Recently I have been thinking about how best to explain chiropractic. As a chiropractor is Colorado Springs I have seen many amazing results in patients. I have had patients with indigestion, numbness/tingling, depression/anxiety, and of course lots of different kinds of pain all get better under chiropractic care. While most people think about back and neck pain as being the primary reason to go to a chiropractor, really that is just one of the many, many things that chiropractic can help with. And this is why I have been thinking of how best to explain what chiropractic can do because most people just don’t ‘get it’. So in today’s post I hope to explain a little more about how awesome chiropractic really is, but to do that I need to talk a little about something called innate intelligence.
Innate Intelligence
To start off let me ask a few questions: Did you need to think about each breath you have taken today? Did you need to consciously tell your body to digest your breakfast? How does your body know how much insulin to produce? How does your body know how regulate your blood pressure? How does your body know how to grow? When you were a developing fetus, how did your body know to differentiate into the many different types of cells and get those cells in the right place?
If you really think about it, our bodies do millions of amazing things each day! And the body does all those amazing things without you even having to think about it. But how does it know to do all those things?
Well you may say it is all because a complex series of chemical and electrical reactions that take place in the body that stimulates receptors, etc. While that may be true, how did you come to know to use all those receptors and those complex series of reactions? Ultimately, it is because you have intelligence inside of you!
Your body knows how to function and survive. You did not need to teach it how to do this, it already knows. And really you can call this ability to function and survive by many different names, but in chiropractic we call this innate intelligence. Innate intelligence is the inherent intelligence in your body that knows how to do all those many things so you can live and thrive.
Nerve System
Now all those different functions that we mentioned before are all controlled by one thing: the brain. In the end, the brain takes all those signals and information in and sends out signals to the body to control all those functions. The information comes and goes to the brain and body via the nerve system.
The nerve system is the complex network of nerves that go to all parts of the body. The nerves allow the signals from the body to get to the brain and the signals from the brain to get to the body. This whole system of the brain, spinal cord, and nerves is essential in having the body to function properly. If you took the nerves away could you live and function? No. When you block a nerve can the body function properly? No.
That innate intelligence we talked about earlier functions or is ‘expressed’ through the nerve system. A properly functioning nerve system allows innate intelligence to be expressed fully. Without a properly functioning nerve system the body’s innate intelligence would not be able to function at its full potential, and this would lead to varying degrees of dysfunction and break-down in the body. This could be a factor in any health problem – indigestion, numbness/tingling, depression/anxiety, pain, and anything else you can think of.
Chiropractic Care
In chiropractic we use the term ‘vertebral subluxation’ or just ‘subluxation.’ A subluxation is when the bones of the spine are misaligned or not moving properly and this in turn puts stress on the nerve system. There are many different ways that this stress may be put on the nerve system, but in the end the outcome is the same – there is interference with normal nerve function. And without normal nerve function that innate intelligence inside of you is not able to fully express itself. Again when that innate intelligence is not able to fully express itself it can lead to health problems.
Chiropractic adjustments are specific thrusts that help to restore proper movement and alignment to the spine, which relieves that stress on the nerve system. Then the nerve system will be able to more fully express that innate intelligence! The signals from the body going to the brain and from the brain to the body are able to be transmitted without interference! Then the body will do what it is designed to do and heal itself and thrive!
This really is the power of chiropractic care! It removes the interference from the nerve system so the body can function better. That is why chiropractic can help with so much more than just back and neck pain!
Now I want to be upfront that I do not believe chiropractic is a ‘cure-all’. There are many factors that can play into any disease process, and, while I believe subluxation is a big factor, it is only one of them. While I have seen many amazing things, not everyone gets ‘amazing’ results. Your diet, exercise, the amount of stress you are under and other factors all play a part in your health. In the end while the body can do amazing things—a lot more than you probably think possible—there are limits to what it can do. But I do firmly believe that even if you don’t get the results you hope for, you are better off without subluxations than you were before.
In closing I just want to say that I love being a chiropractor! It is awesome and humbling to see what our bodies can accomplish when given the opportunity by removing the interference. I hope you have enjoyed this post, it helped you better understand chiropractic and it has given you something to think about. Please let me know what you think in the comments below. And if there is someone that could benefit from hearing this please share chiropractic and send them our way. Thanks!
