Tag: stress relief

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https://mindandbodyexercises.wordpress.com/

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Why is There Resistance to Alternative Healthcare Methods?

American society and culture are very much dependent upon Western allopathic medicine which relies on scientific proof of whether healthcare practices are deemed as safe and effective. The problem herein lies that many of the ancient time-proven methods don’t fit nicely to allopathic medicine’s gold standard of random controlled trials (RCT). It is difficult to quantify results for methods that rely upon the practitioner to assess the patient at the time of treatment and decide how much or how little pressure to apply or other variables that cannot really be controlled during treatments such as emotions, outcomes or experience of the practitioner and/or the patient.

I feel from my experiences with allopathic medical practitioners, that there is much resistance to sharing the healthcare market with alternative healthcare options such as massage, acupuncture, and meditation among others. I think that most allopathic medical doctors try to stay true to their oath of trying to help people and do no harm in the process. However, my understanding is that medical doctors are trained to follow a flowchart of recommended protocols.

Massage, yoga, meditation and many other complimentary alternative practices fall way behind use of pharmaceuticals and sometimes surgery for many common ailments and injuries. Let’s be honest and accept that most people don’t go to their medical doctor with the expectation of nutritional advice, a prescription for more activity or the suggestion of a massage to relief mental as well as physical stress. People often go to their doctor to get meds to fix or mask their underlying root causes and then go about whatever might be causing their issues to begin with. So I think that the healthcare industry is only part of the problem/solution with the other part being how many people look at their healthcare as someone else’s responsibility that can be fixed with a pill or surgery. Look how many people are in the waiting room at medical doctor’s office compared to how many are waiting for a massage at a local Hand & Stone massage business.

Various Types of “alternative” healthcare methods

With many medical experts calling for more studies and more research, I feel it is mostly an excuse not to promote other alternative therapies. The American Medical Association along with many prestigious research universities have vast resources to conduct whatever studies they care to or rather, care not to invest upon. The American healthcare system, can be debated as either severely broken or also seemingly miraculous for others. Regardless, US healthcare is an over $4 trillion dollar a year economic powerhouse that will only continue to grow with or without acceptance of alternative therapies.

Be Well, Stay Healthy, Be Wise.

References:

https://www.takingcharge.csh.umn.edu/explore-healing-practices/massage-therapy/what-does-research-say-about-massage-theraphy (Links to an external site.)

https://www.advisory.com/en/daily-briefing/2020/04/03/health-spending (Links to an external site.)

https://journalofethics.ama-assn.org/article/licensure-complementary-and-alternative-practitioners/2011-06

Mind and Body Exercises on Google: https://posts.gle/aD47Qo

Jim Moltzan

407-234-0119

https://mindandbodyexercises.wordpress.com/https://umareg.com/masters-council/

Strive to have a “relationship with your physical body”

Strive to have a “relationship with your physical body”. I think often times people hear about the mind, body and spirit connection but really have no idea, plan or methods on how to achieve this state of being.

From what I have learned from my teachers of martial arts & qigong is that by becoming aware and understanding how the physical body exists and operates (kind of from like a mechanical or physiological perspective) one can begin to better understand how their own mind works. For example, if holding a particular yoga, qigong or kung fu posture for say 1-5 minutes, the muscles and the physical body begin to fatigue. The process of the mind trying to keep the body in the correct position engages the thoughts to express emotional traits of patience, frustration, determination, focus and other levels of awareness. This can also be similarly developed from other mind/body practices such as archery, painting, singing, playing an instrument, carpentry or other trades that all require repetitive engagement of the thought process and the control of the body to accomplish a particular task. These types of activities can be viewed as various types of sitting, standing, or moving meditations all in their own rights.

Background music can be a pro or con depending upon the goal of the practitioner. Some martial arts or dance styles utilize drums to keep a beat that coincides with the pace of the movements. Others moving meditations like tai chi or qigong might incorporate music that consists of specific tones or tempos to help to coincide the breathing and heart rates to slower paces, thereby hacking the parasympathetic nervous system and reducing stress. Certain tones can either help elevate the heart rate (like maybe Led Zeppelin) while others might lower the heart rate (maybe jazz or instrumentals), where as in TCM specific notes are associated with wood (liver-gall bladder), fire (heart-small intestines), earth (stomach-spleen), metal (lungs-large intestine) and water (bladder-kidneys).

Be well, get healthy, be wise.

I am currently accepting new clients for group, small group & private instruction in Wekiva and Longwood areas.

Mind and Body Exercises on Google: https://posts.gle/aD47Qo

Jim Moltzan

407-234-0119

http://www.amazon.com/author/jimmoltzan

https://mindandbodyexercises.wordpress.com/

Masters Council

The Gradual Decline of Physical Education in Schools and Relevance to Adult Health

I thought I’d share my perspective on this subject of state of American health. Mostly just my opinion from my experiences as a father of 2 young adults and teacher (martial arts, wellness, qigong, Taoist yoga etc.) for almost 40 years. Yes, I am showing my age. When I was in elementary school in the 70’s, we had a 1/2-hour recess and 1-hour of physical education (PE) every school day. Middle & high school was PE everyday regardless of weather. I cannot remember more than 1-2 kids during that time as being labeled “hyperactive” however a lot more kids had trouble focusing and getting good grades in particular subjects; so focus had always been an issue on some level. Ritalin was the only medicine that I had even known to exist for a few young people, that had what was to in later decades diagnosed as ADHD.

Fast forward to the last 20 years of my life. My kids while in elementary school had recess for about 15-20 minutes a few days a week alternating with PE for two days a week. High school required 1 credit of PE over the 4 years of attendance; online or in person were the options. Talking with other parents and teachers over this time led me to understand that a large portion of kids were having ADHD, depression, anxiety, obesity and many other health issues that were dealt with through pharmaceuticals on a daily basis. Sports and PE were often not even considered as methods to manage these ailments. Getting good grades and into a good college are the main focus in high school, leaving little time for such non-academic pursuits of physical activities that actually make the mind work better.

Having discussed this issue with many school teachers that I knew as friends, most felt that less recess and PE was a major step backwards in child development. Additionally, these teachers felt that it was much more difficult for them to teach while attempting to harness the pent-up energy and emotions of kids sitting for hours on end throughout the school day. Most wished that recess and PE were brought back as a standard daily requirement.

So while I strongly believe that yoga and other mindful methods would be great (this is what I teach!) I would be very happy just to see regular exercise of running, swimming, calisthenics, and game play come back to all levels of school. So many benefits for the mind and body that are associated with whatever level of physical as well as mental and social engagement that are being left out of schools in lieu of more time spent on academics. If we are to have a strong and healthy population, we really need to be planting seeds of good health education and self-responsibility with our youth, in order to make it grow into the adult years.

I offer instruction in qigong, Taoist yoga, tai chi, martial arts, ship pal gye, hapkido, fitness, wellness and many other avenues to improve health and well-being.

I am currently accepting new clients for group, small group & private instruction.

Mind and Body Exercises on Google: https://posts.gle/aD47Qo

Be well!

Jim Moltzan

407-234-0119