Happy Wednesday to You!
I hope you are all happy, well, and enjoying our “Movement As Medicine” series.
In my blog today:
1. Movement as Medicine (Pt. 5): Pumping
2. Healing Help Needed! Natalya Mammadova’s sister badly injured.
1. Movement as Medicine (Pt. 5): Pumping
Did you know that the human being is the only creature in nature that has to pump feces up hill, against gravity? Well, it’s true.
Our upright posture, be it seated, or standing is such that there is a vertical climb from the end of the small intestine (cecum) upward through the ascending colon.
Once the journey upward through the ascending colon, fecal material must still move through the transverse colon through muscular action before turning the corner and heading down via the descending colon.
In my drawing above, you can see that our bodies are designed so that when we squat, assuming our natural posture for defecation, the right thigh compresses the ascending colon, and the left thigh the descending colon.
This demonstrates the importance of the full squat position as an internal aid to our own health.
If we eat processed foods to the point that they displace wholefoods, and the roughage they provide, our intestinal tract becomes bogged down with something more like pasty glue than decomposed food remains. The result is commonly that the colon becomes impacted, encrusted, caked in toxic fecal material.
Although an active person can develop an impacted colon (which begins as constipation in most instances) from eating poor quality foods and drinks alone, they are often better off than an inactive person on the same diet.
This is because that most any exercise we do standing on our own feet without a balance aid is pumping us within due to pressure fluctuations caused by moving the body. Exercise in general also tends to improve the quality of our tissues, giving them more integrity.
Don’t Strain In Vein!
Have you ever noticed that sedentary, overweight, and/or obese people seem to grunt along when doing typical activities of daily living, such as getting in and out of a chair, getting in and out of a car, moving boxes, making beds, etc.?
This is typically because their deep abdominal wall and pelvic floor have become so weak and poorly coordinated that they have to stop breathing to produce a “bracing reaction” in order to protect their spinal column from injury.
This bracing reaction is called a “Valsalva’s Manouver”: A maneuver first described by an Italian, A.M. Valsalva (1666-1723). It occurs when the breath is held while muscles in the abdomen and chest are contracted.
With the contraction, the chest contents become compressed, increasing gas pressure in the cavity of the thorax and blood pressure in the blood vessels; the abdominal contents are also put under pressure, which increases in proportion to the degree of physical exertion.
When breathing is restarted, a reflex reaction causes the heart to slow down, sometimes resulting in dizziness and fainting.
The pressure of pushing feces out of you during periods of constipation can easily be more pressure than the colon of many individuals can handle causing a bulge in the colon, called a “diverticula”.
The longer one has eaten commercially raised foods, and/or processed foods as the mainstay of their diet, the weaker their tissues are and the more likely they will develop a diverticula in their colon.
Once a diverticula is created, fecal material, parasites, fungi, bacteria, viruses, and rotting food remains get stuck in them. This begins a process of both poisoning the body, but encourages the growth of pathogenic bacterial, parasites, and encourages fungal infections in the gut, which contribute to leaky gut syndrome.
This is actually serious shit that is going on all around you (hopefully not inside you!).
Aside from following the essential diet/hydration and lifestyle recommendations provided in my book, How To Eat, Move and Be Healthy!, and the food recommendations in my audio/workbook program titled, You Are What You Eat!, getting regular movement throughout the day can go a long way to improving your overall health, inside and out.
The Breathing squat is a simple exercise from my book How To Eat, Move and Be Healthy!, and it is a great aid to the digestive/eliminative system and processes.
The Breathing Squat is done starting from a standing position and taking a deep belly-breath in through your nose, and lowering your body into the squat as you exhale. You should go as deep into the squat as you comfortably can.
I recommend doing this exercise at a low enough intensity that you could comfortably do it on a full stomach. During the exercise, your heart rate, nor breathing rate should speed up. Essentially, if you are fit enough to get into and out of a chair, then you should be able to do this exercise easily.
