If I were forced to choose one movement project for the rest of my life, one movement project to develop my strength, to develop vitality, confidence, self awareness, resilience, one project to try and access all of the benefits, the infinite benefits of a movement practice, I know what that one project would be.

Do you?

At this point you might be asking, why choose one thing? Someone who's Become quite popular for discussing the one thing Gary killer in his book lays out a few different reasons we're not going to go into depth, but Understanding what is the one thing that we should? Prioritize above all else has many benefits including understanding what our priority or what our priority is And being able to make better choices because of understanding what our priority is.

We're able to better manage our time when we make such decisions. When we know what's important. When we know how to structure our time. How to prioritize our time. Especially when we're tight on time. When we can't do everything. What should we prioritize? There's less stress when we have a clear understanding of what is important.

And when we know we're moving forward in what is important even though we're not getting to a bunch of other stuff we would love to do or think we should do. If we know we're getting what is primary, we reduce our stress. In general, we have a much greater clarity and understanding of what levers we need to pull to get where we need to go, to get where we want to go.

These are some of the reasons Gary Keller explains why prioritizing, why understanding what the one thing is. and prioritizing it can give us so much benefits. He also mentions how success generally comes, and I explained this in the previous episode when we discussed how movement is developed from simple to complex, layer by layer,

that by mastering the basic, by mastering certain elements, we proficiently master complex elements. by focusing on certain things. we can build towards much more complex and sophisticated things. But if we try and achieve everything at once, then we will chase all the rabbits and catch none.

But there's another reason that we would benefit a bunch from focusing on one thing, or understanding at least what our highest priority is. And this is the Pareto Principle, the 80 20 rule. And we're going to look at it now through a double edged lens. Firstly, that Acknowledging that most of the harm that we experience to our movement experience, towards our movement development, is actually coming from a select few activities.

Those activities being sitting. The various forms of sitting and sedentary activities we perform. Most of the harm And our movement experience is coming from sitting and related activities. Conversely, most of our potential lies in prioritizing, or can be accessed, by prioritizing the longest levers, the select few movement practices.

Most of the benefit that we can access for our entire movement experience is accessed through some fundamental practices. Nothing is more fundamental and far reaching in its impact than our spinal cord system, our spinal cord complex. And there's a almost sadistic but very interesting connection between these two.

Most of the harm that sitting exerts on us, most of the insult from sitting, comes from its impact on our spine. The way it is anti developmental on our spine, the structures and the dynamics of our spine. And Nothing is more central to our movement potential than our spine and core systems. At the structural and dynamic center.

of our movement experience. And so here we have a connection between where our biggest opportunity lies to, to avoid most of the harm, most of the losses that we are experiencing in our movement in this modern era. And there is a connection from this to where our potential as a natural human mover lies.

How do we get to, how do we access Our movement potential will at rest on a solid bedrock, spinal cord proficiency. And so is there a way that we can, is there one project we can engage with that takes care of both reversing the harm that sitting has caused, is causing on our spinal cord complex and simultaneously develops our spinal cord complex in the direction of our movement potential.

Because if there is one practice that takes care of these two. These two directions, when we have found ourselves. A double edged, double whammy, compounded opportunity to remove most of our harms and amplify most of our potential. And there is something. There is one practice which perfectly achieves both of these inverse ends at the same time.

And this is neutral spine stability. As popularized by Professor Stuart McGill, what is neutral spine stability? A complex of skills, or a movement project. I've come to understand advanced neutral spine stability as the precise awareness of our spine's position in every moment, and whether it's in neutral or not.

Secondly, it is the coherent, coordinated control of spine's supporting muscles. from very low levels of activation through to maximal activations. And while constantly accessing the awareness of our spine's position and the control of our spine's supporting structures, the muscles, we need to maintain unimpeded breathing, full, deep, unrestricted oxygenation, fueling of our system, relaxation of our nervous system.

These three elements, when come together, make up an advanced or elite neutral spine stability ability. And so mastering neutral spine stability to the highest degree and the three components which make up a functional neutral spine stability. By mastering this whole project, this one project, we get to avoid most of the harm.

That we are currently experiencing in our mo in our modern movement era. And we're able to reclaim, re access, much of our movement potential. As much as is possible with a single practice. But more than we would have thought possible with a single practice. And this is why I have made the course Kinetic Keystone.

And hopefully that name even makes a little bit more sense now why that has resonated with me. Kinetic Keystone Really the keystone to unlock our movement to build movement resilience to access our potential If you're interested in getting started on this journey head over to craigvan.com You'll find everything you need there.

You can get started for free If you know someone who might benefit from this, please share this with them. Do your good deed for the day Let's get real health education out there. Subscribe to the channel. Your future self will thank you. I'm on a mission to make sure that we get real health education out there and accessible to everyone.

Until next time, I wish you wisdom and wellness.