I am a Yoga Health Coach. I lead a group health coaching program called “Body Wisdom.” In this program, we learn, experiment with, and automate ten healthy habits over the course of a year. I’ve been leading Body Wisdom for over two years now, and many of the members who started with me back in January of 2018 are still active members of the group.
One component of the program is accountability partnerships. I have my own accountability partner (she’s amazing), and we check in with each other every day using a video-messaging app called Marco Polo. Over the past few days, part of our check-in has naturally included some discussion of the coronavirus. It occurred to me yesterday that all of the habits that we learn in Body Wisdom prepare us for a situation like this one.
Allow me to explain . . .
Three of our ten habits help us clean up our eating habits. We learn when, how, and what to eat in order to digest our food efficiently and effectively. This is hugely beneficial when you consider that the gut is the “control tower” of the immune system. Around 70 percent of our immune cells live in the gut, so we need to feed them nutrient-packed food at optimal times of day and give the gut time to rest and digest between meals. (Yes, that means no snacking.)
We learn about the importance of sleep, its role in our immune system, and how to regularly get the right amount of quality sleep. We learn to create an evening routine that is conducive to a good night’s rest. We learn what hours are optimal for deep, rejuvenating sleep. We learn how to overcome long-standing patterns like the inability to fall asleep or, once asleep, the tendency to wake several times during the night, sometimes without being able to fall back to sleep.
We learn how to exercise in ways that support our bodies and minds in accordance with our unique constitutions. Regular moderate exercise (like yoga) is one of the four pillars of health in Ayurveda. Just like a healthy diet, daily moderate exercise can contribute to general good health (physical and mental) and therefore to a healthy immune system. But it may even more directly boost your immune system by promoting good circulation, which allows the cells and substances of the immune system to move through the body freely and do their job efficiently.
Our immune system is also affected by stress. In Body Wisdom, we learn self-care practices like meditation and self-massage (which also has a direct effect on the immune system) to help keep our stress levels in check. Finally, we learn how to take care of our sense organs using practices like neti and nasya to help keep invaders like viruses and bacteria at bay.
All of these practices lead us to our final habit, easeful living. This means that when something significant happens, like a pandemic, we don’t freak out. We rely on the tools we’ve developed to keep us healthy and sane. Will we follow the CDC guidelines? Of course! But we can rest easy knowing that we’ve already done the work of building a robust immune system. Since adopting these habits, I’ve not had a single sinus infection (which used to be a semi-annual occurrence), stomach bug, or flu (despite helping nurse my grandson through it in January). AND my autoimmune disease is well under control (as are those of the other members of Body Wisdom with autoimmune issues).
If this all sounds like something you need in your life, contact me. The next round of Body Wisdom starts on April 15th! In the meantime, eat well, get plenty of sleep, do some yoga and meditation, maybe put some oil in your nose, and above all, stay calm!
See you at the studio!
P.S. Does anyone know where I can buy toilet paper? Since I didn’t fly into a panic, I failed to purchase my normal amount of TP before the shelves went bare.