56 | How to unlock Back Pain breakthroughs

Introduction

“There's only one corner of the universe you can be certain of improving, and that's your own self.” - Aldous Huxley

"He who has health, has hope; and he who has hope, has everything." - Thomas Carlyle

Everything we want must be caused into existence. And, the most powerful forces shaping our lives are our choices and behaviour.

When it comes to back pain, some behaviours play a much bigger role than others. So, how can we know which behaviours to prioritise? I have a framework that answers that exact question.

When it comes to our body and mind, there are three domains of behaviour which stand out far beyond the rest. Three domains of behaviour which contain our greatest opportunities, and our biggest threats. Do you want to know how you can recover from anything, and reach a potential you didn’t even know you had?

I am going to describe a framework for healing that will make this possible for you.

The Interconnected System of Health

Our body is a complex and interdependent system. Every cell, tissue, and organ is interconnected, working in harmony to maintain health and vitality, or disharmony that causes disease and injury.

This intricate system is largely controlled by our genes, which in turn are controlled by the various inputs from our choices and actions. This interactive interdependence between our daily habits and our genes is the lever with which we drive our body to freedom, or despair.

The Importance of the EMM Framework

"The secret of change is to focus all of your energy, not on fighting the old, but on building the new." - Socrates

There are three domains of activity that play the leading roles in our epigenetic story, three domains of behaviour that shape our genetic expression - eating, moving and thinking. As a result, all three are non-negotiables on the path to health and recovery.

There are three significant reasons for this:

All three are far-reaching in their effect on us, each influencing every aspect of our health. Combined, they determine everything we become.
They are inescapable; we eat, move, and think all day, every day, making these actions a constant and compounding part of our lives.
Most importantly, these elements are controllable. As significant as their impact on us is, we are still able to control and direct them.

Let’s unpack each of these reasons.

FAR-REACHING

The first fact which prescribes these domains of behaviour as non-negotiables, is the seemingly limitless reach of each of their influence over our internal universe.

Eating

Eating provides the very building blocks for everything happening in our body - from signals to structures, every atom our body needs to complete its tasks must be consumed in one form or another.

Beyond providing substance, the nutrients in our food are a form of information, rich with instructions for the genes throughout our body. What we eat regulates our hormones, inflammation, and immune system.

Food is much more than simply fuel, or calories to keep the ‘machine’ moving.

Moving

Movement goes far beyond exercise; it's the continuous physical activity (or inactivity) which our body performs. Activity which does or doesn’t apply mechanical loads on the structures of our body, driving their growth or deterioration.

Movement is also the main user of body’s energy, dictating the story of our body’s metabolism.

The quality and quantity of our movement are pivotal in steering how most of our body develops, or doesn’t develop, over time. Every bone, muscle and connective tissue, plus all the structures which play a role in providing the energy for movement, are regulated by the movements we do and don’t perform.

How we move, and how much we move, are central to the development of the structures and metabolic engine which support and drive our body. Plus, everything from our brains to our bones receives a multitude of benefits from healthy movement, and an avalanche of issues from the lack of it.

Thinking

"You are today where your thoughts have brought you; you will be tomorrow where your thoughts take you." - James Allen

The state of our mind is like an amniotic fluid which embraces all of our body’s activities.

From stress to relaxation, from love to fear, our body’s operating system colours and controls every molecular and cellular process.

In every moment, we are somewhere on the spectrum between recovery and urgency. The instantaneous state of our psyche governs whether our body feels safe enough to regenerate, or if it believes it is in a state of emergency.

Even the slightest agitation is enough to tip the balance marginally towards stress, which most people don’t realise, is enough to switch off many channels of rejuvenation. Resource allocation, hormonal balance, and immune function are intimately tied to our mood fluctuations.

Recent research has also deeply implicated our state of mind with our motivation and will-power - the necessary driver’s of all improved behaviour. And, thinking, like any action, has the tendency to form deeply ingrained and compounding habits over time.

INESCAPABLE

There is no off-switch for the influence each of these activities has over our body and mind. It is simply impossible to avoid being shaped by the presence or absence of any nutritional, movement or mental action, in any moment.

The state of activity within each of these three domains is permanently sending ripples of consequences across the fabric of our body-mind. All the time, always, and without end, the development or deterioration of our entire being is being moulded by these three forces.

Consequently, due to a few forces, or a few faces of the same force, our behaviour has a strong tendency to reinforce itself. Repeated actions become habits. Habits become difficult-to-break programs.

If behaviours repeat, then their results must accumulate. Like steadily slipping coins into a piggy bank, the collection of consequences deposited into our savings account must also grow. Then, like any other system, if our body and mind are repeatedly nudged in the same direction, a point must be reached when those nudges start to compound.

Compounded results are the key to our highest aspirations and our most inescapable nightmares.

No matter how insignificant something might seem at first, when it patiently accumulates, and then unexpectedly compounds, it will produce results that can transform or tear apart any system.

However pervasive and inescapable these forces of our nature are, the most important characteristic which makes them central to our recovery and health, is that we can change them for the better.

"Success is neither magical nor mysterious. Success is the natural consequence of consistently applying basic fundamentals." - Jim Rohn

CONTROLLABLE

“God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.” - Reinhold Niebuhr

We can absolutely change the way we eat, move and think. In fact, these are part of a small collection of things we can truly change. But through changing these behaviours, we can change everything.

Beyond being the most practically useful place to put our attention, there is an opportunity waiting for us if we choose to perceive that the only forces which matter, are those which we control.

Even if there is something that is very convincingly important and lies outside of our control, if we believe that we depend on it for our change, then we stop noticing the opportunities that we might have to do something for our better. The more strongly we believe that it is our responsibility to change our situation, the more powerfully we become aware of opportunities to change it.

Our greatest liberation, and our greatest imprisonment, is our perception. If we wish to shape our destiny, then we must perceive that it is us that shapes our destiny. We must know with certainty that things change as we change.

In summary, our eating, moving and thinking are limitlessly influential and irrevocably inescapable. But by being controllable, we can use their power to shape our recovery, and health destiny. Then, by pushing the limits of what we take responsibility for, we become powerfully capable of changing ourselves for the better.

We can transform a life-sentence into the opportunity of a lifetime.

Non-Negotiable Synergy

It should be blatantly clear that leaving even one of these domains out from our pursuit of vitality, is to cause a black hole of difficulty. There is no way to ensure that we will get to where we choose to be, if even one of these domains is not geared towards it. Each is simply too powerful.

Out of necessity, we must optimise all three towards our health goals. What follows then, is a radical synergy - three monumentally powerful forces, aligned in agreement, towards a common goal. A deliberate goal.

The power of each of these three parts can be imagined, to some degree. But all three together lead to an experience far beyond their sum. One plus one plus one becomes a hundred and eleven. This is how miracles can be invited into our healing.

Conclusion

I’ve been referring to this triad as, eat.move.meditate, for a long time. I do not even try to achieve anything in my healing or fitness, without aligning all three towards my goal. And I have managed to take my body and mind exactly where I have wanted, overcoming challenge after challenge, every single time. And man, I have faced some challenges.

By focusing on what we eat, how we move, and the way we think, we take full responsibility for our health. This framework takes us beyond treating or preventing injuries and diseases; it's about revolutionising ourselves with possibility.

We will use all three opportunities to move us away from back pain and towards spinal stability - activating our Kinetic Keystone.

"Your body is your most priceless possession. Take care of it." - Jack LaLanne