Digesting 2020
Holy moly 2020. Can we break down and cry yet? Yes! Yes, we can. It does a body good.
I’ve been talking about digestion a lot lately in my sphere, and on a year where we’ve all had more to chew on - metaphorically and energetically speaking - than usual, maybe you’ve noticed that your upset stomach is about more than just the spicy spaghetti you ate last night.
It’s a general statement to say that yoga is good for digestion. It’s a slightly more specific statement to say that focusing on stretching and working the muscles of the lower body is good for digestion. (PS next on my agenda of content for the store is a yoga sequence focusing on digestion, so check back on that come January.)
Low lunge can help to stretch our hip flexors, which can loosen tight low back muscles that constrain nerves related to the digestive tissues of our large and small intestines.
While it’s true that stretching out our thighs, outer hips, and low back can help with a myriad of digestive problems, I’d like to invite you to take a step back from what we generally very directly think of as “digestion,” meaning food in your stomach, and small and large intestines, and step into the following, less direct notion about your “diet.”
There’s a question I ask all of my 1-to-1 clients when we start Phase I together: “What would you most like to work on? Your physical diet, your emotional diet, or your mental diet?
Our physical diet is what we most commonly think of relating to “health” and a “yoga practice.” The food we eat, and the ways we’re moving our bodies.
Our emotional diet is the feelings we process based on people and situations in our lives.
Our mental diet is the thoughts that run through our heads all day, whether from external sources or from an internal narrative.
All three of these elements - physical, emotional, & mental - contribute to the bigger picture of our “digestion.” and using the notion that we are not merely a sum of parts, but a unified system, it can be helpful to recognize which part of our “consumption” may be causing us ailment.
There’s increasing research that the flora in our gut (the various bacteria & enzymes that populate our digestive tract) has a direct relation to brain health. Studies have found links to everything from depression to memory to general ability to cope with stress.
So while certain foods are incredibly helpful in terms of aiding our physical digestion, which can lead to improved mental performance, this is also a two-way street: In a culture that has spent plenty of time obsessing about diets, image, and a pre-fab notion of what “health” looks like, I like to put the word “diet” in a larger context so that we can make conscious choices about more than just the food we put in our mouths.
Yoga, after all, is a practice of awareness, not a prescription. Additionally, I take its definition of “union,” very literally and want to encourage my students, clients, community and even myself to see links where maybe we previously hadn’t suspected them. Like between our thoughts, our emotions, and our gut.
Meditation, spending time with pets, and slowing down to use our five senses are all great tools for battling stress. (Pictured here is Tommy, my 13-year old Bombay cat, a blanket knitted by my mother, and a incense bowl given to me by a friend.)
A good stepping stone toward processing stress - any stress - is making rituals in the body. In a world that doesn’t often slow down, incorporating a regular yoga practice can help link up our brains and bodies, and give us time to process in all ways - physically (food, stress hormones), mentally (learning to focus our minds on productive and mindful breathing and moving), and emotionally (getting some distance from that thing that’s plaguing us).
Having the support and regularity around a regular yoga practice helps this processing, ahem, digesting.
Think of it like a shot of Pepto Bismol, a funny movie, and a good therapy session all in one.