Show me a runner who is smiling, relaxed and with good posture and I’ll show you a good athlete.
When we take on a task, we bring in an energy. An intent.
Running, like all exercise, is an easy one to spot – you can watch people doing all sorts of movements – climbing the hill with strain throughout the face and body. It looks as though they are running away from something, or in the gym it looks like they are frustrated with the weights.
This is really common in the gym. If we had a photo of the faces, we wouldn’t know what is happening. It appears to be anger even.
Even when it’s not so heavy, there is a conditioning to grimace, to bring tension into the face and strain through the movement.
But it is not just exercise. If you watch people eat, you can see a lot of different energies going into the activity yet again, franticness, doubt and frustration sometimes even through the scowl on the forehead.
Attacking the food, or frustrated at the keyboard on which they type at work.
It turns out, that how we organise our physical body creates a shift in our underlying physiology. Paul Ekman taught us that through conscious “smiling” we can influence testosterone and cortisol levels.
Amy Cuddy also teaches us the importance of posture in influencing these same hormones.
It turns out, if we are smiling while we run, work, organise, or if we are bringing the right intent, we are likely creating an entirely new pathway.
This sends a signal to the underlying physiology that we are working, exercising or moving in a way that is safe, abundant, and is helpful for our physical and mental-emotional bodies.
This brings me to the work of Simon Borg-Olivier. Simon has been a great influence in recent years, he really introduced me to the concept of bringing the right intent in our movement at a deeper level.
In a “Posture, Movement and Breathing” workshop, he taught us how to carry out a movement practice with “loving intent,” to help create a healthy practice rather than a stressful one.
Anyway, today I’m dropping a link to an interview/podcast I just did with Simon.
Last week Simon invited me down to see him in Bondi and we had a great conversation. I hope you enjoy this one as much as I did
You can find the podcast here.
(You can also search iTunes or Spotify for “Access Potential Podcast”)
