Our Biology is our Biography.
I’ve spent the past few weeks really getting to know my own bio-emotional archetypal structure. Being the way my emotions show up in my body and the way I hold myself. How depression, trauma, anxiety show up in my own posture and neuromuscular-skeletal system. Specifically looking at what was stagnant in my body and was needing a shift. Physically it can be quite obvious when someone is suffering. The general archetype for someone who is depressed may be turning inwards, rounding their back, (intuitively protecting themselves), bowing their heads to hinder themselves from the world.
Living in the close proximity of the DTES (downtown east side) it’s evident when you look at someones own posture the pain they are in and or have experienced. The amount of people I see hunched over, hands gripped, excessive tension throughout their muscular-skeletal system this are all signs of years of pent up emotions/stress/ and hyper-aroused nervous systems. Now I’m not saying holding these postures are necessarily “bad”. The body does not know morality nor should it. However, these postural holdings aren’t optimal for longevity of health and mobility. In essence “our biology is our biography” our bodies literally hold us, have endured every psychological event we have been through. The body tells our story.
Our bodies have bio-feedback loops throughout, such as afferent and efferent nerve fibres sending and receiving information too and from the brain, and informing the muscle tissue and membrane through out body, through movement we can change our own narratives. We can change the arriving information to the brain by changing our posture. We can tell the body we are safe and no longer needing protection by soothing the nervous system. Habitually we can become stagnant in our own postures. Creating movement, expansion, and bringing the body into different shapes challenges archetypal informed emotions. The next time you’re feeling an emotion or mental health fluctuation begin to notice what your body is doing. Notice the points of tension, what the spine is doing, the neck, shoulders, head, and challenge those positions by creating subtle movement. By rolling the shoulders back, elongating the spine throughout your day. It might create a different emotional response for you. One that may be lighter, and more optimal for your overall well-being.
As when we are hunched over we are not breathing optimally, when we are not breathing this can cause disruption in homeostatic functioning. Reducing the amount of oxygen levels in the body, inducing fatigue, brain fog, and irregular moods via the HPA (hypothalamus pituitary adrenal) axis and its involvement in regulation of the neuroendocrine system. Breathing specifically works alongside our circulatory system by oxygenating the body via red blood cells.
One thing that is similar across the board is that as people all have our own unique neuromuscular-skeletal variation. Attuning to our own bodies nuances allows for greater insight into how we hold emotions. Changing our postures can change our emotional state by disrupting habitual postural holdings and their associated thought patterns. Changing our posture can change our respiration rate and oxygen intake. Our oxygen intake can change our mental state through providing more oxygen to visceral organs. When we experience pain, we feel it in our body. Thus, influences all of these interconnected systems. Our biology is our biography, and can be one avenue into further understanding our mental health and its relationship to physiological functions within the body.
