Aligned Home Movement
Over the last couple weeks, I led another instagram challenge.
The Topic:
Aligned Home Movement
The Premise:
The environment in which we live, our habitat, has a huge effect on the health and shape of our bodies. I like to think of the movement of our bodies like the movement of water in a river:
Water flows in the path of least resistance and so the shape of the river is determined by the contours of the ground over which it is flowing.
[Of course the movement of the water changes the contours of the earth as well… but for the sake of simplicity and the metaphor that’s a subject for another post]
Our ancestor’s had to move a lot for survival- finding nutrients and shelter in the natural environment requires it. Our bodies evolved in tandem with all that movement so that the full health and functioning of our bodies requires us to be in motion much of the time. It makes sense that we also have an innate desire to conserve energy from those times when nutrients were scarce. So, we instinctively find pleasing any new convenience that makes life easier because in ancient times, it was a given that we would be moving consistently. However, in modern life, we have developed to the point where our conveniences have made it nearly unnecessary to move at all! So now we have this predicament:
Our modern habitats are an evolutionary mismatch with the requirements for our bodies’ health.
We try to offset the dearth of movement in our lives through exercise. Exercise is good and fun and helpful. However, the amount of time spent exercising cannot outweigh the amount of time spent in an environment that encourages sedentarism (an inactive lifestyle). It’s just a numbers game.
The body doesn’t adapt to your best intentions, but rather to what you do most often.
- Katy Bowman (paraphrased)
Let’s look at where we spend much of our time- our homes. Most items in our home environments, from our furniture to our floors, are designed for comfort, convenience, and less movement.
But what if we could change the paradigm? What if we could rethink the need for and repurpose the use of our furniture? What if we became aware of the need for more movement and then saw the opportunities for movement all around us?
This was the intention of this instagram challenge: To start a discussion and look at how we may change our home environment to one that encourages health in our bodies.
What we explored and learned:
Regular chores can be made into games and movement challenges
The architecture of your home is filled with movement opportunities:
hanging on poles & door jambs
balancing on thresholds
squatting assists from doorknobs and countertops
adding texture to the floor for more foot movement
wall and floor spaces are essential for more movement
With imagination and play, movement possibilities are endless
Committing a period of time to explore these things, I learned, is really helpful. Not only did it bring concentrated awareness to my home movement habits, but because it takes time and consistency to change unconscious habits I found it easier and easier to do the action or play the game that required more movement as time went on.
A big Thank You to those who participated!
It was so cool to share with others who participated in this challenge! Not only did I learn from them and get new ideas, but I felt a sense of solidarity and community in something that is sometimes regarded as atypical and anti-social. Maybe we can change the paradigm for home movement and create a new “normal”!
What’s Next?
I’m planning to create a whole course based on this! Where I discuss how to shift your home habitat to encourage more movement, demonstrate exercises and alignment tips based on using common items and rooms of the home, and even offer a whole exercise class based on each area of the home! Would you be interested in trying this out? Let me know!