This month we return to explore our Blossom core philosophical lenses and are happy to share a focus on one of them a month. It feels wonderful as a practitioner to dive into these and prepare to share them with you. Each lens builds on the next as we lay out a foundation for the unique ways in which we view healing here at the studio. As I dive in to these, I get a layer deeper myself into an element of healing and worldview truth that is core to me. These core principles have been in my life now for a decade or two, however in my experience they are like constant unfoldings, rememberings and forgettings. Skip to the end of this entry if you’d like to see them all laid out before proceeding!
Some of these ideas run fairly counter to principles of culture I was raised in or currently live in. Our culture is much like a current that takes us along. We experience it both from our individual family cultures as well as our community culture (or subculture as it were), as well as from the country we live in and the currents of belief we find ourselves in during this stage in human history. It frames who we are, unless, we also become aware enough of it to begin to sculpt a system of belief from within us. We claim our own culture, and, in so doing, the lenses through which we will experience our life. Many of us are like a soup of those ideas we have inherited and live out, conscious or unconscious, as well as the ones we have found as young and older adults that feel like truth to us. We say, this, this makes more sense to me. Yet, running within, there it is, the inherited programing that runs counter to what we want to believe, what makes sense to us now. So, it is like a remembering and a forgetting. A rhythmic process. And even in this rhythm, this ebb and flow that feels much like forgetting our innately connected and healthy selves time and time again to the disorienting dark of sickness, ailment, or isolation, we still find ourselves intricately connected to the world which we are so deeply woven. Like an ocean’s tide moving in and out, the light of morning replaced with the dark star sparkle of night, or spring’s promise cycling into winter’s cold quiet.
These core lenses, for me, are like a homecoming. They whisper of a deep truth which, when pondered upon, begin to reveal a sense of hope, even in the most troubling of times.
Chiropractic Philosophy & Practice: Who is the Healer? Who does the healing? The role of Innate Intelligence
Before I dive into this month’s theme from a uniquely chiropractic lens, I would like to share that in our core system of chiropractic, we express what we do from a uniting of a “three legged stool.” This stool is composed of philosophy, science, and art. Here we are exploring primarily the philosophical lens we are looking through, along with the art of application. Now to get to the goods.
Now let’s dive into it. In our worldview, who is the healer? Who does the healing? Is it us? Is it the adjustment? Is it our particular techniques, things we say, the resting room?
In short, that which does the healing is the Innate Intelligence of the body. The definition we can go by is that A “living thing” has an inborn intelligence within its body, called Innate Intelligence. The mission of innate intelligence is to maintain the material of the body of a “living thing” in active organization. This inborn intelligence is considered to be that coordinator of the healing forces and organization inside of your body, your mind, your emotions, your relationships, and your life.
Why is it so powerful to have an inborn intelligence along with healing power inside of the body? That incredible intelligence directs healing power to go to work where and how it is needed, and it does this coordination at massively rapid rates with millions of processes taking place at the exact same time inside of the body.
Sometimes I like to ponder the wonder of the intelligence coordinating every cell inside of the body much like the wonder I feel when looking up at the night sky on a night when the Milky Way is showing. It is so huge and infinite. In a mirroring way, so is the depth of the human body. Our cells are a multitude of coordinated members inside of the community of our human body. All of them a rapid dance of electrons taking the coordinated shape of organs, dna, neurons, etc.!
It’s like a glorious symphony of players, all coordinated into a well tuned and beautiful song called "healthy you" kept in tune by that incredible intelligence: the conductor.
Truly, anything that then can help to inspire this conductor to play the tune of health vs. the tune disease or illness is healing!
In this way, at the studio, we as the chiropractors aim to collaborate with your innate intelligence by inspiring healing within from the moment we engage with you, offer an adjustment, and say goodbye until next time.
So in our view, while someone might interact with a person or take medicines or make art or write or do many other things to spark healing, the actual weave of cellular healing in the body is inspired and coordinated by the master conductor within, your innate intelligence. This brilliance within is inborn and always present until the final breathe has gone and the heart has completed its work.
Studio Culture: Innate Intelligence in Practice
Our entire studio is designed with the mission in mind to help you tune to health from the moment you walk in, so that you may relax and thereby begin the process of moving from a “protective” type state into a “growth” type state, the state where the innate intelligence of the body is most free to bring about cellular healing and restoration.
In other words, you walk in from “out there” and you enter an environment that holds the truth for you that you do have this brilliance within! “Out there” the most common story you will hear is all about the problems. The ways in which your body fails you, or the world, or life, etc. You hear about what to watch out for, what to fear, etc. So that which is breaking down is often what is being amplified into your mind, rather than what is in the process of being built. This leads to further states of disorganization and entropy due to a mental and emotional state that is being further scattered and discoordinated. This is akin to an orchestra completely out of tune! Where is the symphony?
Inside of the studio we know that bringing the symphony back together is a huge part in helping an individual (and, well, an entire symphonic body of humanity as well) head into healing. So we want you to know that you are walking into a culture that holds your brilliant innate intelligence in high esteem.
I like how Bruce Lipton often describes these communities of cells, and then the “cells” of humanity as harmonic people. In this interview he is describing a basic idea idea about how if you put cells in a petri dish and then introduce a chemical environment of “love”, the cells will expand and move in this direction, in other words, they will open to growth. If you introduce a chemical environment of “fear”, the cells will contract into a protective stance, walling themselves off, and essentially freezing into the opposite of a healing potential.
