushing food from the stomach to eventual excretion. Our digestive tract works better when it’s massaged by our diaphragm - the muscle that separates the upper body (lungs, heart) from the lower body (abdomen, digestive tract, urogenital organs). When we breathe properly with the diaphragm and ribs opening, this massaging occurs, when we breathe up in our chest, our gut also stays quite rigid, which also does not move the fascia lining the gut = accumulation of rigidity over time!
Imagine doing this your whole life? The lack of movement of the gut from our breath? This can lead to constipation, pain, bloating, and a whole host of gut problems just from the lack of movement and buildup of dense fascia over time. Mentally this can lead to irritability, stress, anxiety and the list goes on. When I learned this I was like WOW lightbulb moment, it seems so unbelievably simple and natural, but these types of problems and unfamiliarity with how our bodies and minds work can lead to so many health problems.
Coming back to my original point on movement and actually DOING the work though: you need to find what works for you. Everyone is different.
Some people love that explosive exercise and can switch off from running, HIIT classes, and weights. I am not one of those people, I am so happy I found yoga at the age of 26, it was low impact enough but still extremely challenging through postures and intense vinyasa movements, mindfulness through breath is incorporated as well to get out of the busy mind (or try to).
As unpopular as this may be to say - my competitive, perfectionist side loved it as I was so inspired by other practitioners in the studio by their strength and grace that they achieved through practising yoga. I wanted to do what they were doing and the gains each month were enough that I could start to see that through very hard work and dedication, it was possible for me to do what they were doing as well. Over time that competitive nature wore off as it naturally does in this practice, as that is what it’s meant to do. You learn through your own direct experience of your senses and mind of what you can accomplish, and the possibilities are limitless!