our roots and routine

Routine, such a drab reason to do anything. A conversational shorthand, saying, I did this because it would take more effort not to do it. How did this word become so rundown. Deriving from the French word route, meaning road or path, its become a way to speak of our life trajectory devoid of any socially awkward enthesium. I'm surrounded by the gargantuan firs of forest park thinking this so I make a connection between our human routine, how we navigate and survive life and roots the way a tree acquire so many of its need . Root is a norse word for the underground part of the plant and is related to the word rot. These word seem not etymologically (the study of a words history) related even if etymology is far from an exact science. Despite having different histories and cultural connotations route and root make the same sound, creating a pavlovian association in the mind.

In humans the root chakra or (muladhara) is located at the base of the spine and concerns itself with issues of basic survival. Are you safe, do you have enough food and water, have you adequate protection against the elements. For the most part if you are reading this I’m assuming under no imminent threat from these primal fears, but thanks to hundreds of thousands of years of evolutionary pressures we all carry a little bit of the dread around with us. How much of our routines are are based on carefully analyzed strategies to best attain our nobelist goals verse a desire to put ourselves on autopilot so we can avoid facing these fears.

I would say we are all a bit guilty of this, except we really can’t be guilty since it such a default position for our neuro systems. Its necessary for us to function in such a complex world, but life also requires us to break old routines, and form new ones..

Massage, can be a useful component in this process. While thought mostly as working in the domain of the muscles, massage has a profound effect on the nervous system..Every move you make requires a precise neural pathway from your brain to all the affecting body parts. Much like how we psychologically we fall into habits and neuropatterns our motor neurons will follow familiar patterns unless there is an intevention of some sort. It's why we don’t have to think when we do routine physical task. Open a door, brush your teeth, walk and chew gum. This can be healthy, but we do also find ourselves in neuromuscular pattern that need to change. Massage is recreational (re / create) in the most profound way. Whether breaking up adheased muscle tissues, stretching tendons, or just calling attention to a compromised part of the body by holding it, massage will intervene how the nervous system interacts with the our skeletal muscles. It why we can feel a bit confused moving our bodies right after a massage and probably should not drive for a while.

The brain is far too complicated even to begin to understand how changes in motor neural pathways will elicit pattern changes elsewhere. I believe the more we are conscious of our patterns the more influence we have change them. Do you wish to use bodywork as a catalyst for a life changing break through, or would you rather as a slight recalerberation of the path you are on. Either way doing so can bring up those root fears. Your path led you this for and for good or ill, it how got you here. There is no guarantee it will continue to do so, but we humans are superstitious. A soccer player may have a lucky pair of socks they wouldn't quite feel right if they didn’t have those for a game. Likewise an office worker may feel the same totemic attraction to a prework cup of coffee despite not craving a caffeine buzz nor the familiar taste. Slight deviations can cause us to express uncomfortable emotions. To properly strategize through any change we are well served to be aware of any potential pitfall. Imbuing these data points in fear, an evolutionary tool for immediate survival, hardly ever helpful here. Massage works holistic as it relaxes the mind as it recreates the mind body interaction