Wanna geek out on that idea? Here is an interview excerpt of Bruce Lipton from an interview I did of him for the film Love Bomb.
At Blossom we aim to be an environment of “love”, where the individuals who enter will feel this and begin the process of expanding into their growth potential. They begin to move from disharmonic to harmonic. The inner brilliant conductor of the Innate Intelligence is liberated and encouraged to play the tone of healing to the cells of the body.
This awareness of ours then also extends into the healing moment of the chiropractic adjustment. As we work with your body, we do so knowing that we are working to liberate that which is right in you. We know that this healing intelligence is far greater than any one element of what we might understand from our minds about what is going to bring about the most powerful healing for you. We do our best work therefore in helping your body to become aligned through the adjustment, so that we can then "get out of the way" and let the healing happen.
This is where the resting room comes in, as we know this innate intelligence is now flowing, going to work. As we chiropractor like to say “the power is on” and now we let you rest in a moment of ease, or a moment of positive meditation, soaking in the free flow of healing energy and harmonics. We want this to really have time to go to work in the body so that when you walk out the door, back "out there", you are more in touch with your own innate flow, innate symphony, so that instead of immediately going back into reaction of all of the other conductors out there of out of tune chaos, you can bring your own well tuned conductor to the scene! You can be a source of harmonics from the inside out.
Or at the very least, you can feel a lot better. The rest is a process, and that is where individualized care plans come in :).
Resource:
One of the best ways I know how to participate in the healing idea that there is an innate intelligence within the body is to take a look at the incredible things that intelligence already coordinates on a daily basis.
Take a moment to ponder this:
At one point you were a sperm and egg coming together, forming a cell, which then began to divide and divide and divide and divide. As it divided, a body got put together. An innate intelligence coordinated stem cells to differentiate to become body parts. They then became bone cells, and skin cells, and heart cells, and brain cells. All of this was being tied together by a brain and spinal cord forming as primary to bring about the developing of everything else. This process lasts for roughly the same amount of time in every mom and then you were born. Once born, that same intelligence stayed present to see you crawl, then walk, then learn to talk, etc. On and on that intelligence formed you and then even now, as you learn new things or create new habits there it is, it is there ready to reshape the parts of the brain needed to bring about this new learning and change.
And some inspiring facts!
Every day, your heart pumps at least 4 litres of blood throughout your entire body in 1,000 round trips, totalling a distance greater than two trips around the world.
Information zooms along your nerves at about 400 kmph.
Your mouth produces about one litre of saliva each day.
The human brain produces 100,000 chemical signals per second.
The acid in your stomach is so strong it could dissolve an iron nail!
To stop your stomach digesting itself, it’s lined with a protective mucus, and your stomach cells are replaced every few days.
About one third of the body’s blood flows through the liver every minute! It’s your largest internal organ and has about 500 different jobs! It’s like a chemical processing factory – blood carries nutrients there from the small intestine, then the liver decides what to do with them. It also gets rid of toxins (substances that can be harmful to the body), recycles old blood cells, makes bile and other digestive juices, and produces, stores and releases glucose (to give you energy).
(All facts in this paragraph from natgeokids.com resources for parents 1/10/18).
And this is literally just scratching the surface of the amazing events happening inside of your body every minute and being coordinate by an innate intelligence!
Practice:
My favorite personal go-to in between sessions with the healing helpers and habits of my life is the “Faith” track from Breathe Love. You can press play on it just about anywhere and immediately allow it to free the mind from the grip of a negative railway and move it into a more positive state of being.
The “Faith” track in particular is written to help you to remember the fact that you have this inborn intelligence, and this inborn healing power. For a slightly longer practice you can play “Hope” as well, and for a full internal reset, I recommend a nice hour long walk or hike while listening to the entire album.
Like I mentioned in the opening of this blog- we have strong cultural programming and inner concepts. Even though this idea of your inborn intelligence is true, and healing, it is still possible to wreak havoc on the job of this intelligence through chaotic, doubt filled, fear driven emotional states of dwelling. These tracks are designed to be little midwives of a healthier state within you. They are designed to take over and guide you back to a more balanced way of being, whereby the intelligence within can do the job of symphony conductor.
And, I can’t recommend enough, when the going gets rough, seek out the trustworthy healers of your life whose aim it is to realign you to YOUR innate intelligence, innate truth, and unique healing transformation.
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The Blossom Philosophical Lenses We Are Covering:
These weave from one to the next, and also offer a series of explorations into what healing means at Blossom and how you can engage further in it yourself.
2. Who is the Healer? Who does the healing? The role of Innate Intelligence.
3. If you have an inborn healer, why do things go wrong? The Causes of Interference to the healing power of the Innate Intelligence.
4. What does it mean to heal? (Healing as it relates to Curing)
5. Chiropractic Healing & The Primacy of the Nervous System
6. Freedom & Healing Momentum
7. Adaptation and the Building of Resilience & Flexibility
8. Harmony is the Healing State: The Amplification of Coherence.
9. Active Participation in Change Makes Healing Transformation
10. Building the Capacity for Honest Self-Awareness
11. The Power of a Positive Healing Image