For those that can’t comfortably support their own weight during a squat, or who can’t squat deep enough to rest in the basic squat position used to poop in the woods, a Swiss ball is a great help.
As you see in the drawing above, you do the same exercise, and still get some good pumping, but the support of the ball is enough that most people can squat all the way down, or close to it. The deeper you go, the more effective the exercise is for pumping feces upward in the ascending colon, and downward in the descending colon.
If there is any pain in hip or knee joints (or anywhere in the body) while doing Breathing Squats, simply make smaller squatting movements.
Keep your movements and breath timed so that your exhale ends as you finish descending into the squat, and the inhale ends in time with your standing upright from the squat position. ‘As your body warms and heals from practice, and applying the diet and lifestyle changes
I suggest in my books and programs, you are likely to find you can go deeper and deeper without discomfort. Just allow it to happen naturally.
My recommendation for this exercise is as follows:
1. For those with round, distended abdomens: Perform 10-20 Breathing Squats every hour of the waking day. If possible, get a session of 10 minutes first thing in the morning before you start our day, and 10 minutes in the just after dinner.
2. For general health maintenance: 10 minutes of breathing squats while the sunrises, or sets. Any of the zone 1-4 exercises in my book How To Eat, Move and Be Healthy! will help digestion and elimination in general.
NOTE: Those with issues of constipation, digestion/elimination challenges, or who have pain performing simple movements like this would be well served to hire a CHEK HLC Practitioner to assess them and construct a program suited to their individual needs. You can find CHEK HLC Practitioners near you through our locator system: www.chekconnect.com
2. HEALING HELP NEEDED! Natalya Mammadova’s sister badly injured!
If you’ve been following my blog lately, you are aware that I’ve been in the process of coaching Natalya Mammadova from Russia (considered one of the world’s best volleyball players).
Natalya and her trainer/translator Boris made the long trip to spend three weeks with me and we were having a great time getting lots done with her.
Last weekend, Natalya got an emergency call, informing her that her sister was the victim of a hit-and-run car accident in NYC. Her sister, “Yelena” was badly injured. She sustained a broken ankle, a badly fractured pelvis, and a bad injury to the rib cage, resulting in both a collapsed lung and water in her lungs.
The doctors have her on a respirator and can’t operate on her pelvis because she’s too unstable to endure the surgery.
Natalya and Boris had to grab everything and fly to New York City right away; there is no one in her family that could support her and fortunately, Natalya was in the country working with me.
Vidya and I went out to my stone circle and we took down the three stacks Natalya, Boris and I had recently made. We created a healing mandala out of stone for Yelena Skazka out of the stones that have been handled by Boris and Natalya; this creates sympathetic resonance between the sisters because Natalya’s vibration is now in the stones.
The stone structure in the center represents all of us willing to share some love with her, wrapping around her and infusing her with our spirit, our Love. The four stacks in the cardinal directions represent the energies/elements of the four directions, as well as representing Vidya, Boris, Natalya, and I.
Here you can see me spraying evian water infused with my love and chi onto the stones to activate the love and healing intentions symbolized within them. We are sending Yelena love and blessings throughout the day. I have been meditating on her and sending love at night in my IR sauna.
PLEASE HELP with a moment of heart-space for Yelena. If you can take a moment of your time to close your eyes and see that part of yourself knows as Yelena Skazka as “Whole”, as one with the Universe, as a vital living contributor to the life-plan for us all, that would be a great gift to Yelena, Natalya, and their family.
Love given without attachment takes nothing from us, and the great masters say that love given without attachment, as unconditional love, comes back a thousand fold.
Thank you for taking the time to read this. And THANK YOU for sharing your healing love and thoughts of Wholeness with the body-mind and soul of Yelena and her family.
We send our love and blessings to you Yelena, Natalya, your family, and Boris at this time in your life.
“You Are Safe!”
“You Are Home!”
“You Are Whole!”
It is done!
It is done!
It is done!
Ah Ho! Great Spirit!
Love and chi,
Paul Chek
