NSA Thoughts on Becoming Self Aware– from Dr. Shannon Patterson

As children, most people were not taught that paying attention to oneself is vital to a happy and healthy life. Many people were taught that paying attention to their job, their schedule, their accomplishments, their spouse or family, or earning a living was primary. Many were also taught that paying attention to oneself is self indulgent or selfish. Therefore, the natural mechanisms that help you to listen to, or to observe your bodymind’s subtle cues, became inhibited, improperly developed, or blocked. We learned to use our thinking brain to redirect our attention outside of ourselves and began placing our trust where our attention had been – also outside of ourselves.

Physical, chemical, and emotional stresses or traumas can often be difficult to deal with. Brilliant unconscious biological mechanisms are established throughout lifetimes to insulate us from our unpleasant experiences.

It has been shown that in people with severe trauma, the emotional brain (limbic system) places a “marker” on certain experiences. This happens as our cerebral cortex (thinking brain) avoids having to deal with the trauma. The energy of the trauma still circulates throughout the body without our awareness (or perhaps with only partial or distorted awareness) of the experience that had been so difficult.

In cases of people with severe trauma, it has been reported that posture, body movements, and sensations associated with the situation or event may persist or recur, even though there may be no conscious memory of the event. Dr. Epstein suggests that via the mechanism of the facilitated subluxation, mechanical tension at the spinal level replays the energy that the brain cannot fully experience. Therefore, spinal tension and altered spinal postures act as a means of further perpetuating the fragmentation of the nerve system.

Your body cannot remedy something it is not aware of. You cannot begin to do things differently until you are aware of what it is that you are actually doing.

Through NSA care, Network Spinal Analysis, you will learn to pay attention to yourself in a way that may exceed anything you have ever experienced. You will be asked to place your focused attention on your spine, its movements, your breath and your sensations. By placing your attention on yourself as you participate in this care you allow yourself to help those parts that have become separate to come together again. In this process the body will most often disburse the energy once confined to a specific area, as it reintegrates this separated part of you back into the whole.

Vancouver Chiropractor Dr. Shannon Patterson  is practicing Network Spinal Anaylsis in The Adjusting Room at Broadway Wellness. She is currently booking new clients! Contact us or find a time that fits into your schedule to book with Shannon online!