A couple of years ago,
I started seeing an osteopath to help with my scoliosis. It changed my life. He
helped to align and balance my body as much as possible, and it honestly feels
like I am walking on a cloud when I leave. BUT I’M STILL ON THE GROUND.
Anyway, the
manipulations he makes are very small. In fact, he generally has to
go by feel because the problem isn’t always visible to the naked eye. Just a small
tweak here, a series of movements there, and I’m on my way, on my invisible
cloud. The same goes for chiropractors and their adjustments. They make minor
adjustments to your spine, and all of a sudden, your whole body feels
completely different.
Here’s another example
of a small tweak in our life that yielded a significant difference:
Emmett was not progressing with reading as fast as what his teacher
wanted to see last year. I asked his teacher for a second home reading book, so we had
two books on the go at home instead of one. This added another 5-10 minutes of
reading every day, which I found to be quite minor—a minor adjustment—but the
results were major. Emmett read literally double the number of books he would
have read with just one at home, and he progressed much more quickly, and
reading is no longer an issue. That small tweak made a world of difference.
You don’t have to
experience a massive upheaval or do things completely differently in order to
experience a significant change in your life. Sometimes those sorts of
upheavals need to happen to get the change you need, but not always.
This has changed my
way of thinking about change. I’ve always been big on big changes. Maybe this
is because I love the excitement, the new sense of opportunity and the bright light
that comes with the idea of a big change. However, you can still promote significant change
in your life without major life events happening by tweaking this here, and that there. Switch from one thing to
another if something isn’t working. Add 10 minutes of something here, or
subtract 10 minutes of something there. Eat this instead of that. Change your
hand cream. Drink another glass of water. Tweak the way you view yourself in
the world. Tweak the type of person you want to be—a mindset, a perception, the
stopping or starting of a habit. When you read something that resonates with you, repeat it or remind yourself of it, and it will change you.
Honestly, sometimes if
you let yourself think a little smaller—a little simpler—the answer for things
that cause frustration, or aren't working, or take up too much of your time, are staring
you right in the face. The causes of misalignment—the notes that
are out of tune—are often corrected by a small adjustment, not major surgery. You can change your life for the better, a little bit at a time.
As Dr. Seuss is quoted as saying, “Sometimes the questions are complicated and the answers are simple.” I
love that quote so much that it’s hanging on my living room wall.
