The Freedom of a Moving Body

When I read Cal Newport’s So Good They Can’t Ignore You, one thing in particular stuck out to me. It’s something I’ve based my decisions on my entire life, and he sums it up succinctly. He writes, “Decades of scientific research have identified this trait [control] as one of the most important you can pursue in the quest for a happier, more successful, and more meaningful life” (p.112).  I want control. Every decision I’ve made in my life has been based on wanting more control over my life. I don’t like to feel bound or stuck or limited in my pursuits. One fairly consistent way to get me to do something is to tell me I can’t do it. (Yes, I’m one of those people.) I’ve moved on from two cities, countless jobs, and several relationships (romantic and not) when I felt a loss of control creeping in or—maybe better put—a feeling of “stuckness.” 

My work as a yoga teacher aligned with my quest for control in terms of schedule, money, business structure, and travel, which was a big part of why I was attracted to it in the first place (in addition to enjoying the practice). But the more I delved into my work and explored the moving body, the more I gained access to something I wasn’t expecting:  Agency over my own body. As this freedom evolved for me, I evolved to wanting to share the experience with others. Hence, the path of Movement Coaching was born. I had no idea when I started 4 years ago that this is where I would be.  I had no idea this is how I would feel in my own body and that it would change my life. I had no idea that sharing this freedom would become the single goal I’m the most passionate about.

A sense of agency is the the feeling that we are in control of our actions and their consequences (Beyer et al., 2018). If you’ve ever gone down an existential rabbit hole in your mind asking “Who are we and what are we doing here?” or if you’ve experienced death and tragedy, the only way out is to realize that the only thing we have control over is our actions. This is not a post about letting go of things you can’t control. This is a post about seizing the opportunity for things we DO have control over. One of those things is the movements of our physical bodies. 

Self-agency is closely tied with a sense of responsibility. The more responsibility we think we have, the more likely we are to take charge of our actions and assume the consequences. The same thing happens in reverse. The less responsibility we think have, the less likely we are to take charge of our actions and assume the consequences (Wen Wen et al., 2019). If we think about this in terms of our bodies and the current state of the health industry, it’s quite frightening to be honest. From every angle, we’re receiving messages implying that we don’t know what to do with our own bodies. Personal trainers will tell you that you must squat with proper alignment to pick up a heavy object, orthopedists will tell you never to round your spine if you have a herniated disc, yoga teachers will tell you never to let your knees move past your ankles, chiropractors will tell you your SI joints are “out of place,” and podiatrists will place orthotics in your shoes at the mention of any foot pain and commit you to them forever. Every single one of these scenarios involves taking away responsibility from the individual. The moment we’re given directives of what not to do with our bodies is the moment options on how to deal with our situation have been taken away. That moment signifies a loss of agency/control/freedom. Imagine this happening to you time and time again. Soon enough, you have a rule book of things you shouldn’t be doing and you find yourself estranged from your own body, unfamiliar with its capacity to move because it’s too scary to do so. How in control are you? 

During my training last year with Jules Mitchell, I read a paper about self-efficacy and shoulder pain. (There is a notable difference between self efficacy and self agency. Self-efficacy refers to someone’s perceived control over a situation or ability to complete a task while self-agency is someone’s actual control or ability. For the purpose of this post, I’ll let them be interchangeable). The paper established that those participants with shoulder pain who held strong beliefs about their ability to complete their assigned treatment protocol and reach their desired pain-free outcome were more likely to accomplish that goal than those who were less confident (Chester et al., 2018). This is huge! Our beliefs about what we can do with our body can dictate how we feel in our body. So, what contributes to someone’s self-agency over her/his body? Three things, in my opinion.

The people and things contributing to our belief systems. 
Surround yourself with messages of empowerment. Professionals who tell you they can “fix you”? They’re stealing your empowerment potential. Your uncle who has a bad back and hasn’t picked up anything heavier than 20 pounds in the last 15 years who’s telling you that you need to be careful or else you’ll end up like him? Maybe a kind boundary is in order. Articles in health magazines or gym/fitness blog posts? Check the validity of their facts or maybe unsubscribe. Yoga teachers who caution you to do things a certain way because injury is inevitable any other way? Find a new teacher.

Learning to move well.
The foundations matter. Understanding the principles behind certain movement patterns in your body can change the way your body organizes to complete any task whether it’s walking or playing tennis or just breathing. But the foundations are just that, building blocks for more complex movements and interesting explorations. You can’t speak a language without learning the vocabulary and you can’t learn the vocabulary without knowing the letters. The foundations are the letters. Or you can think about it in terms of grammar and creative writing. You have to know the grammar rules in order to break them creatively.

Being curious.
I am infinitely grateful to three influential mentors in my life over the past few years: Leslie Kaminoff, Jules Mitchell, and Jenn Pilotti. All three of them place curiosity at the core of our relationship with our bodies, and they instilled in me a sense of curiosity about my own body and movement that I had never had before. Being curious allows us to ask questions and explore the many possible answers. As soon as our curiosity dies, not only are we not asking questions, but we’re looking to others to define our answers and therefore define our body and its capabilities. 

Something incredible happens when we acquire this self-agency. We engage in a positive, self-fulfilling loop that incorporates even more of the above three components. The more freedom I feel I have over my movement abilities, the more likely I am to create an environment of like minded people/professionals/educators; the more likely I am to continue to build a greater movement vocabulary; the more likely I am to be curious rather than fearful of things that come up like challenging movements, new sensations, and injuries.

I have to write a note here that I don’t believe we have have so much freedom or control over our bodies that we can prevent harm. Of course things can happen that blindside us. Marathon runners get heart attacks, elite athletes get musculoskeletal injuries playing their sport, and world-renowned climbers fall to their deaths. But I do believe we can mitigate risk. And honestly, mitigating risk ends up being just one of so many positive outcomes of acquiring self-agency over our movements.

At a time where so much of our daily freedoms we took for granted have been stripped away from us because of COVID-19—when so many of us are feeling stuck—the golden opportunity may simply be recovering self-agency over our moving bodies.

keep moving.